Research from DEKRA once again confirms longevity of EV batteries

• Following on from research earlier this month from Stanford University, that suggested in the real world, the lifetime of EV batteries could be 40% higher than previously realised, research from German testing company DEKRA has further bolstered these positive claims.
• DEKRA tested six individual Jaguar I-PACE models, which had all been heavily used as taxis in the German city of Munich since 2018.
• All six had relatively high mileage, ranging between around 112,000 miles and 162,000 miles – yet all returned state of health ratings within the 95-97% range.

More positive news for EV longevity

Being taxis, you can imagine that these Jaguars weren’t used gently either. The manager of the taxi company who used the I-PACE fleet told DEKRA that the EVs were charged more than once a day, and ‘always to the full capacity’ in order to maximise range – something that many manufacturers advise against doing on a daily basis, to keep battery wear down.

This research should further increase EV purchase confidence not only for those purchasing a new EV, but also those purchasing used EVs with much higher mileage. The figures were gathered using DEKRA’s 15 minute battery test app, which provides a battery health figure from both a static test and a short acceleration of around 100 metres.

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It’s a similar story to research carried out by Tesla on its own vehicles last year, with the manufacturer finding that on average, Tesla Model 3s and Ys with over 200,000 miles still had 85% of their original battery capacity remaining.

Christoph Nolte, Executive Vice President of DEKRA, commented:

“Many people, for example, transfer their experience with smartphone batteries to the topic of electromobility. They have experienced that mobile devices have a noticeably lower battery capacity after just a few years, and fear the same effect with electric vehicles. Our experience with the quick battery test shows significantly longer service lives. The drive batteries are very good overall. Even with higher mileage, we still find a ‘state of health’ of over 90 percent in most cases.”