The number of public charging devices has surpassed the 70,000 mark, charge point mapping firm Zapmap has announced.
The milestone comes just five months after Zapmap recorded 60,000 public chargers in April 2024. There are now 70,434 public charging devices available to EV drivers in the UK, representing a 41% year-on-year increase compared to September 2023. The public chargers are across 35,810 locations, with more than 13,000 being rapid or ultra-rapid, across 5,762 locations.
The pace of installation has continued to accelerate, rising from an average of 730 new devices installed per month in 2022 to 1,387 devices in 2023 and now 1,872 devices.
Operated by charging network evyve, the 70,000th charging device installed was a rapid charging device in the car park of the New Pippin, a Greene King pub in Coventry.
One trend is the growth in the number of ultra-rapid chargers, capable of delivering 100 miles of range in just 15 minutes, which has shown 114% year-on-year growth, from 2,869 in September 2023 to 6,136 in September 2024.
Similarly, the number of charging hubs with six or more rapid or ultra-rapid charging devices has more than doubled to 451 hubs, which is a 129% increase.
On-street charging infrastructure makes up more than a third of all the charge points, with Greater London accounting for the majority (72%).
In a new report led by Cenex and Vauxhall, in collaboration with Zapmap, Field Dynamics and Experian, new charging metrics revealed that outside of London, households reliant on public charging in Brighton and Hove have the best supply and distribution, while Nah-Eileanan Siar, Coventry and Blaenau Gwent are the leading Scottish, English and Welsh local authorities.
A further third of the UK’s overall provision is located in car parks across the UK. With the number of these devices rising by nearly 50% over the last year, with 21,178 devices now in place.
James Moat, CEO of evyve, said:
“Reaching 70,000 devices on Zapmap highlights the industry’s commitment to making the switch to electric as seamless as possible!”
Melanie Shufflebotham, Co-founder & COO of Zapmap, said:
“This number covers many different charging use cases from low powered on-street chargers to destination chargers at hotels and 150kW+ charging hubs.
“Whilst requiring different levels of investment, each reflects charge point operators’ significant commitment to providing EV drivers with the public charging infrastructure they need to confidently travel and charge their vehicles anywhere.“
Dan Caesar, Launch CEO of Electric Vehicles UK said:
“The staggering rise in publicly available electric vehicle charging points in just the last few months is testament to an industry that is responding at pace to growing end-user demand.
“This rollout is critical to consumer confidence, not least in an era of misinformation in which EV drivers’ largely positive experience of electric cars is not reflected accurately in the media.
“Consistently when surveyed, more than 9 out of 10 EV drivers will not return to combustion engine cars, and the increasing availability of charging points will only improve that ratio, and pave the way to a zero emission (from the tailpipe) future.”
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