ChargerHelp Report Reveals Charge Success Rate and not Uptime More Accurate Metric for EV Driver Experience

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LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sep 24, 2025--

With 64% of Americans now living within two miles of an electric vehicle (EV) charging station, ChargerHelp has released its 2025 EV Charging Reliability Report. Among other findings, the analysis concluded that uptime is a less accurate metric for assessing infrastructure functionality and that the first-time charge success rate (FTCSR) has emerged as a more accurate measure for evaluating driver experience. And while reported uptime has improved, nearly one in three charging attempts still fail, and success rates fell from 85% at new stations to below 70% by year three, showing that traditional metrics mask critical reliability gaps as infrastructure ages. The report provides the most comprehensive view of EV charging infrastructure performance, encompassing over 100,000 sessions across 2,400 chargers, with input from partners including Plug In America and Paren.

“Reliable, accessible and convenient public charging is foundational to accelerating EV adoption,” said Will Hotchkiss, GM Energy’s COO and head of public charging. “We believe that we have the ability – and responsibility – to solve the challenges with charging infrastructure, if we truly want customers to go all-electric.”

Based on key data from the report, several conclusions are made to help the industry move forward:

• FTCSR matches the driver experience: While reported charger uptime has improved (98.7 – 99.9%), only 71% of charging attempts actually succeed. More than one-third of failures occur on chargers that appear operational, and the driver experience suffers when critical charge initiations fail 30% of the time. Many chargers report 100% uptime yet still fail without multiple retries, resets, or errors, making FTCSR a more accurate and actionable metric.
• FTCSR is a better measure. Unlike uptime, which shows whether a charger is technically “available,” FTCSR reflects the true customer experience: whether a driver can successfully start charging on the first attempt.
• Aging infrastructure erodes reliability. New stations average an 85% success rate, but performance drops to 69.9% by year three, a 15-point decline that uptime monitoring fails to capture.
• Short-term fixes fall short. Hardware swaps and site refreshes can temporarily improve uptime, but do not address deeper reliability issues, underscoring the need for preventative maintenance over costly, short-lived replacements.

“Uptime tells us if a charger is available, but it doesn’t tell us if a driver can actually plug in and get a charge on the first attempt,” said Kameale Terry, CEO of ChargerHelp. “First-time charge success captures the real driver experience, and by centering on this metric, the industry can close the gap between availability and usability and build the trust needed for mass adoption.”

The findings also emphasize that while newer hardware and site refreshes can reduce downtime in the short term, they may not fully resolve underlying reliability issues because most current operational charging sites aren’t designed and maintained with future-proofing in mind. The result is compatibility and interoperability issues that do not adapt to new standards, firmware updates, and vehicle requirements to complete charging. Moving forward, the study urges industry stakeholders to rethink infrastructure planning, standardize firmware deployment, and adopt better metrics to ensure charging experiences meet driver expectations at scale. This approach could shift the focus from quick fixes to long-term resiliency, reducing both costs and disruptions while better serving drivers.

“Reliable, user-friendly charging is the linchpin of mass EV adoption, and this year’s report shows that quick fixes alone won’t get us there,” said Bill Ferro, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of Paren. “By highlighting both the risks of aging infrastructure and the opportunities in preventative maintenance and better metrics, the analysis charts a path toward long-term resiliency, one where consistent standards and future-proof planning make charging as seamless and predictable as filling up a gas tank.

While the industry is still evolving, emulating previous successes could be the key to full maturation. Along these lines, the study identifies common traits of top-rated charging sites, including higher-powered chargers, multiple ports per location, longer cables to accommodate diverse vehicle designs, streamlined payment processes, and essential amenities such as covered parking and restrooms. The success of the electric transition, it concludes, will depend not only on how quickly infrastructure is built, but on how effectively the industry can bridge the knowledge gap and deliver reliable, user-centered charging experiences.

This is the second consecutive year that ChargerHelp has published its reliability report. To view the full 2025 report, click here.

About ChargerHelp

ChargerHelp (CH) is fixing the single greatest barrier to faster electric vehicle (EV) adoption: the charging experience. As the first company exclusively dedicated to EVSE operations and maintenance (O&M), we’re working together with the entire EVSE value chain to make a positive charging experience the norm. We achieve that goal through our EMPWR technology platform purpose built for your charging station O&M needs. ChargerHelp provides flexible Reliability-as-a-Service (RaaS) solutions tailored to your specific business needs. Since its inception, ChargerHelp has maintained thousands of chargers for major networks, utilities, and OEMs across 47 states, having assessed and repaired over 30,000 EV charger failures.

For more information, visit www.chargerhelp.com.

View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250924845665/en/

CONTACT: Media Contact

Technica Communications for ChargerHelp

Luis de Leon

[email protected]

KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA CALIFORNIA

INDUSTRY KEYWORD: BATTERIES ALTERNATIVE ENERGY EV/ELECTRIC VEHICLES ENERGY AUTOMOTIVE OTHER AUTOMOTIVE TECHNOLOGY GENERAL AUTOMOTIVE

SOURCE: ChargerHelp

Copyright Business Wire 2025.

PUB: 09/24/2025 06:00 AM/DISC: 09/24/2025 05:59 AM

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