Tesla Supercharging Tips To Speed Up Your Charging Time

Last Updated on February 24, 2023 by Rose Morah

Supercharging is always the best option when planning a long Tesla road trip.

This is because superchargers are fast and don’t take much of your time when charging.

And additionally, no one wants to spend much of their time at a charging station or queuing to charge.

In this article, we are going to discuss tips to help you reduce the charging time at the superchargers.

Be sure to also check out these 7 Long -distance Tesla Road trip Tips.

1. Check the number of charging stops

Before the trip, check the number of stops you will take using a Tesla trip planner app. I recommend using the A Better Route Planner App instead of the Tesla trip planner. Tesla trip planner tends to give fewer supercharging stops than ABRP.

Additionally, A Better Route planner app will help you know:

The charging duration at each charging stop
The number of charging stops
The charging cost
And alternate routes

With the Tesla route planner, the road trip will take longer due to the long charging stops.

On the other hand, A Better Route Planner aims at maximizing fast charging. Though you tend to make more stops, you also don’t charge as much. Hence your trip takes a shorter duration since you are done with charging within a short time.

You may also like:

Best EV Route Planner in 2022 (According To EV Owners).

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2. Charge from 10% to 80%

To charge fast during your Tesla road trip, your battery has to be on a low charge (like let’s say 10%) when you arrive at the next supercharger.

This way, the battery charges much faster than when it has more than a 10% charge.

N/B: But try also not to drive with a 10% or below charge if you are driving in cold weather, heavy winds, or hilly terrain. The car will use or require more energy under such conditions.

The good thing is A Better Route Planner allows you to add the percentage you want to arrive with.

We have a detailed article on How‌ ‌to‌ ‌Use‌ ‌A ‌Better‌ ‌Route‌ ‌Planner‌ (With Illustrations).

3. Precondition your battery

When using other Tesla trip planner apps, you can either set your destination or the next supercharger as your final destination so that Tesla can start to precondition the battery before arriving at your next charging stop.

This helps the battery charge fast when you arrive at your next supercharger, especially during the cold weather or when driving in winter.

4. Supercharging options

When it comes to fast charging, V3 superchargers are the best. This is because:

They have a maximum charging rate of 250kW.
They are not shared. This means they don’t split the 250kW between cars.

Before you use the V3 Supercharger, be sure your car is capable of receiving that 250kW power. Otherwise, it may max out!

So, to minimize the charge time during your Tesla road trip, check the type of supercharger available in the charging station.

And if they are all shared superchargers, don’t go next to the charging spot that is already occupied by another Tesla. Instead, skip that one and move to the next unoccupied charging spot or the furthest charging spot.

For instance, if the occupied charger is 1A, don’t go to 1B!

This will help you cut your charging time by half.

You can actually check the labels on each supercharger. Most of them are usually V3 superchargers.

The easiest way to know the type of superchargers at your next charging stop is by tapping the supercharger location from your navigation.

See the below screenshots;