New technology from Chinese BYD gives electric cars a range of 400 kilometers in just five minutes of charging.
Most people associate fast charging with Tesla and its worldwide Supercharger network. But now the American company is being overtaken when it comes to charging speed.
The Chinese car manufacturer BYD has developed a new technology that, according to an analysis from Finbold, delivers four times as much power per minute as Tesla's Supercharger.
BYD's so-called Megawatt Flash Charging gives electric cars a full 80 kilometers of range for every minute the car is plugged in. In comparison, Tesla delivers 18 kilometers per minute under optimal conditions, the analysis says.
With these figures in hand, BYD is currently the fastest among the major electric car manufacturers on the market. The analysis also shows that five out of seven manufacturers surveyed perform better than Tesla when measuring efficient charging.
Tesla lags behind in charging efficiency
Several well-known car brands are ahead of Elon Musk's electric car company. This includes Mercedes-Benz, Volvo, Hyundai and China's Li Auto. Only Lucid Motors performs lower than Tesla in the study.
While BYD delivers 400 kilometers in five minutes, Mercedes-Benz can offer 33 kilometers per minute. Volvo is at 30, Hyundai at 23 and Li Auto is right behind BYD at 42 kilometers per minute. Tesla has to make do with 275 kilometers in 15 minutes.
According to Finbold's analysis, it is surprising that Tesla, which is otherwise known as the leader in the electric car market, ranks second to last in that particular measurement.
Fast charging requires the right infrastructure
However, charging speeds are not the whole story. It takes the right conditions and charging equipment to achieve the high miles per minute.
Most of the world's charging stations are still slow, and in many countries there are large differences in coverage.
This is where China stands out. The country is ahead, both in terms of the number of charging stations and the speed of charging.
Tesla still has the world's largest network of its own fast chargers with over 60,000 Superchargers globally.
BYD is currently planning just 4,000 ultra-fast charging stations, but their cars can be used with most public chargers.
