I know the conventional wisdom is to "keep it charged" (we charge nightly to 85% to get a nice even 200 miles on our X 75D). But our daily weekday driving is no more than 10-15 miles. Is there any benefit to charging every night vs. letting it drop to 50-60% charge and charging every 2-3 days? I'm asking because I know regularly letting it run down close to 0% is highly discouraged and am guessing is the reason for the "keep it charged" rule. But as long as I keep it above 50%, am I risking battery health?
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The recommendation is to keep it plugged in, not necessarily to keep it charged (although I don't know why you wouldn't want to keep it charged). There is no advantage to letting the battery run down, as Tesla says very clearly in the manual.
Remember "A connected Model S is a happy Model S", and that goes for the X too.
Remember "A connected Model S is a happy Model S", and that goes for the X too.
The reason I ask is because our garage is on the side of the house connected to the basement one level below our 1st floor, and it's much more convenient to park in the front of the house on the same level as our family room/kitchen day to day, especially when unloading groceries, kids, etc
One of the great advantages of owning a Tesla is home charging so you start every day knowing you have more than enough range for you daily driving needs. You don't have to check your energy/fuel gauge every time you start driving to decide if you need to stop to charge/refuel during your outing. For daily driving you never have to think about range. All you need to do is take a few seconds to plugin every time you park at home.
If you only charge every 3rd of 4th night, you risk getting in the habit of parking at home without plugging in to charge, because it's what you'll do most often (2-3 times more often).
One day when you need to charge you'll forget to plugin and when you need to leave in the morning you'll realize you forgot and then you have to plugin and wait for the car to charge. Waiting for a charge is the worst, and it should never happen for daily driving.
Maybe there's an outlet near the more convenient parking spot you can use? If not then consider having one installed there. Even a standard 110 outlet will do since your daily drive is so short.
There's no issue of battery degradation due to not plugging in every night.
If you only charge every 3rd of 4th night, you risk getting in the habit of parking at home without plugging in to charge, because it's what you'll do most often (2-3 times more often).
One day when you need to charge you'll forget to plugin and when you need to leave in the morning you'll realize you forgot and then you have to plugin and wait for the car to charge. Waiting for a charge is the worst, and it should never happen for daily driving.
Maybe there's an outlet near the more convenient parking spot you can use? If not then consider having one installed there. Even a standard 110 outlet will do since your daily drive is so short.
There's no issue of battery degradation due to not plugging in every night.
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Electric700
Active Member
@gfb107 forgetting to charge one day when we need it will absolutely happen.
Plugless Power should be coming out with a version for the Model X, perhaps within the next year. You'd never have to worry about forgetting to plug in with that system, since you just park over the Plugless Power pad and then it starts wirelessly charging! More at pluglesspower.com.
That appears to be a solution looking for a problem. If you have the power available to install plugless charging, then you can install an outlet for a lot less cost and charge at higher efficiency.
It wouldn't help in this situation, and is expensive, inefficient and totally unnecessary.
The OP has charging available in his garage, but would only park in the garage every 3rd or 4th night, when the battery charge level drops below some threshold based on typical daily driving needs. The normal parking location is not in the garage, for reasons of convenience. The risk of forgetting to park in the garage and plug in is exponentially higher because it isn't part of the normal routine when parking at home.
Plugging in when I park at home became a habit within one week of ownership, because I do it every time I come home, even when I know I'll be heading back out and don't need any additional charge (and in fact it won't charge because I've set it to start charging after midnight). If I only did it twice a week it would not have become a habit I would have to think about it in order to do it.
eye.surgeon
Active Member
I have a short commute also. I only charge to about 55%. Why? Same reason I didn't fill up my ICE car every other day. Because I don't need that much range. I guess you could say I have the opposite of range anxiety. I have range confidence. I do leave it plugged in overnight regardless though.
We often forget to plug in the X. Usually it's because we come home and don't plug in because we're planning to go out again in a bit, but then for whatever reason our plans change. That's why EV range of 200+ miles is critical. Forgetting to plug in is usually not a big deal for the next day. Whereas with something like a Nissan Leaf, forgetting to plug in could really screw up the next day.
I've had a MS for a couple years and trading in for an MX Saturday. The only issue I've had in 2 years is my HPWC has broken twice. Tesla came out and fixed it the next day. But I have an 80 mile commute so I could go 3 days without charging. But when my HPWC broke, boy wad I happy to have couple day cushion.
ishop4more
Member
So far, I haven't been plugging in every night. My commute to work, round trip is 6 miles. If I also head to the gym, it's another 6 miles. In 3 weeks of driving, I've only put 400 miles in. (Yes, surprising considering I live in Houston.) Why don't I plug in every night? Because I'm often in a hurry to leave in the morning and I don't want to unplug. With my last car (hybrid), I only filled up the gas once every 2-4 weeks. For right now, I do have a "schedule" of charging . . . every Tuesday and Saturday night. The lowest "range" I've had left has been 120 miles . . . which is just under half. I planned my journeys before and I continue to do so. For the most part, I could have lived with the range of a Leaf.
Yea if I am only picking/dropping my kid off at school 2-3 times a week, it seems like it will be very inconvenient to plug and unplug every single day for 2 miles of driving. We pretty much only go out on weekend so I think it makes more sense to charge on Thursday on a weekly basis.
Do you find it inconvenient to plug in your smartphone every night and unplug it in the morning? With the car it's less than that, as you don't have to unplug it on the days you're not driving.
It's your battery, so do what you want with it, but I prefer to follow Tesla's strong recommendation to keep the car plugged in when possible.
A connected Model S is a happy Model S
Skotty
2014 S P85 | 2023 F-150L
Just plug it in when you need to. If you aren't driving it much, and only need to charge it once a week, then you only need to charge it once a week. I already do this (I'm plugged in maybe 3 nights a week). It's actually a big relief over my old Volt which I had to religiously remember to plug in every night if I wanted to drive on electrons. My Tesla has enough range I don't have to be so strict.
Cell phone is the same way. If I haven't used my phone much and it still has 85% charge at night, why bother plugging it in? I just leave it unplugged, and maybe I'll charge it the next day.
Just be careful to charge it before a day when you might have to do a lot of driving, since charging at home is slow.
Cell phone is the same way. If I haven't used my phone much and it still has 85% charge at night, why bother plugging it in? I just leave it unplugged, and maybe I'll charge it the next day.
Just be careful to charge it before a day when you might have to do a lot of driving, since charging at home is slow.
deonb
Active Member
It's actually much easier than with a Smartphone. With a Smartphone you have to remember to do this every day and the phone is still a useful device at home while it's not plugged in, which kind'a encourages you not to keep in plugged in.
With a car, it's just something you automatically do when you get home - like closing the garage door.
And the ergonomics of the Model S plug makes it so that it doesn't suffer from the USB Superposition problem:
