From “Engineering Explained.” He says that as you charge/discharge, the random orientation of microcrystalline structure in the battery combined with expansion/contraction due to Lithium migration results in forming cracks in the particles, which then results in reduced battery capacity. I’ve been letting my battery get down to 50% or so before bothering to charge back up to 80%, I may default to 70% and charge after every trip instead. (For a Volvo with NMC chemistry I’m not sure if I have “high nickel content” and would benefit form staying below 75% or not.)
Bullshit. This is 2024. If your EV requires you to do anything other than plug it in to charge, it’s not designed correctly. The on-board software and hardware in an EV is designed to charge your vehicle optimally, just like the charge controller in any common laptop.
It’s actually true - Any battery has a nominal percentage at where to both discharge and charge to, to extend battery life by a great deal.
E.g for your phone, it’s roughly at 30% to discharge to and 70-75 to charge to.
You don’t have to do this though!
And think about it … if Elon can sell you a new battery faster than expected … It’s not like there’s any reason for him to tell you about this 😂
What many people don’t seem to get is that the phone will lie to you for your own benefit, reporting 100% full when it is actually 75-80%, and adapting that as the battery ages. So you usually don’t need to do this manually.
There is a difference between requirements and best practices though. There are some things that rarely impact me one way or another, so I’m happy to do it as feasible.
Like, setting an 80% charge limit. I’m in no way required to do that, but I typically drive 50 miles a day or less. That’s about 20% of my battery capacity. I plug into a charging setup every night that can bring my battery from 0-100% while I sleep. So I really don’t care if that 20% capacity usage means I go from 100-80% or 80-60%. For those days, I’m happy to set an 80% charge limit. I’m not required to, and when I have a day of over 100 miles planned (doesn’t usually happen spontaneously) I’ll bump it up to 100% because my car works for me and it’s designed to do that if needed.