The 30-second answer: At the current U.S. average residential rate of 18.56¢ per kWh, a full charge costs about $12.50 for a 60 kWh Model 3 or Model Y Standard, about $16.40 for a 79 kWh Premium, and about $25.50 for a Cybertruck. Drive 1,000 miles a month in a Model Y and you will spend roughly $51 — call it $610 a year. The same miles in a 29 mpg gas SUV cost about $134 a month. Your electricity rate matters more than your car does: the identical Model Y costs $36/month in Nebraska and $116/month in Hawaii.
Almost every “cost to charge a Tesla” article you will find online is running on stale numbers. That matters, because electricity is not cheap the way it was two years ago — the U.S. average residential rate climbed to 18.56¢/kWh as of March 2026, up about 9% year over year per the EIA’s Electric Power Monthly. If a page is still quoting you 15 or 17 cents, every dollar figure on it is wrong on the low side.
So here is the current math, done honestly, including the part most articles quietly skip: you do not pay for the energy that goes into your battery. You pay for the energy that leaves your wall. Those are not the same number, and the gap is where a surprising amount of money hides.
What a full charge actually costs, by model
Two things set the price of a full charge: your battery’s usable capacity and your electricity rate. The table below uses the national average rate and accounts for AC charging losses — the roughly 11% of energy that becomes heat in the onboard charger and the pack instead of miles.
| Model | Usable battery | Full charge @ 18.56¢/kWh* | Cost per mile* |
|---|---|---|---|
| Model 3 Standard (RWD, LFP) | ~60 kWh | ~$12.50 | ~4.5¢ |
| Model 3 Premium RWD / AWD | ~79 kWh | ~$16.40 | — |
| Model Y Standard (RWD) | ~60 kWh | ~$12.50 | — |
| Model Y Premium AWD | ~79 kWh | ~$16.40 | ~5.1¢ |
| Model Y Performance | ~79 kWh | ~$16.40 | ~6.0¢ |
| Model S / Model X | ~95 kWh | ~$19.70 | — |
| Cybertruck | ~123 kWh | ~$25.50 | ~8.0¢ |
*Full-charge cost is grid-side: it includes the ~11% lost turning wall AC into stored DC. Per-mile cost is shown only for trims with published EPA consumption (which is already measured at the wall, so it needs no loss markup) — a dash means EPA has not published a figure for that trim yet; use the calculator below with your car’s own Wh/mi. Real-world numbers move with speed, temperature, wheels and terrain. Note: Tesla renamed the Model 3 and Model Y “Long Range” trims to “Premium” in late 2025 — a 2024 Long Range is the smaller ~75 kWh pack, not the ~79 kWh Premium.
Notice how narrow that spread is. The difference between the cheapest Tesla to charge and the most expensive is a few cents a mile. Now compare that to the spread created by where you live, which is a far bigger lever than which car sits in your garage.
Your electricity rate is the whole ballgame
The single number that determines what you pay is the one printed on your utility bill, and it varies by more than 3× across the country. Same car, same miles, wildly different bill:
| Where you plug in | Residential rate | Model Y, 1,000 mi/month |
|---|---|---|
| North Dakota (cheapest) | 11.95¢/kWh | ~$33 |
| Nebraska | 13.10¢/kWh | ~$36 |
| U.S. average | 18.56¢/kWh | ~$51 |
| Connecticut | 30.47¢/kWh | ~$83 |
| California | 33.35¢/kWh | ~$91 |
| Hawaii (most expensive) | 42.23¢/kWh | ~$116 |
Residential rates, all from one table: EIA Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.A, March 2026 data (the most recent release). Be careful with rate tables you find elsewhere — many quote the all-sector blended average, which is much lower than what a household actually pays.
A Hawaii owner pays more than three times what a North Dakota owner pays to drive the same mile. Before you compare Tesla to gas, or home to Supercharger, find your actual rate. It is on your bill, usually as a “price per kWh” or as total dollars divided by total kWh used.
Run your own numbers
Plug in your rate, your car and your mileage. Everything below updates instantly — including what those same miles would cost you at a Supercharger or in a gas car.
How this works: a full charge is billed grid-side, so battery kWh is divided by charging efficiency — you pay for the losses too. Wh/mi is prefilled with EPA-rated consumption (already a wall-side number) where EPA publishes one, and a close estimate otherwise; overwrite it with your own lifetime Wh/mi from the Tesla app for an exact answer. Supercharging is priced on energy delivered to the car, so it carries no home-charging loss markup, and assumes $0.36/kWh (mid-range U.S.). Nothing is stored or sent anywhere — this runs entirely in your browser.
Home vs. Supercharger vs. gas
Here is the comparison that actually decides whether an EV saves you money, priced per 1,000 miles in a Model Y at today’s rates:
| How you fuel | Typical price | Cost per 1,000 miles |
|---|---|---|
| Home, off-peak EV plan | ~$0.10/kWh (varies widely) | ~$27 |
| Home, national average | $0.1856/kWh | ~$51 |
| Supercharger | $0.30–0.45/kWh | ~$73–110 |
| Efficient hybrid (42 mpg) | $3.88/gal | ~$92 |
| Gas compact SUV (29 mpg) | $3.88/gal | ~$134 |
Gas price: AAA national average, July 11, 2026. Supercharger pricing is dynamic by site and time of day and is only visible in the Tesla app.
Two honest takeaways from that table. First, Supercharging exclusively erases most of the savings. At $0.30–0.45/kWh, Supercharging lands in the same neighborhood as a fuel-efficient hybrid. Superchargers are a road-trip tool, not a fueling strategy — if you cannot charge where you sleep, run the numbers carefully before you buy.
Second, the honest competitor is a hybrid, not a truck. Plenty of EV articles pick a thirsty V8 to make the savings look enormous. Against a 42 mpg hybrid, home charging at the national average still wins — about $42 per 1,000 miles, or roughly $500 a year — but it is a normal advantage, not a life-changing one. Against a typical 29 mpg gas SUV, you are saving just under $1,000 a year at 12,000 miles. Both of those are true; which one applies depends on what you are actually replacing.
The charging loss nobody bills you for (but you pay for)
This is the part I care about most, because it is invisible on your bill and almost nobody mentions it. Your utility meter measures energy leaving the wall. Your car reports energy arriving in the battery. In between, some of it becomes heat — in the onboard charger’s power electronics, in the wiring, and in the pack itself. You are billed for all of it.
How much? Peer-reviewed measurements are consistent: Level 2 charging at 240V runs about 89% efficient, while Level 1 charging on a standard 120V outlet is only about 84% efficient (Sears et al., IEEE, 2014; corroborated by later work). Lower current and lower voltage mean the fixed overhead — the electronics that have to stay powered up for the whole session — is spread over fewer delivered kWh. A Level 1 charge takes far longer, and that overhead runs the entire time.
What that costs you: For a Model Y driven 12,000 miles a year, charging exclusively on a standard wall outlet instead of a 240V Level 2 charger wastes roughly $41 a year in electricity you bought and never used. That is not the main reason to install a Level 2 charger — the main reason is that a wall outlet adds only about 3 miles of range per hour — but it means the efficiency gain quietly pays down part of the hardware over time.
Efficiency also gets worse at high states of charge. Charging losses climb meaningfully above roughly 80%, which is why the last stretch to 100% is both slower and more expensive per usable kWh. Charging to 80% for daily driving is usually framed as a battery-health habit — it is also, quietly, the cheaper habit. (The exception: LFP-battery cars like the Model 3 Standard, which Tesla asks you to take to 100% regularly.)
The biggest lever: get on a time-of-use plan
Everything above assumes you pay a flat rate. Most owners do, and most owners should not. Utilities charge you flat because it is simple, but the actual cost of generating power at 2 a.m. is a fraction of what it costs at 6 p.m., when everyone is home running air conditioning. Utilities would much rather you charged overnight, and they will pay you to do it — through a time-of-use (TOU) or dedicated EV rate.
The spread is real. Georgia Power’s Overnight Advantage plan prices super-off-peak energy (11 p.m.–7 a.m.) at a few cents per kWh before riders. PG&E’s EV2-A tariff in California puts off-peak at about 22.6¢/kWh against a peak rate of 41–54¢. Those are very different numbers — which is exactly the point: you have to look up your own utility’s EV rate, because the national picture ranges from a couple of cents to over twenty. What is nearly universal is that the overnight window is the cheapest power your utility sells.
The beautiful part for an EV owner is that this is a one-time setup. Open the Tesla app, set a scheduled charging start time inside your off-peak window, and the car does it every night for the life of the car. It is the single highest-return hour you will spend on your charging setup.
What it costs to set up home charging
You have two real options, and the gap between them is bigger than most people expect.
Level 1 (a standard 120V outlet). Free. Every Tesla can do it with the mobile connector. It adds roughly 3 miles of range per hour, which is about 36 miles overnight. If you drive under ~30 miles a day and never need a fast turnaround, this genuinely works — a lot of owners run this way for years. It is also, as covered above, the least efficient way to charge.
Level 2 (240V). This is the real answer for most households. A Tesla Wall Connector delivers up to 11.5 kW (48 amps), which is roughly 44 miles of range per hour — a full charge overnight, every night, with room to spare. To get the full 48 amps it needs a 60-amp circuit (a 50-amp breaker limits you to 40 amps and about 37 miles per hour). A NEMA 14-50 outlet with the mobile connector is the cheaper middle path at ~30 miles per hour. One thing to confirm before you size the circuit: not every trim accepts the full 48 amps — some cap lower at the car’s onboard charger — so check your specific car’s maximum AC charge rate rather than assuming the wall unit’s headline number.
The variable is the electrical work, not the hardware. If your panel has capacity and the run to the garage is short, this is a modest job. If the panel is full or the run is long, it is not. Get a real quote before you assume. We break down the hardware options in our best home EV chargers guide, and the ChargePoint Home Flex — the main third-party alternative to Tesla’s unit — gets a full review here.
What happened to the $1,000 federal charger credit
It is gone, and you should know that before you budget an install. The federal Section 30C alternative fuel refueling property credit — 30% of cost, capped at $1,000 for a home install — expired for chargers placed in service after June 30, 2026, per the IRS instructions for Form 8911. The 2025 tax law pulled the sunset forward from 2032. There is no extension pending.
If your charger was installed and operational on or before June 30, 2026, you can still claim it on Form 8911 when you file. If it was not, that door is closed.
What is not closed: state and utility rebates, which are separate programs and many are still running — some utilities will discount or even fully cover a Level 2 charger for customers who sign up for an EV rate plan. Look up your ZIP in the DSIRE database before you buy anything. We track the broader incentive picture in our 2026 EV incentives guide.
The caveats worth knowing
A few things that will make your real-world number differ from the table:
Winter. Cold weather costs you efficiency twice — the battery is less willing, and the cabin heat comes out of the same pack. Expect your cost per mile to rise noticeably in deep cold. One free mitigation: precondition the car while it is still plugged in, so the heating energy comes from the wall instead of the battery.
Speed and wheels. Aerodynamic drag rises with the square of speed, so a 75 mph commuter pays meaningfully more per mile than a 55 mph one. Wheel choice matters more than most owners assume — see our breakdown of whether aero wheel covers are worth it and the tire head-to-head, since tire rolling resistance is a direct line item on your electric bill.
Vampire drain and Sentry Mode. A car that sits parked still uses energy, and Sentry Mode is not free. It is a small number, but it is not zero, and it shows up on the bill of owners who leave Sentry on all day at work.
Your rate is not fixed forever. Residential electricity climbed about 9% year-over-year to reach today’s average. Budget with that in mind rather than assuming today’s number holds.
Just took delivery? Charging setup is item one — walk the rest with our first-week Tesla checklist. Ready to price hardware? Shop home charging on Amazon →
FAQ: Tesla home charging costs
How much does it cost to charge a Tesla at home?
At the U.S. average residential electricity rate of 18.56 cents per kWh (EIA Electric Power Monthly, March 2026 data), a full charge costs roughly $12.50 for a 60 kWh Model 3 Standard or Model Y Standard, about $16.40 for a 79 kWh Premium, and about $25.50 for a Cybertruck. That includes the roughly 11 percent of energy lost as heat during AC charging, which your meter bills you for but never reaches the battery. A typical owner driving 1,000 miles a month spends about $51.
Is it cheaper to charge a Tesla at home or at a Supercharger?
Home is far cheaper. At the 18.56 cent national average, home charging a Model Y works out to roughly 5.1 cents per mile, or about $51 per 1,000 miles. Supercharging typically runs $0.30 to $0.45 per kWh, which is about $73 to $110 per 1,000 miles. Superchargers are excellent for road trips, but if you can charge where you sleep, home wins by a wide margin.
How much does it cost to charge a Tesla vs buy gas?
At 1,000 miles, home charging a Model Y at the national average costs about $51. A gas compact SUV at 29 mpg with gasoline at $3.88 per gallon (AAA, July 11, 2026) costs about $134 for the same distance. That is roughly $83 saved per 1,000 miles, or just under $1,000 a year at 12,000 miles. Note that an efficient hybrid at 42 mpg costs about $92 per 1,000 miles, so the savings versus a hybrid are real but much smaller.
Does charging on a regular wall outlet cost more?
Yes, and most owners never notice. Level 1 charging on a 120-volt outlet is only about 84 percent efficient, versus about 89 percent for a 240-volt Level 2 charger (Sears et al., IEEE, 2014). You pay for every kWh that leaves the wall, including the portion lost as heat. For a Model Y driven 12,000 miles a year, charging exclusively on a wall outlet wastes roughly $41 a year in electricity you bought but never used.
What is the cheapest way to charge a Tesla at home?
Get on your utility’s time-of-use or EV rate plan and schedule charging for the overnight window in the Tesla app. Off-peak EV rates vary enormously by utility, from a few cents per kWh on some plans to over 20 cents on others, but on most plans the overnight rate is a large discount to the standard rate. Because charging is scheduled in the car, it is a one-time setup that keeps paying every night.
Is the $1,000 federal tax credit for a home charger still available?
No. The federal Section 30C alternative fuel refueling property credit expired for chargers placed in service after June 30, 2026. If your charger was installed and operational on or before that date, you can still claim it on IRS Form 8911 when you file. State and utility rebates are separate and many are still active — check the DSIRE database at dsireusa.org for programs in your ZIP code.
Why should I charge to 80 percent instead of 100 percent?
Two reasons, and the second one is about money. Charging past roughly 80 percent is slower and less efficient, because charging losses climb significantly at high states of charge, so the last 20 percent costs more per usable kWh than the first 80. It is also easier on a nickel-based battery pack over the long run. Owners of LFP-battery cars like the Model 3 Standard are the exception — Tesla recommends charging those to 100 percent regularly.