7 Best Home EV Chargers for 2023, Expert Picks

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This article was updated with new products and information in July 2023. We plan to update this piece as needed, so check back regularly.

The age of the electric vehicle is drawing nearer. As legislation from across the globe continues to push automakers towards EV exclusivity, there is a higher chance than ever that you might be considering installing an EV charger in your garage. Whether you’re an excited early adopter or a begrudging buyer, one thing is certain: you’re going to need a way to charge that battery-powered automobile.

The Hearst Autos Gear Team tested a wide range of different options at various price points, in an effort to discover the best home EV chargers available in 2023.

Things to Consider When Shopping for a Home EV Charger

There are three major factors to consider when considering a home EV charger: the output of the household circuit you're connecting to, the output of the EV charging equipment, and the rate of charging that your vehicle can handle.

We've gathered seven charging options to connect your house to your electric car that range in price from $300 to $700, all of which are compatible with any new EV on sale today. The more expensive ones tend to have Wi-Fi connectivity, which lets you monitor charging, receive alerts, and control the unit via an app. Many of these products have variants (hard-wired or plug, different output capabilities, and varying cord lengths) with slightly different prices.

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ChargePoint Home Flex EV Charger

• Output capability: 50/48/40/32/24/16 amps (12.0/11.5/9.6/7.7/5.8/3.8 kW)

• Cord length: 23 feet

• Cord management: Built-in

• Outdoor rating: Yes (NEMA 3R)

ChargePoint is one of the largest providers of public charging, with thousands of units nationwide. Its Home Flex unit tested here integrates into the same app used to connect to the company's public units. You can add your vehicle in the app, which tailors the percentage of the battery replenished and number of EPA miles added to your specific vehicle. We found the app to be very user-friendly, with the best displays for charge-rate graphs, and it also shows the total charge time and total energy output during each charge. Furthermore, it offers the ability to schedule charging times to take advantage of variable-cost electricity during off-peak hours (most EVs also allow this to be configured in their settings menu).

The ChargePoint app has the most nuanced cost tracking, allowing us to select from among dozens of possible rate plans from our local utility to pinpoint the actual cost of charging down to the penny, even when on a variable rate. We also appreciate the simplicity of the built-in notch at the top of the unit to wrap the cord around and that the plug latches onto its dock in the center; many other units require mounting a second cord-management device.

Emporia EV Charger

• Output capability: 48–6 amps (11.5–1.4 kW)

• Cord length: 24 feet

• Cord management: Included wall mount

• Outdoor rating: Yes (NEMA 4)

Emporia offers a vast library of electricity-monitoring devices, from typical smart outlets to a system that tracks every circuit in your fuse panel. This entire electricity-tracking universe is integrated into Emporia's app, including the ability to link your EV to the app through the Smartcar API. But if you're just using the EV charging equipment, navigating around all of these unused areas makes the app seem overly complex.

Otherwise, this is an impressive Wi-Fi-connected entry at a price that's hundreds of dollars less than the JuiceBox or ChargePoint. The 11.5-kW output capability is at the high end of this roundup, and short of a couple features, such as the ChargePoint's electricity pricing (the Emporia allows you to input your own cost per kilowatt-hour) or using a specific vehicle to estimate the miles or battery percentage gained, the Emporia has just about everything.

Tesla J1772 Wall Connector

• Output capability: 48/40/32/24/16/12 amps (11.5/9.6/7.7/5.8/3.8/2.9 kW)

• Cord length: 24 feet

• Cord management: Built-in

• Outdoor rating: Yes (NEMA 3R)

Even if you don't own a Tesla, the company's Wall Connector is a good option. In addition to Tesla's NACS plug, the brand now offers its home charging unit with the round J1772 plug most other EVs currently use. This new feature is somewhat ironic in light of a number of automakers recently announcing they will be adopting Tesla's NACS plug type by 2025. But even with the Tesla plug, connecting to a non-Tesla EV simply requires an adapter (such as this one from Lectron).

This third-generation Tesla charging unit has Wi-Fi capability, which allows for firmware updates but doesn't include any ability to control or monitor charging. But if you have a Tesla, any of that data and adjustability is available from the vehicle using a third-party application such as TeslaFi.Although the lack of electricity tracking is probably the biggest drawback, Tesla's home-charging unit has a few advanced features that none of the other units have. For instance, it can network multiple units together to share a single circuit where the combined output will never exceed a set threshold. Also, with the Tesla plug unit, you can choose to allow specific Tesla vehicles to charge while blocking others.

The setup process for the Wall Connector is easy; you simply scan the QR code on the side of the unit to connect to Wi-Fi and then set the output limit through a web-based interface. Surprisingly, although the Wall Connector is capable of nearly the highest output of our group (48 amps or 11.5 kilowatts), it has the thinnest, most flexible cables. We also find the Wall Connector's sleek shape and glass-like clear top layer the most visually appealing.

JuiceBox 40 Smart EV Charging Station with WiFi

• Output capability: 40/32/24/16/12/6 amps (9.6/7.7/5.8/3.8/2.9/1.4 kW)

• Cord length: 25 feet

• Cord management: Built-in

• Outdoor rating: Yes (NEMA 4X/IP66)

When we first tested these charging units in 2022, we liked the JuiceBox best. Since then, the company redesigned its app, so we gave it another go. We were surprised to find the app to be less intuitive to use. Certain features, such as showing the charge curves for past charges, are gone, and this app annoyingly logged us out far more frequently than the others. Nevertheless, the JuiceBox is still one of the most feature-rich Wi-Fi-enabled Level 2 chargers.

One small advantage for the JuiceBox is that it is offered in a number of output levels, and if your household circuit can’t take full advantage of the maximum, choosing a lesser variant can lower the price. In addition to the 40-amp version we tested, there's a 48-amp version that's at the high end of this group and a 32-amp version that costs slightly less (since we were using a 40-amp circuit, we couldn't take advantage of the JuiceBox 40's full output anyway).

Like the ChargePoint unit, the JuiceBox provides energy output and charge time for each charging session, various adjustable notifications, and the ability to set up customized charge times to take advantage of differing electricity pricing. But it can't match ChargePoint's nuanced utility pricing information or the Emporia’s low price.

Lectron 32 Amp

• Output capability: 32/16/13/10 amps (7.7/3.8/3.1/2.4 kW)

• Cord length: 21 feet

• Cord management: none

• Outdoor rating: Yes (IP67)

This Lectron is one of the cheapest options, so it's not surprising that there's no wall mount, but a simple hose reel or hook mounted to the wall could take care of that. Even though the Lectron isn't a "smart" unit with Wi-Fi capability, it has a small LCD screen that displays voltage, amperage, charge time, energy (kWh), and temperature.

This unit came with no instructions, but with only two buttons, it wasn't too hard to figure out that holding down the "+" was how to set the limit on current, which can be adjusted among 10, 13, 16, or 32 amps of output to match your wall circuit. When you plug in, charge time starts over, but the kilowatt-hour readout doesn't, so if you want to monitor individual charges to track your car's efficiency, you have to unplug and replug before every charge. If you want to track your charging fastidiously, one of the Wi-Fi-connected units is probably a better choice, and the Emporia doesn't even cost much more.

Grizzl-E Level 2 EV Charger

• Output capability: 40/32/24/16 amps (9.6/7.7/5.8/3.8 kW)

• Cord length: 24 feet

• Cord management: Included wall mount

• Outdoor rating: Yes (NEMA 4X/IP67)

The promise of the Grizzl-E Smart is that it can theoretically pair with any EV charging app that uses the OCPP (Open Charge Point Protocol) 1.6 and it's one of the cheapest smart units. Unfortunately, it took months to get ours to connect. Initially, Grizzl-E said its unit could work with either AmpUp or ChargeLab apps, but now it's only the latter. It appears that Grizzl-E has streamlined the connection process considerably since we first tried using this unit, and we were eventually able to get a firmware update and connect it to the ChargeLab app.

Grizzl-E touts the ruggedness of its beefy aluminum enclosure, with videos on its website showing a small off-road vehicle running over it (which seems completely unnecessary for a thing that's mounted on a wall in or outside your garage). It also had the thickest cables, which were consequently the most resistant to hanging up after charging. A wall mount for the cable is included.

Like the other units, this one can adjust among various output levels, but that's most difficult to accomplish in the Grizzl-E. Rather than change it via the app, you have to take off the front cover and toggle DIP switches. The unit can, however, be preordered to a specific setting to save that hassle. The cover also must be removed to reset the Wi-Fi connection, which we did at least a half-dozen times when trying to get ours to connect.

Electrify America EV Charger

• Output capability: 40/32/16 amps (9.6/7.7/3.8 kW)

• Cord length: 24 feet

• Cord management: Included wall mount

• Outdoor rating: Yes (NEMA 3R)

As with our top-pick ChargePoint unit, this Electrify America home charging station integrates with the same app used for the company's public fast-chargers (most EV owners likely already have it on their phones). Setup is easy—the app offers the ability to scan the unit's barcode to add it to your account and connect it to Wi-Fi. But the short cable that plugs into the house's outlet limits mounting options. And we're not sure why this unit is so large, but it's far bulkier than the others and still doesn't include any cord management, which is handled by a separate holster that is included and mounts to the wall. Despite that the Italian design house Italdesign is credited on the enclosure for the design, we don't think it's nearly as sleek as the Tesla Wall Connector.

After successfully tracking the first charge, our unit stopped communicating with the app, despite still indicating it was connected. After trying every possible reset, we spent a half-hour with the support line doing the same, none of which fixed the issue. After we followed instructions to send a follow-up email with a screen grab from the app, we never heard back. But even the lone time it did work, we didn't like that it doesn't display a charging curve or indicate when charging stopped. That info comes in handy when trying to manage charge-time windows to potentially take advantage of variable electricity rates and make sure the car has enough time to charge before you plan to depart (e.g., after the car is plugged in overnight, you don’t know whether it was fully charged hours before your departure or minutes before you're leaving).

How We Tested Home EV Chargers

When putting together this story, I went down the same path a new EV owner would, starting with installing a dedicated 240-volt outlet in my garage. We have a charger at the office, but I needed a proper setup at home to support all of the EVs we're reviewing these days. I was able to add a 40-amp circuit to the existing electric service in my house without a pricey upgrade to run additional capacity, so that's why I landed on a 40-amp outlet versus a 50-amp setup. To be able to easily switch among the units, we ordered the NEMA 14-50 plug-in variant of each charging device. (Note: Tesla doesn't sell a version of its Wall Connector with a plug, so to keep our test comparable, we wired one in ourselves to connect to our NEMA 14-50 outlet.)

In the first round of testing, we used each unit to charge a Tesla Model 3 numerous times over a period of months. We then compared the electricity output from the wall to what the Model 3 reported made it into its battery pack using the third-party (and very cool) TeslaFi software. Recently, we tested a few new units along with our favorites from before using a Rivian R1T, verifying the energy delivered to the vehicle via an inline electrical meter. Despite varying cord lengths and thicknesses, there was no measurable difference in performance or efficiency (which averaged roughly 5 to 8 percent charging losses).

FAQs

What are the different types of EV chargers?

Before you charge your electric vehicle, it is helpful to know what sort of options you have at your disposal. There are three main types of chargers, each with different performance levels on offer: Level 1 and Level 2 AC chargers, as well as Level 3 DC fast chargers. When it comes to at-home units, Level 1 and Level 2 offerings are by far the most common option. This is mostly due to the fact that your home is already running on an AC electrical circuit, and therefore these chargers don’t require special equipment or specialized help from your service provided during installation.

Level 1 chargers run on 120-volt AC current, and can be plugged right into a typical wall outlet. As you’d expect, this is the slowest way to recharge your EV. Speeds typically sit right around 4 kilowatts. Level 2 chargers on the other hand operate on 240-volt AC current.

While you might not think you have one of these plugs accessible in your home, chances are your dryer already operates on a 240-volt outlet. Depending on the amperage of your socket, you can expect speeds between 5.8 and 19.2 kW. Level 3 chargers are extremely high-voltage (400 to 800 volts), and are completely incompatible with the wiring in your home. They also tend to run deep into the six-figures, which is why you'll really only find these at public charging stations.

They're also capable of pilling the miles back into your battery with haste, with Tesla's Supercharger network delivering around 200 miles of range in just 15 minutes of charge time. Based on the amount of driving that you do, as well as your public charging options, either a Level 1 or Level 2 charger will be a great addition to your garage regardless.

Are all home electric vehicle chargers the same?

This one really depends on how technical you want to be. The tools that we call EV chargers are really known as electric vehicle supply equipment, and simply serve to transfer energy from your home into a vehicle. From there, the vehicle’s onboard charger will turn that AC current into some DC flow, which it uses to charge up the battery pack. In that sense, the overall function of every home EV charger is identical. That said, there are certainly some real-world differences in how these machines operate, as well as the features they provide owners.

The biggest difference between home charging options is going to come down to the overall output of the charger. These figures are measured in either amps (e.g., 32, 40, 48 amps) or power (e.g., 7.7, 9.6, 11.5 kW). The higher the output of the charger, the faster you will be able to charge.

The second major factor to consider when shopping relates to whether or not you’d like a smart charger. Backed by wi-fi connectivity, these chargers tend to offer more features such as charge reports, scheduling features for off-peak charging, and even mileage logs. Those added features tend to bring an added lump to the price tag, so it’s worth considering your actual use case.

How to choose the right charger?

Here are some of the major considerations that should go into every EV home charger purchase:

Cable Management and Length

It may seem silly, but having a convenient place to stick your charge cable after a top up is a nice feature, and one that many chargers lack. Of course you can always stick a hook in the wall should your charger of choice lack this option. What's harder to work around is the length of the charging cord, which varies dramatically between manufacturers. Depending on where you park and the overall cleanliness of your garage, a long cord might be a necessary. Furthermore, thick cords aren't as flexible as skinnier counterparts, but they are more likely to stand up to some abuse. Keep all of these factors in mind while you shop

Size

Depending on how much space you have available in your garage or outside your home, certain EV home chargers just might not fit your needs. A bulkier unit could eat up useful garage space, whereas a thinner unit would not. Measure the space in which you'd like to place the charger, and make sure the unit you intend to purchase will fit!

Weatherproof

If you're limited on garage space, you may opt to install an outdoor EV charger. While there are a ton of weatherproof units available for purchase (including every unit you see here), double check the owner's manual to ensure everything is up to par. Water and electricity is not a fun combination.

Hardwire Vs Plug-in

Once you've got a space set aside for you home EV charger, you'll need to decide whether you want a hardwired or plug-in unit. Plug-in units have gotten far more popular as more EVs hit the market, as owners can simply unplug the unit and bring them along on trips or a full-blown move. That said, a hardwired unit will still provide the same level of charging performance, albeit locked into one place.

Do I need to buy my own EV charging equipment?

This is a more personal consideration that every EV must make. You technically don't need any form of home charger to own an EV, as a typical wall outlet is capable of juicing up a car's battery pack if needed. As we've previously discussed however, that simple outlet isn't packing a ton of output behind it. If you don't drive all that much, you might be more than fine simply topping up a little bit each night, and hitting the public charger when possible. That said, people who have to do a bit more mileage might want to consider some of the home charging options you see here.

How do I wire my house to charge an EV, and how much does it cost?

The answer to this question is largely dependent on the home that you are currently living in. If you have enough electrical capacity on your property, an installation can be as low as a few hundred dollars, as you'll just need an additional dedicated electrical line.

This runs from your breaker right to the charger and ensures you have the consistent output required to charge the vehicle. You're also going to need a 40- or 50-amp circuit installed if you don't have one nearby. A NEMA 14-50 outlet; outlet works great, and allows you to unplug your charger if needed. You can also run heavy power tools on that outlet, should you have a project car in the garage as well. Qmerit is a company that provides these installation services nationwide, and is a great resource for new EV owners.

If you don't currently have enough electricity available on your property, the cost of installing a charger gets significantly more expensive. We're talking at least a few thousand dollars worth of work in order to bring you the extra juice. That's worth keeping in mind before you start tackling an EV charger install on your own.

Are there tax breaks for electric car owners who buy a home charger?

Yes. The sweeping Inflation Reduction Act reinstated a federal tax credit of 30 percent of your total costs (capped at $1000). That includes money spent on electrical upgrades and wiring to your house, in addition to the charging unit itself. This credit is currently set to be in place through 2032. In addition, there are often additional state or regional incentives, so make sure to check what's available in your area.

Which plug type should I choose for my charging equipment?

Although several automakers have announced a switch from a J1772 connector to Tesla's North America Charging Standard (NACS) design in the 2025 time frame, whether you buy a J1772 or NACS unit today doesn't limit its future compatibility. There are adapters to go from NACS to J1772 or vice versa, and with the mixed ports both on the vehicles and the public-charging infrastructure, EV owners will need to get used to keeping adapters in their vehicles to be prepared for whichever plug type they encounter.

Can charging equipment be mounted outside?

Generally, yes. Each charging unit we tested has an outdoor-grade rating according to either the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) or Ingress Protection (IP) standards. A NEMA 3R rating, like the ChargePoint and Tesla Wall Connector have, is intended for outdoor use, but does not mean watertight; under certain circumstances, moisture could potentially enter the enclosure. The NEMA 4X rating of the JuiceBox 40 and Grizzl-E is superior. The IP ratings are two digits, the first representing the unit's resistance to solids (in this case dust) and the second number representing water protection. An IP66 rating means the unit is intended for outdoor use, with complete protection from dust or high-pressure water. But an IP67 goes one step further and can be immersed in water up to three feet deep.

Another thing to keep in mind with charging equipment mounted outside is that the electrical feed line to that location must also be in an outdoor-rated enclosure and, if you’re using a plug-type unit like we tested, that the outlet's enclosure must also be rated for outdoor use.

What's the difference between a vehicle's onboard charger and an EV charger?

Although many people refer to the products reviewed here as "chargers," technically they are electric-vehicle supply equipment, or EVSE. The vehicle's onboard charger is a device that converts the AC electricity from your house to DC energy to be stored in the battery, and it determines the fastest Level 2 charging rate your vehicle can handle. No matter how much electrical output you have at your house, you can't exceed the charge rate limited by the onboard charger.

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Road & Track and its sibling publications at Hearst Autos represent three of the most influential automotive publications in the world. We rely on decades of experience in the automotive and gear spaces to help readers make informed purchasing choices.

With the legacies of Autoweek, Car and Driver, and Road & Track behind us, the Hearst Autos Gear Team is more concerned with our integrity and the trust our readers place in us than our bottom line. We won't tell you to buy something if we wouldn't buy it ourselves or recommend it to our friends, and we'll never claim to have used or tested something if we haven't.

We've evaluated dozens of products, from SIM Racing Setups and Rooftop Cargo Carriers to Affordable Watches. Our picks and recommendations of products and gear are based on testing and knowledge, not hype.

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