Charging Habits and Battery Health

[Ramble On Rivian]

I had a thought about charging last week. Generally I keep my battery level between 20%-70%. My daily commute uses 10% each way. I charge at work bringing the level back to 70% and when I return home in the evening I charge again returning the level to 70%. The thought I had was maybe this daily charging is not the best practice and I pondered the idea that it might be better for the battery packs if I ran them closer to 20% and then charged returning them to 70%.

I reached out to Rivian with this question and they passed it on too you the Rivian community, they real had, to my suprise no insight.
Here was their response.

"Thanks for reaching out! There are many subjective variables, but generally, I can say these are probably the best rules of thumb:

• Keeping your vehicle at 100% SOC consistently is not the healthiest for your battery.
• Leaving your vehicle unplugged can potentially result in your vehicle reaching 0%; in this scenario, this would also be detrimental to your battery and possibly require replacement.
• Keeping your vehicle charged between 20-70% seems to be the universal best practice.

I might say this question may be best posed to the online community. Battery chemistry can get very dense to digest and a rabbit hole of information to get into. Lots of helpful resources online but the forums are typically the best place to learn about EV practices.

Stay adventurous,
Michael
Sr. Inside Delivery Guide"

So here I am, what are your practices and general thoughts on daily charging vs charging when needed?

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[Riviot]

I might say this question may be best posed to the online community.

Having just discovered the Max Charging Limit Override, I suggest enabling and charging to 10000000000000000000000000000%

/s

 

[TigerWuxia]

I charge between 30% and 80%, and I don't charge every day.

 

[kvenom]

The was an interview done with a Tesla battery engineer/Lithium expert a while back.

Summary was IIRC:
-Daily charging is fine (Best practice is 20% charging ie 50-70%, 40-60%)
-Avoid frequent deep charges 20-80% avoid depleting the battery to a low percentage during the week and only charging once etc.
-Its fine to do a bms calibration charge once in a while to 100%, but don't let it sit at a high SOC

 

[Ramble On Rivian]

Thank you for sharing @kvenom very helpful.

 

[SANZC02]

I’m not recommending or suggesting what you should do just providing my personal experience. Most people suggest stay plugged in and rarely use DCFC for best health.

I have done neither with my Model S, in July I will have had it for 8 years, never plug in unless I am charging, only exception was went on a 3 week trip and plugged it in because it would be idle for an extended time. I have lifetime free Supercharging so 95% of my charging has been DCFC. Stop every 3 days or so and charge it to 80%, do not let it sit long over 80% or below 20%. Close to 90k miles on it and still have 93% of original range.

I only plug in my R1S when charging as well but charge mostly at home on L2.

 

[moosetags]

We also almost always charge at home with the Rivian Wall Charger on a 60 amp breaker. We have the maximum charge level set at 70% unless we are planning a trip. We most often charge when it gets down to 30-35%. We most often charge in the evening and leave it plugged in until it hits 70% and ends the charging session sometime after we go to bed. We unplug in the morning.

Brian

 

[240vPlug]

You're doing very well. Keeping it between 20 and 70% best is to use the middle of the battery. That would be between 25 and 75%, but that's getting super particular about it generally speaking. Don't charge it regularly above 90% and don't regularly run it below. 10%. It is good to keep it plugged in as much as possible when you're not using it. Me personally I charge it to 80%. I do this on both the R1T and the R1S.

Let your battery management system worry about the rest.

 

[s4wrxttcs]

My charging habits are built around my needs, and my understanding of battery longevity. Where I don't do anything that would drastically harm the battery, but at the same time I try not to allow the vehicle to get in the way of my needs.

A few times a month I charge to 100% right before a journey of around 215 miles. This allows me to get to my Oregon Coast house with about 60 miles in range left even without using conserve mode. Then I charge it to 70% or 85% overnight. Usually I spend a few nights there and charge back up to 100% right before my journey home.

That's really the only actual strain on the battery.

The rest of the time I'm typically go from 80% to 30% and then charge back up, but I don't charge every night. I charge on an as-needed basis. The average percentage that it sits is around 50%.

The only rule I follow is not to allow the battery to stay at a high state of charge for very long, and not to allow it to get to low or to stay low. The lowest I've gone down to is around 20-25 miles, but I charged as soon as I reached my destination. When it comes to how low I should go its less about the battery and more about what happens to the vehicle when a battery is too low to charge the 12VDC battery.

I rarely L3 charge not because of battery concern with fast charging, but I rarely need to.

 

[ndmiller]

I leave it plugged in at home for the cabin/battery conditioning off battery option for the morning commute. Otherwise to 75% and charge once every 1-2 weeks when it gets to 30-35.

 

[Tarkus]

I guess Tarkus & I (and my two kitty cats) are a "EV Anomaly Drive Team" as I/we live & work on the road, driving nationwide from county to county testing the accuracy of wireless E911 calls. I typically pick a motel with a supercharger nearby for Tarkus as the "bullseye" & test the surrounding counties (one per day up to 1.5 hrs. of drive time to get to a county). Depending on the weather/time of the year, I usually charge up in the morning while I setup my test equipment in Tarkus (summer time & mid-late afternoon during the winter time). Sometimes my county is so far away I'll stop-off at a charger for short charge during lunch to make sure I can get back to my "home-base" motel/supercharger. I've run her down to less than 10% a few times & typically stop charging at 80%-95% depending on congestion at the charge station. Maybe once a month I come across a station that is packed & has a line formed & I just move on to the next station and when I'm done with the 10 or so surrounding counties, I pack up Tarkus & move to the next cluster of counties. Now that I can use Tesla Superchargers', Motel selections will be better... & nothing wrong with Red Roof as they are Pet Friendly...

 

[inconceivable]

This guy seems pretty smart and seems to say you should do frequent small charges if possible. I’ll let you decide how much stock to put in to YouTubers recommendations.

 

[R1Sky Business]

I had a thought about charging last week. Generally I keep my battery level between 20%-70%. My daily commute uses 10% each way. I charge at work bringing the level back to 70% and when I return home in the evening I charge again returning the level to 70%. The thought I had was maybe this daily charging is not the best practice and I pondered the idea that it might be better for the battery packs if I ran them closer to 20% and then charged returning them to 70%.

I reached out to Rivian with this question and they passed it on too you the Rivian community, they real had, to my suprise no insight.
Here was their response.

"Thanks for reaching out! There are many subjective variables, but generally, I can say these are probably the best rules of thumb:

• Keeping your vehicle at 100% SOC consistently is not the healthiest for your battery.
• Leaving your vehicle unplugged can potentially result in your vehicle reaching 0%; in this scenario, this would also be detrimental to your battery and possibly require replacement.
• Keeping your vehicle charged between 20-70% seems to be the universal best practice.

I might say this question may be best posed to the online community. Battery chemistry can get very dense to digest and a rabbit hole of information to get into. Lots of helpful resources online but the forums are typically the best place to learn about EV practices.

Stay adventurous,
Michael
Sr. Inside Delivery Guide"

So here I am, what are your practices and general thoughts on daily charging vs charging when needed?

Dodging the q

 

[R1Sky Business]

I had a thought about charging last week. Generally I keep my battery level between 20%-70%. My daily commute uses 10% each way. I charge at work bringing the level back to 70% and when I return home in the evening I charge again returning the level to 70%. The thought I had was maybe this daily charging is not the best practice and I pondered the idea that it might be better for the battery packs if I ran them closer to 20% and then charged returning them to 70%.

I reached out to Rivian with this question and they passed it on too you the Rivian community, they real had, to my suprise no insight.
Here was their response.

"Thanks for reaching out! There are many subjective variables, but generally, I can say these are probably the best rules of thumb:

• Keeping your vehicle at 100% SOC consistently is not the healthiest for your battery.
• Leaving your vehicle unplugged can potentially result in your vehicle reaching 0%; in this scenario, this would also be detrimental to your battery and possibly require replacement.
• Keeping your vehicle charged between 20-70% seems to be the universal best practice.

I might say this question may be best posed to the online community. Battery chemistry can get very dense to digest and a rabbit hole of information to get into. Lots of helpful resources online but the forums are typically the best place to learn about EV practices.

Stay adventurous,
Michael
Sr. Inside Delivery Guide"

So here I am, what are your practices and general thoughts on daily charging vs charging when needed?

Your battery charging routine is ideal.

 

[R1Sky Business]

250K miles with less than 10% battery degradation here we come!!!!

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