How to Charge an Electric Car

You can charge your car at home using a conventional electrical outlet or a professionally installed wallbox. The process is similar if you’re out on the road at a public charging station. Charging will go especially quickly if the station has CCS. Every electric car from Volkswagen comes with a cable that lets you charge it at home. A Type 2 AC cable for public charging stations is available as an option. CCS stations generally already have cables with plugs installed.

Full charge: Volkswagen uses proven lithium-ion technology. High-grade components ensure the system works perfectly. Your Volkswagen battery also comes with a special guarantee, the details of which are found in the warranty conditions.

Charging an electric car is essentially as easy as filling a conventional car with gasoline or diesel. There are different ways of doing so, each with its own advantages.

Your own fuel station at home: Electric cars can be charged at standard electrical outlets that are in proper working order and have been professionally installed. Just like with a smartphone, insert the charging cable’s plug into the electrical outlet and the connector on the other end into the charging socket on the car. The charging process either starts immediately or can be programmed to begin later, for example overnight. You can then drive off in the morning with a fully charged battery.

Charge time with a standard outlet (2.3 kW):

• e-up!¹: 10 h
• e-Golf²: 17 h 00 min
• Golf GTE³: 3 h 45 min
• Passat GTE⁴: 4 h 20 min

A high-voltage outlet for your home: A wallbox provides maximum charging power for your car. It can be installed for an extra fee if desired by our business partner, The Mobility House. The wallbox uses the power supplied and billed by your utility company. It too can either charge immediately or at a later point in time.

Charge time with a wallbox:

• e-up!¹: 6 h 12 min* at max. 3.6 kW
• e-Golf²: 5 h 20 min* at max. 7.2 kW
• Golf GTE³: 2 h 25 min* at max. 3.6 kW
• Passat GTE⁴: 2 h 45 min* at max. 3.6 kW

* Charge time with an AC wallbox (7.2 or 3.6 kW) from 0% to 100% SoC (state of charge)


CCS – One system, many possibilities

CCS stands for Combined Charging System. Based on both European and American standards, it supports both AC and DC charging. As of January 2018 there were around 7,000 CCS charging points worldwide. The cables and plugs are nearly always installed as part of these charging stations.

The “2 in 1” system known as “Combo 2” consists of a classic Type 2 vehicle plug with two additional DC contacts below. Electric cars with a Combo 2 connection like the Volkswagen e-Golf have the big advantage of being able to charge nearly everywhere, from AC outlets to DC high-speed charging columns. In other words, they can use nearly the entire charging infrastructure – another parallel to conventional gas stations.

All electric cars from Volkswagen show the battery level and remaining range in multiple places, such as the instrument cluster and navigation system or the maps + more display in the e-up!. If you register the car and yourself as a user on Car-Net, you will have all the important information even when you’re not in the car. Use the Car-Net app on your computer, tablet, or smartphone to check the battery level and range at any time, and to start the charging process, the heating or AC and the windshield defroster.

Charging infrastructure on the road

You won’t run out of power in your electric car. There are charging stations nearly everywhere these days, and the network is growing by the month. It will become even denser as more and more people use electric cars – just like the network of gas stations expanded in the last century. Look online to find the public charging stations near your address, zip code, or town. Or use the Charge&Fuel app to see all the charging points nearby.