Charging Ahead With The Volkswagen ID.4
Welcome back. Today we’re going to be talking about one of my favorite new electric vehicles for 2021, the Volkswagen ID.4. I’ve teamed up with Volkswagen and they’ve loaned me this beautiful mythos black ID.4 first edition, so I could talk a little bit about some of the things I like about it. Now, there are a lot of features in the ID.4 that I really like, but this is State of Charge, and our favorite topic here is EV charging. Luckily charging is one of the ID.4’s best attributes. Now, electric vehicles aren’t all that different from conventionally fueled cars. However, there is one big difference, and that’s the refueling or in the case of electric vehicles, recharging process. If an EV doesn’t charge simply, if it takes too long to charge, I’m afraid the ownership experience is not going to be a pleasant one.
Luckily for ID.4 owners, that’s not the case. The ID.4 charges extremely well. We’re going to talk all about that right now, but first don’t forget, please click the subscribe button and ring that notification bell, so you don’t miss any upcoming content here on State of Charge. With electric vehicles, there’s three levels of charging, level 1, level 2, and DC fast charging, sometimes called level 3. With level 1 charging, that’s charging from a regular 120 volt household outlet. The ID.4 comes standard with a portable level 1 charging court. Level 1 charging is slow, and you can only replenish about two to three miles of range per hour of charging. Therefore, you can only add 20 to 30 miles of range when charging overnight. ID.4 owners that only drive 20 or 30 miles a day, may find that simple level 1 charging is all they need.
But for most owners, they will likely elect to get a level 2 charging station to install at their home. Once you go beyond level 1 charging, to level 2 and DC fast charging, that’s when the ID.4s robust charging capabilities are realized. If you want to charge faster at home, you need to purchase a level 2 charging station, like those that you see behind me on the State of Charge wall of chargers. Now, level 2 charging is from a 240 volt source. You can either install a 240 volt outlet to plug the level 2 charging station in, or are hard wire directly so it’s permanently mounted to the wall. When charging from a level 2 charging station, the ID.4 can accept up to 11 kW and that’s a lot of power. But if you want your ID.4 to charge at the 11 kW charging rate, it’s capable of accepting, you’ll need to purchase home charging equipment that can deliver 48 amps or more.
The ID.4 pro can replenish up to 34 miles of range per hour. When charging on a level 2 charging station, that can deliver the full 11 kW that the ID.4 can accept. Because the ID.4 has such robust level 2 charging capabilities, you can fully charge an ID.4 from a 48 amp home charging station in about seven and a half hours. However, most people won’t return home with a completely depleted battery. On most days, you’ll probably only need a couple hours to fully recharge the battery. But even if you do need to charge from a very low state of charge, the ID.4s fast level 2 charging means you can always get a full charge overnight in about seven and a half to 11 and a half hours.
As I said earlier, the refueling or recharging process is one of the biggest differences consumers are going to face when they transition to an electric vehicle. Now, the ID.4 does a great job at making that transition very easy. Now, charging on the road, the ID.4 is also an excellent DC fast charging vehicle. It can recharge really quickly along road trips, making traveling long distance no problem with the ID.4. And the best part about it is, the ID.4 comes with three years unlimited charging at Electrify America DC fast chargers.
