EV charging · Costs by country

What does it cost to charge an EV across Europe?

Checked 30 September 2026 on each operator's own tariff page, the EU observatory and Eurostat · skynomad

Put in the countries on your route and roughly how many kilometres you will drive in each. The calculator multiplies your car's consumption by each country's typical fast-charging price, the one you pay at the plug with a bank card and no account. It assumes every kWh comes from an ultra-fast charger, which is the expensive case: a night on a hotel's AC post or at home costs less.

Price per kWh, country by country

"Typical" is the middle of the no-subscription prices the big fast-charging networks publish for that country; "cheapest published" includes Electra's app price, which needs the app but no subscription. Every figure was read on the operator's own page on 30 September 2026 and includes VAT. Prices outside the euro are converted at the European Central Bank's reference rate.

Ionity Power subscription prices per kWh: France €0.31, Germany €0.41, Austria €0.39, Switzerland CHF 0.46, Italy €0.48, Spain €0.37, Belgium €0.43, Netherlands €0.43, Poland 1.86 zł, Czechia 12.00 Kč, Slovakia €0.40, Slovenia €0.41, Hungary 159 Ft.
* Luxembourg: Only Electra publishes a price for its fast chargers here; Luxembourg's public Chargy network lists indicative prices that are not specific to fast chargers.
* Slovenia: Only Ionity publishes a fast-charging price we could read at source.
* Hungary: Only Ionity publishes an ad hoc fast-charging price we could read at source; other networks show prices per charger in their apps.
* Portugal: Only one network publishes a single all-in price. Portugal's Mobi.E system adds an operator fee, a retailer fee and taxes, so other networks cost what the app or terminal shows.

Where the fast chargers are

This table counts public charging points of 150 kW and above, from the European Alternative Fuels Observatory's figures for August 2026, and divides them by each country's motorway length from Eurostat. It tells you how many ultra-fast plugs a country has for every 100 km of motorway it has to cover.

France: the ranking says middle, the motorway says otherwise

France comes fifth on that table, behind Belgium, Austria, Germany and Luxembourg. I drove it this summer and it did not feel fifth. On the autoroutes, the fast chargers were where I needed them, and Electra was the cheapest ultra-fast plug I used: its French price moves with demand between €0.39 and €0.61 in the app, and it starts at €0.64 by bank card.

The two views do not contradict each other. The Observatory counts every public point in the country, in city hubs and supermarket car parks as well as at service areas, so a country with a lot of chargers in its cities scores high. It measures how easy it is to find a fast charger somewhere nearby, not whether there is one at the next service area. For a road trip, the second question is the one that matters, and on the French motorways I found the answer was nearly always yes.

Spain is the opposite lesson. It is the cheapest per kWh here and the thinnest on the ground: 31 ultra-fast points per 100 km of motorway, a twelfth of Belgium's. The price is good once you have found the plug.

Belgium to Luxembourg: the E411 gap

Driving from Belgium into Luxembourg on the E411, I remember roughly 100 km with nowhere to charge. On the motorway itself that holds up. South of Namur, the Wanlin service area has a 50 kW Allego charger (listed for the Brussels-bound side), and after it the only charger I could find beside the motorway in Belgium is a Tesla Supercharger at Hondelange, near Arlon, which I could not confirm is open to other cars. The next open charger on the motorway itself is Aire de Capellen on Luxembourg's A6, where Creos runs SuperChargy points at up to 350 kW, about 100 km further on.

The fast chargers exist, but they sit a short way off the exits, and you have to know to leave. Ionity has a site at exit 23 (Wellin), and Fastned has opened two in the province of Luxembourg, at exit 24 (Libin) and near exit 28 (Léglise), both with 400 kW chargers. With those, the longest stretch between ultra-fast sites near the E411 is about 47 km, from Namur to Wellin. Put them in the car's navigation before you leave Namur, not after the Wanlin sign.

When a subscription pays

A month of Ionity Power costs €11.99 and cuts Ionity's French price from €0.55 to €0.31 a kWh, so it pays for itself after about 50 kWh: one large fill. The calculator shows what the whole trip would cost on it. Fastned Gold takes 30% off Fastned's standard price and costs €5.99 a month until 31 October 2026, a half-price offer. Electra's subscription takes up to €0.20 off every Electra kWh. If a trip is longer than a weekend, I take one subscription for the network I will use most and cancel it when I get home.

How the numbers were put together

• Prices come from the operators' own tariff pages, not from charging-map apps. I list the networks that publish a price for fast charging without an account; where only one network does, the country is marked with an asterisk and the price is a single data point, not a typical one.
• Tesla Superchargers open to other cars set a price per site and time of day, shown only in the Tesla app, so they are not in the tables.
• Density counts points, not sites: a site with eight 400 kW chargers counts eight. The Observatory's power bands are 150 to 350 kW and 350 kW and above; the two are added together here.
• Motorway length is Eurostat's latest year: 2024, or 2023 for Germany and Italy. Countries count expressways differently, so the figure flatters some countries and penalises others; Poland's and Slovakia's are the least comparable.
• The figures move quickly. The Observatory updates every month; I recheck the prices and the counts at least every quarter, and the date above changes when I do.