Electric vehicles (EVs) are more popular than ever, but many drivers are finding that public charging stations aren’t living up to the hype. From broken chargers to long lines and high fees, public charging often fails to meet drivers’ needs. In this post, we’ll explore why public charging stations are letting EV drivers down, backed by data, studies, and real-world examples.
Not Enough Chargers (and Not Where You Need Them)
One major issue is simply finding an available charger when you need one. In some areas, public EV chargers are few and far between. The U.S. actually has one of the worst EV charger-to-vehicle ratios in the world, meaning far more cars per charger than EV-leading countries (As EV adoption picks up, so does the threat of congestion at charging stations). For example, the Netherlands has about one public charger for every 5 EVs, whereas the U.S. has many more EVs per station – leading to scarcity in many regions (As EV adoption picks up, so does the threat of congestion at charging stations).
EV drivers in parts of the country (especially outside major coastal cities) encounter charging deserts. Large swaths of the Southeast U.S. have very few high-speed charging stations (Electric cars have a road trip problem: slow and unreliable charging : NPR). That means if you’re road-tripping or live in a rural area, you might have to detour far out of your way to charge. And even when stations exist, there may be too few plugs at each location to serve multiple cars. ChargePoint’s CEO notes that if a station hits about 40% utilization (meaning a few cars charging), new arrivals will likely have trouble finding an open plug (As EV adoption picks up, so does the threat of congestion at charging stations)
Holiday travel crunches make this painfully clear. During peak travel events like Thanksgiving or long weekends, public chargers can see massive lines. In early 2024, some U.S. EV drivers found themselves waiting in “massive lines to juice up” during a solar eclipse event. Over Presidents’ Day weekend (a busy but often underestimated travel time), certain fast-charging sites were backed up for hours (As EV adoption picks up, so does the threat of congestion at charging stations). These examples show that charger availability hasn’t kept pace with the growing number of EVs on the road.
Broken Stations and Reliability Woes
Even when you do locate a public charging station, there’s a good chance it might not be working. Reliability is a huge problem plaguing public EV chargers. A detailed 2022 study in the San Francisco Bay Area, an area at the forefront of EV adoption, found that only 72.5% of public fast chargers were functional when tested, meaning nearly one in four was out of service (EV DCFC Reliability 03302022). The remaining quarter of chargers were offline for reasons ranging from unresponsive touchscreens and network glitches to credit card readers failing and broken connectors (EV DCFC Reliability 03302022). It’s a frustratingly common experience: you roll up to charge, only to find an “Out of Order” message or a charger that simply won’t initiate a session.
Surveys of EV owners reinforce how widespread this is. In California, 22% of EV drivers reported encountering chargers that were completely non-functional, and 18% said they’ve faced payment system problems that prevented charging (EV DCFC Reliability 03302022). In total, nearly half of drivers (44%) in one survey cited inoperable or poorly functioning stations as a serious barrier to EV ownership (California Study: 23% of Electric-Car Chargers Are Broken – Business Insider). Imagine arriving at a public charger with a low battery, only to find it broken; drivers often have to scramble to find an alternate or call customer support (something over 50% of EV owners have had to do when a charger wouldn’t work (EV DCFC Reliability 03302022)).
All of this leads to a troubling statistic: according to J.D. Power research, when drivers of non-Tesla EVs pull up to a public charging station, they end up leaving without charging 20% of the time because the chargers were either out of service or tied up with long waits (Electric cars have a road trip problem: slow and unreliable charging : NPR). That’s a one-in-five failure rate for getting a charge when you need it. No wonder “charger anxiety” is becoming a thing alongside range anxiety. The public charging experience can feel like a dice roll in terms of whether the station will actually work.
The Cost Conundrum: Public Charging Isn’t Cheap
Cost is another way public charging is failing drivers. Many drivers are shocked to realize that juicing up at a public fast charger can cost significantly more per kWh than charging at home. Charging an EV was supposed to be cheaper than fueling with gasoline, but high public charging fees can eat into those savings.
At home, electricity rates might range from say $0.10 to $0.20 per kWh (the U.S. average is around $0.16/kWh for residential power) (Cost Analysis of EV Home Charging vs. Public Charging | Qmerit). Public charging, however, often layers on demand charges, network fees, and profit margins. A typical public Level 2 station might charge about $1–$5 per hour, which works out to roughly $0.20–$0.25 per kWh (Cost Analysis of EV Home Charging vs. Public Charging | Qmerit). Fast DC charging is even pricier: $0.40–$0.60 per kWh is common at many fast chargers (Cost Analysis of EV Home Charging vs. Public Charging | Qmerit). In practical terms, that means a full charge (around 40 kWh for a smaller EV) could cost $16–$24 at a fast charger, versus maybe $6–$8 at home. One analysis found that if an EV owner drove ~13,500 miles a year using only public fast chargers, it would cost around $1,500–$2,300 annually, three times what the same driver would pay charging mostly at home (Cost Analysis of EV Home Charging vs. Public Charging | Qmerit) (Cost Analysis of EV Home Charging vs. Public Charging | Qmerit).
Public charging also often has confusing pricing schemes. Some charge per minute, others per kWh, and some have session fees or idle fees if you stay plugged in. Different networks require different apps or membership cards, and roaming between networks can incur extra fees. All of this can leave drivers feeling nickel-and-dimed compared to the simplicity of plugging in at home overnight for a known low rate. And while there are free public chargers out there (often provided by cities or retailers as a perk), those are increasingly the exception and can be unreliable or crowded (“free” often translates to busy and occasionally broken, as one analysis wryly noted) (Cost Analysis of EV Home Charging vs. Public Charging | Qmerit).
The bottom line: for drivers without access to cheap home charging, relying on public infrastructure means paying a premium to keep their cars running. That undermines one of the selling points of EVs (affordability), especially for folks on a budget.
Gaps in the Infrastructure (Who’s Left Behind)
Public charging infrastructure has grown quickly in absolute numbers, but it hasn’t grown equally everywhere – and that uneven buildout is failing certain groups of drivers. Urban versus rural divide is one aspect: big cities might have a decent number of public chargers (though often still not enough for all the apartments and condos), whereas many smaller towns have zero fast chargers. If you live in an apartment in a city or a townhome without a driveway, you’re likely dependent on public charging – yet those are the very people who face a gap. In many major U.S. cities, 30–40% of residents have no access to private garages or dedicated parking where they could install a charger (Charged EVs | EVmatch: A simple, low-cost way to monetize your charging stations – Charged EVs). For these drivers, the public network is supposed to fill the void, but as we’ve seen, it’s often inadequate. If the nearest public charger is several miles away and might be broken or occupied, owning an EV becomes far less convenient for these folks compared to someone with a home charger. This creates an inequity in the EV experience: those who can charge at home enjoy a smooth ride, while those who cannot are stuck hunting for functioning public stations.
All told, the public charging system’s growing pains – lack of enough stations, poor reliability, high costs, and patchy coverage – are frustrating EV drivers and even deterring would-be buyers. A smooth charging experience is crucial for mainstream EV adoption, and right now too many drivers are getting stuck with a bad experience. As one reporter on an EV road trip noted, “worries about public chargers are the No. 1 reason would-be EV buyers are hesitant” (Electric cars have a road trip problem: slow and unreliable charging : NPR). If nearly half of stations are broken, if you have to drive across town to find a charger, or if it costs as much as gasoline to charge on the go – that’s a problem.
So what’s the solution? It might be time to rethink the paradigm of EV fueling. Many experts and companies are now saying: maybe the future of EV charging isn’t in big public charging lots at all… but rather right in our neighborhoods and driveways. In the next post (Part 2 of this series), we’ll explore why charging close to home – literally on your street or at your neighbor’s house – could solve many of these problems.
