- Chinese EV manufacturer NIO’s commitment to EV battery swapping as a key part of future EV infrastructure is showing no signs of letting up, after the firm announced it has reached a milestone of 80 million battery swaps through its NIO Power service.
- This comes just four months after it reached a milestone of 70 million swaps, and so far in July, it’s been averaging around 97,000 battery swaps per day.
- NIO already operates over 3,400 EV battery swap stations across China, and is also growing its network significantly across Europe.
Driver popularity of NIO Power continues to grow
As seen on NIO’s cumulative live count of battery swaps, the usage of NIO’s battery swap facilities is continuing to grow, particularly in its home territory of China. NIO’s stations allow drivers of compatible NIO EVs to drive into a station and hot-swap the battery for a fully-charged unit in around three minutes. The swapping stations also allow drivers to have flexible battery replacements – for example, to temporarily upgrade to a higher-capacity battery for a long-distance roadtrip.
In Europe, the number of battery swap facilities operated by NIO is lower, but growing. Back in May, it celebrated the opening of its 60th European Power Swap station. NIO now operates Power Swap facilities in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, with the firm looking to expand this European network even further. Here, NIO has a particular advantage against other competitors in Europe by offering this unique battery swapping solution. However, with some of the latest and greatest ultra-rapid chargers allowing a near-full charge to take place in under 15 minutes, the convenience gap is fast closing, with European manufacturers having no imminent plans to implement similar battery swapping solutions.
NIO is not the only firm betting on battery swapping playing a key role in an EV future, complementing conventional EV charging infrastructure. Chinese battery manufacturer CATL is planning to build 10,000 of its own battery swapping stations across China, which will use a standardised protocol, opening up their use to multiple EV manufacturers. CATL and NIO also recently signed a strategic partnership on battery swapping.
