The Cold Hard Truth of Driving a Tesla in Winter

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Tesla cold weather winter tips for Model 3/Y/S/X Cybertruck owners!
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[@aslye]

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[@cgamiga]

For very cold temps, some big ones are to pre-condition/heat the cabin (and battery) before departure, while plugged in.... all that heating up uses shore power, rather than battery range, and once warm, is easier to stay warm. Also, supercharge on ARRIVAL of a long trip, eg before you go sleep in hotel (unless it has available level2 chargers overnight)... you want to supercharge while the battery is nice and warm from driving (and it can be preconditioned driving). If you wait until morning, when the battery is cold-soaked overnight, it will be very slow charging power/rates, and may even take like 30mins just to warm up the battery before ANY range added (if batt is VERY cold/near frozen sitting all day/night in cold)

[@francoisbessing]

As someone who has been preparing to be a first-time Tesla owner I have looked through many videos by many people. I live in Upstate NY and the Winters can be brutal. Yours is the first video I've encountered that comments on the reality of owning a Tesla in the Winter and how to get the best efficiency possible and focus on making the experience positive. I appreciate this. I have subscribed and will continue to learn about my Tesla using your videos. Best wishes!

[@kevinandabbie]

We have 2 Teslas living in Minnesota & I think people think about this wrong most of the time. Yes, they get lower efficiency just like a gas car in winter. But the only way you really know is because they provide so much data about your efficiency for every trip. Unless you're hyper-aware & resetting thr trip counter on a gas car, you just never know how bad winter mileage is. So the efficiency is less but does that affect how you have to drive an EV in winter? Except for very specific use cases, it doesn't. You get in & drive wherever you need to go all day then come back home & plug in at night. In 2 winters, we've had 1 really cold day (high of 2°F) that we ran errands all day & went from 80% to 10% at the end of the day & only drove 120 miles. While I will totally agree that is disappointing range, it still didn't stop us from getting everything done.

[@kevinandabbie]

Our experience is the heating & cooling cycles are the hardest on the battery drain. Drive 30 miles, stop for an hour, then repeat. You expend extra juice warming everything up each time you get back in the car & that's where the juice goes. But unless you drive more than 120 miles of this cycling on a regular basis, you just do you think then come home that night, plug in, & wake up charged (assuming you have home charging). As for road trips, once the car is warm in winter, it recovers most of it's efficiency. I've combed through my Teslafi data & on our winter trips, the first leg to a Supercharger uses quite a bit more energy preconditioning. But then you plug in & Supercharge which cooks the battery. The next leg, the cabin heater pulls heat from the battery (assuming you have a heat pump model) & our efficiency increases halfway back to summer levels. It will drop a little when you precondition for subsequent stops but things stay relatively warm so the penalty drops. So my bottom line is if you do multiple short trips over 120 miles a day in a place with temps below freezing, winter could pose some challenges. But the cold will probably have less effect on your day to day than you think!

[@kevinandabbie]

If this is helpful: '23 Model X Winter road trip: 1st leg 10°F, 85 miles, preconditioning 97%: 492Wh/mi 2nd leg 4°F, 110 miles, 0% preconditioning: 368Wh/mi Summer road trip on the same route (slightly different start/end points but same route & charger) 1st leg 74°F, 115 miles, 10% preconditioning: 330Wh/mi 2nd leg 76°F, 120 miles, 0% preconditioning: 337Wh/mi So the same trip in really cold versus almost perfect summer temps (comparing post Supercharging), we only increased from 337Wh/mi to 368Wh/mi (9%). Before that 1st Supercharge, we were much higher at 492Wh/mi (46%) in the winter. So it took 61% (winter) versus 43% (summer) to make the 1st leg to the charger which did reduce our range but after warming up charging, the penalty was pretty negligible.

[@dmayfield125]

Honestly, I lived in my apartment for 8 months before I moved to our current house. I was on the first floor and ran a 50', 10 gauge, extension cord, across my porch, through the grass, to a parking spot. If I did my normal commute to and from work (30 minutes), I was able to trickle charge from the time I got home and would be right at 80% by the time I woke up. Obviously, this isn't the case for everyone but I made it work for me. So it CAN be done. You just have to have the right situation.

[@BigDaddyInKS]

Kudos to you for this video Andy Slye, and for including both home or work charging as a convenience of owning an EV. Sooooo many EV owners say if you don't have home charging you shouldn't own an EV. That is one of the biggest myths of all. I've lived in an apartment without home charging for 19 months now with zero issues or regrets and I don't rely on public charging. I charge at work daily for free using my L1 charger, which easily covers my 34 mile round trip commute. On my days off I'll charge at one of the many free public L2 chargers in KC where I live while I'm grocery shopping, shopping at the mall, seeing a movie, eating at a restaurant, doing my laundry, etc.

[@Kareem-cx4fi]

You should have level 2 home charging if you own an EV. It makes zero sense to me when i see people who own an EV and are spending 40+ minutes 2-3 times a week at a public charger. You waste your time, you pay 2x-5x more money to charge than home, possibly close to gas prices depending on where you charge.. you can't precondition off the grid to save your battery during extreme temperatures... It takes so much away from the convenience of owning an EV. If you don't have access to home charging, just get a hybrid, or even a plugin hybrid. EVs aren't convenient for everyone's situation.

[@acolon8999]

4 months before taking delivery of my BEV, I installed a Wall Connector on my side of the garage, a Nema 14-50 on my wife's side for her BEV and another Nema 14-50 outside the garage. I know the benefits of Level 2 charging but I also have many friends that change at home on a Level 1 set up. Level 2 is ideal but not necessary for everyone.

[@battery_wattage]

Well some Tesla owners who got 6/12 months of free supercharging, or those few model s/x owners who get unlimited supercharging find the wait worth it. I don’t understand people who want an EV so much that they just deal with the inconveniences of public charging. I really want one and only will get one because I can charge from my home. If not, just a nice normal hybrid would have been my next vehicle.

[@badtoro]

This

[@The_DuMont_Network]

@battery_wattage If you cannot get an EV, forget hybrids and get a reliable American branded ICE. Owning a hybrid is like trying to be half pregnant. A false economy, they make no sense. "normal hybrid "... What an oxymoron.

[@DerekOldfield]

Can you charge outside in the driveway? I assume public superchargers get used in inclement weather. We don't park in our garage but I could get a 14-50 plug in our garage.

[@NRV44]

I have been using EV since 2015 and I never had to think this deeply about EV batteries. I charge 95% at home and 5% superchargers. I let the smart car do it own thing and let it analyze what it needs to do. You will get alert on what to do so just drive.

[@The_DuMont_Network]

Finally someone agrees with me that sometimes EV ownership is not a one size fits all apply anywhere concept. I have bought three model 3s for me and my family. It works for us, we all charge at home, we handle the winter, and it's all good. I have friends who are cliffdwellers and own Teslas. They have a well thought out plan for charging and are happy as poule d'eaux in canaries' cages. Owning and operating an EV takes a little different thought. If you're either not willing to give a little thought or just can't work out a solution, then God bless you, and enjoy your ICE machine. No harm, no foul.

[@svtraversayiii9453]

Thanks for the video! Your thoughts that it is universally not a good idea to have an EV unless you can charge at home or work are not strictly true. Urban superchargers (the 72kw kind) have very reasonable electricity rates where I live. Also, my city has many L2 chargers in downtown parking garages that sell electricity below home rates and don't require payment for parking at night. It all depends how EV friendly your location is. I wouldn't trade my Tesla for anything and keep it charged easily with public facilities.

[@ezpoppy55]

Excellent tips, Andy. I love my ‘21 M3 SR+! Getting in my warm car is soooo nice. A couple years ago when I was visiting in Louisville I had the chance to charge three, as well as Lexington, Elizabethtown, and Beaver Dam, KY. Never an issue getting plugged in and charged. Keep up the great work as always!

[@grannietesla]

Hi Andy, I was hoping and waiting for you to put a video together about driving a Tesla in the cold. As always, you were very informative and honest. Someone on my channel asked about driving in the cold and I referenced this video. Between your video and the recent Tesla software upgrade, people are learning what it's like to drive an EV. Bravo.

[@jaborisBell]

He explained it so well. About the car 💯💯💯

[@Whimsy4fall]

I haven’t upgraded my home charger yet, still using the regular 120 outlet with my mobile charger. But I will be getting the wall charger eventually especially since I live north of Chicago and when we had that severe cold spell, my home charger couldn’t keep up. After a couple days I stopped at a super charger because I didn’t want to be one of those people that got stranded. I completely agree if you can’t charge at home, you should reconsider getting an EV.

[@frederick6886]

You’re absolutely right, Andy! I’m in Chicago in an apartment with 10 superchargers on the top floor of my parking garage. I saw the lines 3+ Teslas deep for 72 hours straight. If you can’t charge at home/in garage with at least a 120V outlet, owning an EV in an urban environment w concentrated # of other EVs might not be the right choice as of today 2/9/2024 As public fast charging options increase, this becomes less and less of an issue.

[@powerstrokemikey]

Like you Andy love my Tesla.. i charge at home with excess solar.. love it never need to stop at a charging station yet..

[@frecklesx20]

I get 30% less range in the winter. Even more in subzero weather.

[@Skyprince27]

I had 40% range loss at -11C on the highway, which basically means if you’re using Superchargers, it’s costing similar per kilometre as a gas car i.e. not-drivable in practice under those conditions. In some provinces in Canada, it can stay below -11C as the day’s high for a month.

[@sun1234567890]

There is a solution. Gas stations should also have EV charging stalls. What an idea!

[@francoisbessing]

Agreed!

[@tenibrosity3425]

That will cause so much back up in bigger cities

[@Gabriel_Fonseca]

Thanks for the video. I've been waiting for someone who talks about it.

[@alanmay7929]

Lol!!!!! So the manufacturer never talked about it?!

[@wvc72]

You are absolutely correct and I will be 5 years my car in 10 days and I just loved it and I just wished why haven't I had Tesla 30 years ago? Unfortunately they didn't make them then. Love your videos.

[@isaacbarret3454]

Thank you for the video. I hope all the people asking me if my Tesla had issues in the snow, after they saw the news about the hand full of teslas in Chicago. 😂

[@haqk4583]

The mobile charger plugged into a regular outlet at home is enough. Just plug in your EV when you get home from work and it will be charged and ready the next day. Basically the same as plugging in your phone every night.

[@BestskaterMorris]

Thanks for the input. I will definitely purchase a moble charger when i get my Tesla.

[@Skyprince27]

For the first time this winter, I drove my Model 3 in moderate freezing rain at -8C on the highway. The defroster went to High, but couldn’t keep the windshield clear; forcing me to shoot the blue juice every 60 seconds. I used 165km of range for a trip of less than 70km. Not an experience I would ever wish to repeat

[@cgrscott]

I was posting this rant in the comments section of some news sites and some KZbin Channels. (Speaking of the Tesla owners in Chicogo having charging issues in the winter time) "EV ownership was never meant for people who live in a 5th floor apartment, with their EV parked in the street, because only fast charging, with public Superchargers, was never meant to be the norm for EV ownership. If all of your charging is done only with public fast chargers, the battery life on your EV, over time, will not be practical. The only way to get your original Tesla battery to have acceptable range, after 200k of service, is to slow charge it at home overnight and only use public fast chargers when you are doing long road trips. EV ownership is only practical if you can plug your EV into your home overnight with a slow charger, either in your garage or outside in your driveway while your EV is plugged into your house. EV ownership can be practical for some but, it should be voluntary and not be forced by the Federal Government."

[@vinnie_rivera]

I have the basic charger $250 And I plugged it in rn @61% And it’s tell me it’s over 24 hrs! To get to 80% is that usually how that works?

[@SonnyChanhvongsak]

I go from 210 Wh/mi in the summer to upwards of 350+ Wh/mi in below zero winters in MN

[@cdnclassiccargarage6620]

What about winter tires? Have you tried them? Do they impact range?

[@paulrandolph8469]

In really cold places, they can fill the tires with nitrogen which does not lose PSI in the cold the way oxygen does.

[@jkimo1178]

Do you think AWD is a must? Or is RWD sufficient?

[@scottmckenna]

I couldn’t agree more about the fact that if you don’t have home charging available, don’t get an EV. Period. Yes, there are a lot of superchargers, but relying on them as your way to charge every day is not just annoying, but also won’t save you money like home charging does. If you can’t charge at home, EV’s aren’t your best choice.

[@robertsteich7362]

Hi Andy, if possible. Can you plug in at home using the 120VAC plug during a cold snap? To monitor where the energy went. Would it go to the battery heater instead of actually charging? I’ve heard many of these folks had only 120 VAC at home, hence their issue.

[@cgamiga]

120v only gives around 1-1.5KW of power, in freezing temps (especially if plugged in outside, not in protected garage),... all that power will go to warming the battery, not adding miles. You really need level2 for adding range in freezing temps. But, of course, it WILL help some, prevent lost range over cold night, and keep batt warm, and help preheat cabin before departing, on "shore" power w/o losing range..

[@timmikep1978]

I currently that I have a 23 Jeep GC 4xe, I have a Vevor level2, on a 40amp breaker. What would I need to do, if I buy a Tesla?

[@cgrscott]

Very good clarity in your latest video , Andy, about the practicalities of owning a Tesla in the Winter Time. I look foreword to your first review of a borrowed Cybertruck sometime in 2024.

[@jkimo1178]

What if your car must be parked outside (no garage).... does that have a substantial effect?

[@147427]

I have the same exact portable air compressor, got it for $30 from amazon

[@edl617]

We got a hybrid and live in Louisville Kentucky too. The range in MPG during the winter has gone down. Expected.

[@notvaporlocked5479]

There is a lot of FUD with regenerative braking on slick roads. Can you do a demonstration to alleviate those fears.

[@anna-vn8cc]

Are you shareholder with Tesla TSLA

[@gregp.7148]

We need the new CATL LFP batteries that don’t have those cold temperature issues. (Comment #1! 😉)

[@vinaykrishna4862]

Very helpful, thank you from down under from Australia

[@AnthonyRose]

I've charged at that springhurst super charger several times! and EVERY time theres a dingus in a Model S pulled forwards in the trailer spot. 🤣 (Also, if you ever need another 2018 red Model 3 for your videos, let me know. )

[@Exciteduser]

Thanks for an accurate and complete summary.

[@jalexand007]

Ice cars lose range in the winter too but no one says anything. Glad you did. Does your Tesla have a heat pump?

[@gerradfay4274]

Wow. Your video was very informative. I recently got the Tesla bug. Am very interested in the 24 Tesla model 3 performance. (Would be more first EV ever). I live in the northern suburbs of Chicago. And, I do remember the whole winter situation with people and there charging issues. I really like the home charging ability. I hope I can do that if I decide to buy a Tesla or any new EV. Where I work they have 2 charging stations available. I wonder if I would have to buy a different adapter since there not Tesla chargers. Your winter Tesla owning experience and tips was very helpful.

[@bnbowes]

Seat heaters, great hack, but how do you turn off HVAC and only turn on seat heaters?

[@cgamiga]

Long-press the HVAC temp display, turns fans/HVAC off completely. Works great if you pre-heat the cabin before departure, then use seat heaters during drive, stays decently warm. You may have to re-enable it for defrosting windows temporarily

[@bnbowes]

@@cgamiga thanks. I've tried this but then when you touch the temperature control to turn the seats on the HVAC and fans come back on? 🤷

[@scottyplug]

Well done and well said.

[@briansung3036]

Great review Thank you..

[@Viraaj1KSP_]

When I saw the thumbnail I was thinking that the traded his Model Y Long Range for a Model Y Performance😅

[@olegvihodets8680]

I bought model y last year and no problems yet . Charging at home every night. Have two SUVs in garage but every one wants to drive a tesla so other car just sits in garage. In tree month tesla has over 7k miles already

[@anna-vn8cc]

Are you shareholder with Tesla TSLA?

[@Elchicoo]

How does FSD handle train and tram stops?

[@richb134]

Great video Thanks

[@kevinerickson2595]

I traded my volt in for model 3 today

[@jason.campbell474]

Ever heard of winter blend gasoline?

[@Holt0216]

5:30 6:40 ?? It seems like youre saying contradicting things. Could you clarify?

[@casperhansen826]

One explains the difference between normal and winter driving, the other explains common things to do to save energy all year around

[@19jessejames83]

You live in Kentucky. Your cold winter is 30°. Were that in Chicago where all the teslas we're freezing up? That was below 30 and that's about average for us in this area. I'm in Wisconsin, it is nothing for us to have 40 to 50 below 0 on average at any given time. So quit saying that you get a super cold winter when you don't know what cold is.

[@withinthecage5718]

You obviously have never been stationed at fort Knox, it gets extremely cold in kentucky. maybe not necessarily chicago cold, but for sure cold enough to be realistic.

[@77racing71]

@@withinthecage5718 clueless u are

[@paulgnc24]

So about %14 more energy in winter.

[@eshepley]

What is your home charger? Not Teslas…..

[@javierarizola13]

Oh helllll nooooo lol. Bundle up and use lowest seat warmer?! 😂😂😂 in a $40-50K car?!?! GMFU

[@nannettewhite1653]

❤

[@stephenbrickwood1602]

When the home robotic vacuum cleaner can teach the selfparking EV to selfplug-in at home or work we will all be laughing. 😊😊😊😊 Renewable electricity all day long. Hahaha. Take home a night-full of electricity at the end of the day. Rapid chargers will be on the main roads and at corner stores. Hahaha 👍 Hahaha 😊😊😊

[@xeritin]

I just can’t accept this type of car. I will stick to gasoline or diesel.

[@anthonybrown1322]

Gas is still better

[@DS_37]

I agree. But I’m getting tired of sitting in traffic for two hours a day. So I might just get a Tesla… maybeeeeeeee

[@cyndy3516]

😢 Promo`SM

[@ianbladuell2694]

Old news

[@77racing71]

Tesla PURE Garbage ..Another geek giving his dilluted thoughts