Best practices on charging battery -- maximum % level?

[irvineboy]

What is the guidance on charging the battery to? I’ve read 80% or 90%. I’ve also read don’t let it go below 20%. Is there some setting where you can set it to maximum X%?

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[Electrified Outdoors]

You bet! Between 70% and 90% is the recommendation. Avoid charging above 90% or discharging below 20% if possible. It's ok to do this on road trips as that is infrequent.

My charge limit sits at 80%. There is a slider in both the app and the charging screen in vehicle which allows you to adjust charge limit.

 

[BeanEW]

I keep mine under 70% and charge more when I knew I need more miles.

 

[irvineboy]

80% on a 135 kWh is going to get me what, about 300 * 80% = 240 miles of real world driving? Maybe less?

 

[Indy avocado]

If you care about maximizing health and longevity, charge to 60-70% when it's cold out, and 50-60% when it's warm/hot as long as that will usually get you through your daily driving with at least 20% left.

Batteries are happiest at 50%, so the goal is to make sure its between 30% and 70% when you're not driving or charging.

I tend to charge to 70% and won't plug in until under 40% which is sometimes at the end of the day and sometimes several days later.

I charge to 95% or so before road trips unless I know that last 5% is going to make the difference...

 

[Indy avocado]

80% on a 135 kWh is going to get me what, about 300 * 80% = 240 miles of real world driving? Maybe less?

In decent weather, that seems about right unless you're doing >75mph on the highway.

 

[HyperionMark]

If you care about maximizing health and longevity, charge to 60-70% when it's cold out, and 50-60% when it's warm/hot as long as that will usually get you through your daily driving with at least 20% left.

Batteries are happiest at 50%, so the goal is to make sure its between 30% and 70% when you're not driving or charging.

I tend to charge to 70% and won't plug in until under 40% which is sometimes at the end of the day and sometimes several days later.

I charge to 95% or so before road trips unless I know that last 5% is going to make the difference...

This man knows what he is talking about. Just follow this advice.

 

[Indy avocado]

This man knows what he is talking about. Just follow this advice.

I'll also note that it's not worth stressing over and if you need more range daily, charge to 80, 90% and use until 5% as needed. Just try to not store it that high or low.

 

[emoore]

For daily charging I don’t go below 25% or above 75%. For road trips I go higher and lower. Do you have a charger at home? If so it doesnt matter what your range to empty is. Just charge when you get home.

 

[irvineboy]

I just have the Nema 14-50 not the Rivian charger.

 

[SANZC02]

Ok, I’m going to put this out there but by no means am I advocating anyone follow my example. Just want to say do not stress so much over battery health, in my experience they are not as fragile as people want to think.

In my Model S I pretty much do everything I am not supposed to do. I have free Supercharging and several stations around my house so better than 95% of my charging has been at Superchargers. I never leave the vehicle plugged in unless going out of town for extended time, then will charge to 80%, set charge limit to 50% and plug in just in case. I charge to 80% generally and recharge when it gets down under 50 miles remaining.

I have had the vehicle for 7.5 years, when new a 100% charge was 235 miles, last 100% charge this week was 216 miles so my battery is at 92% of original after 7.5 years. 5% of that was in the first 2 years so in the last 5.5 years lost 3%.

I am doing the same thing with my Rivian, only difference is no free DCFC so unless traveling or testing DCFC after an update the bulk of my charging is L2.

 

[Mathme]

It won't necessarily hurt your battery to charge to 100%...it isn't good to let it sit there at that state for a long period of time. Before leaving on a road trip I generally charge to 100% at home on my L2 charger as that's the cheapest energy I can buy, then if I need to DCFC, I will usually run it back up to the default 85% "extended charge."

For daily charging, I typically charge to 80-85% depending on what the next day requires, and then recharge when it gets back down to the 30ish percent.

These batteries will last a long time. We are the third owners of a 2010 Tesla Roadster and it gets charged to 80%, and still has a predicted 130ish miles of range when charged. There is degradation there, but that battery is 14 years old.

 

[Dark-Fx]

I always charge to 85% and my battery SoH isn't worse than people who haven't. A shame Rivian took our toy away though.

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