How long does EV charging take? A car stays 30 minutes at a typical German DC site, 133 at AC
How long does a car stay at a charger? At chargers with a CCS connector (direct current, DC), a charge point at the typical German site is occupied for 30 minutes. At chargers with a Type 2 connector (alternating current, AC) it is 133 minutes.
I wanted to know roughly how long you wait when every charge point at a charger is taken. To find out, I went through the status messages in the public live feeds over the past few weeks. For each charge point I measured how long it stayed occupied before it reported available again, and took the typical value for each site.
So this is plug-in time, not charging time. Most feeds do not report whether power is actually flowing.
What surprised me most was how alike the DC sites are. Half of all CCS sites have a typical value between 27 and 36 minutes. Type 2 sites spread out much more.
Numbers as a table
| from (min) | to (min) | CCS sites (%) | Type 2 sites (%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5.0 | 5.5 | 0.01 | 0.07 |
| 5.5 | 6.2 | 0.01 | 0.17 |
| 6.2 | 6.8 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| 6.8 | 7.6 | 0.02 | 0.16 |
| 7.6 | 8.4 | 0.03 | 0.22 |
| 8.4 | 9.3 | 0.02 | 0.26 |
| 9.3 | 10.3 | 0.0 | 0.27 |
| 10.3 | 11.4 | 0.0 | 0.22 |
| 11.4 | 12.7 | 0.02 | 0.18 |
| 12.7 | 14.1 | 0.07 | 0.41 |
| 14.1 | 15.6 | 0.08 | 0.2 |
| 15.6 | 17.3 | 0.22 | 0.44 |
| 17.3 | 19.2 | 0.73 | 0.55 |
| 19.2 | 21.3 | 1.95 | 0.55 |
| 21.3 | 23.6 | 4.71 | 0.44 |
| 23.6 | 26.2 | 15.95 | 0.48 |
| 26.2 | 29.1 | 22.27 | 0.42 |
| 29.1 | 32.2 | 18.24 | 0.38 |
| 32.2 | 35.8 | 9.91 | 0.43 |
| 35.8 | 39.7 | 7.29 | 0.7 |
| 39.7 | 44.0 | 4.78 | 0.7 |
| 44.0 | 48.8 | 3.22 | 1.03 |
| 48.8 | 54.1 | 2.62 | 1.46 |
| 54.1 | 60.0 | 1.95 | 1.45 |
| 60.0 | 66.5 | 1.58 | 1.62 |
| 66.5 | 73.8 | 1.16 | 1.96 |
| 73.8 | 81.9 | 0.92 | 2.56 |
| 81.9 | 90.8 | 0.81 | 3.61 |
| 90.8 | 100.7 | 0.54 | 5.11 |
| 100.7 | 111.7 | 0.35 | 6.84 |
| 111.7 | 123.9 | 0.15 | 8.91 |
| 123.9 | 137.4 | 0.18 | 12.34 |
| 137.4 | 152.4 | 0.1 | 12.88 |
| 152.4 | 169.0 | 0.04 | 11.37 |
| 169.0 | 187.4 | 0.02 | 8.97 |
| 187.4 | 207.8 | 0.01 | 4.55 |
| 207.8 | 230.5 | 0.03 | 2.46 |
| 230.5 | 255.7 | 0.02 | 1.54 |
| 255.7 | 283.6 | 0.0 | 0.95 |
| 283.6 | 314.5 | 0.0 | 0.87 |
| 314.5 | 348.8 | 0.0 | 0.69 |
| 348.8 | 386.8 | 0.0 | 0.54 |
| 386.8 | 429.0 | 0.0 | 0.28 |
| 429.0 | 475.8 | 0.0 | 0.32 |
| 475.8 | 527.8 | 0.0 | 0.36 |
| 527.8 | 585.3 | 0.0 | 0.07 |
| 585.3 | 649.2 | 0.0 | 0.01 |
| 649.2 | 720.0 | 0.0 | 0.01 |
Embed
Chart under CC BY 4.0, free to use with attribution.
<a href="https://ladepark.app/en/blog/how-long-does-ev-charging-take"><img src="https://ladepark.app/blog/assets/occ-05-duration-ccs-vs-type2.en.light.svg" alt="Distribution of plug-in time per site: CCS sites form a narrow peak around 30 minutes, Type 2 sites a wide one around 133 minutes" width="800"></a><br>Chart: Ladepark (https://ladepark.app/en/blog/how-long-does-ev-charging-take), CC BY 4.0. Data: DEU curve pack, charge_duration; MobiData BW OCPDB (DL-DE-BY-2.0), Hamburg UDP (DL-DE-BY-2.0), Mobilithek (CC0)Then I checked whether more power means shorter stops. It does, but only up to 150 kW. Above that, little changes: even at sites with 400 kW or more, a car typically stays about 27 minutes.
Numbers as a table
| Power (kW) | Sites | 25% (min) | Median (min) | 75% (min) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| <50 | 65 | 46.0 | 57.0 | 84.0 |
| 50-99 | 2127 | 31.0 | 37.0 | 52.0 |
| 100-149 | 393 | 29.0 | 33.0 | 41.0 |
| 150-199 | 2307 | 27.0 | 30.0 | 35.0 |
| 200-299 | 801 | 26.0 | 28.0 | 31.0 |
| 300-399 | 2646 | 25.0 | 28.0 | 31.0 |
| 400+ | 738 | 25.0 | 27.0 | 30.0 |
Embed
Chart under CC BY 4.0, free to use with attribution.
<a href="https://ladepark.app/en/blog/how-long-does-ev-charging-take"><img src="https://ladepark.app/blog/assets/occ-06-ccs-duration-by-power.en.light.svg" alt="Dots per power class: plug-in time at CCS sites falls from 37 minutes at 50 to 99 kW to 30 minutes at 150 to 199 kW and stays almost the same above" width="800"></a><br>Chart: Ladepark (https://ladepark.app/en/blog/how-long-does-ev-charging-take), CC BY 4.0. Data: DEU curve pack, charge_duration; DEU search pack (max_power_w); MobiData BW OCPDB (DL-DE-BY-2.0), Hamburg UDP (DL-DE-BY-2.0), Mobilithek (CC0)On AC, the time of day matters. A session that starts at 10 p.m. lasts a median of 8.3 hours, one that starts around noon 2.0 hours. The DC curve, by contrast, looks almost the same all day.
Numbers as a table
| Hour (local) | AC median (min) | DC median (min) |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 351.8 | 24.5 |
| 1 | 315.9 | 25.8 |
| 2 | 262.0 | 28.2 |
| 3 | 132.6 | 30.6 |
| 4 | 108.1 | 30.0 |
| 5 | 209.0 | 28.4 |
| 6 | 204.2 | 27.1 |
| 7 | 222.2 | 27.1 |
| 8 | 197.4 | 28.2 |
| 9 | 146.2 | 28.7 |
| 10 | 121.1 | 29.2 |
| 11 | 117.0 | 29.6 |
| 12 | 120.7 | 29.6 |
| 13 | 120.0 | 29.1 |
| 14 | 114.0 | 28.5 |
| 15 | 107.6 | 27.6 |
| 16 | 106.5 | 27.3 |
| 17 | 119.0 | 26.8 |
| 18 | 131.3 | 26.4 |
| 19 | 135.0 | 25.7 |
| 20 | 158.1 | 25.1 |
| 21 | 219.3 | 24.1 |
| 22 | 499.9 | 23.8 |
| 23 | 466.5 | 24.1 |
Embed
Chart under CC BY 4.0, free to use with attribution.
<a href="https://ladepark.app/en/blog/how-long-does-ev-charging-take"><img src="https://ladepark.app/blog/assets/occ-19-duration-by-start-hour.en.light.svg" alt="Two lines over the day: an AC session that starts at 10 p.m. lasts a median 8.3 hours, one at noon 2.0 hours; DC stays under an hour all day" width="800"></a><br>Chart: Ladepark (https://ladepark.app/en/blog/how-long-does-ev-charging-take), CC BY 4.0. Data: ClickHouse status_events (export 2026-11-07); DEU search pack (evse.current_kind); MobiData BW OCPDB (DL-DE-BY-2.0), Hamburg UDP (DL-DE-BY-2.0), Mobilithek (CC0)What this means for drivers
If you arrive at a full fast charger, you rarely wait long: at any hour, three in four DC sessions are over within 49 minutes. An AC charger that is taken in the evening, on the other hand, is usually not free again until the next morning. Each site's page shows its typical plug-in time.
Method and data
Plug-in time per site (the first two charts): the charge_duration table of
Ladepark's curve pack, status changes measured over 28 days from the German
live sources MobiData BW OCPDB and Hamburg UDP (both DL-DE-BY-2.0) and
Mobilithek (CC0). An occupancy starts when a charge point changes from a
free state to occupied (charging, reserved or blocked) and ends when it
reports available again. Occupancies under 3 minutes or over 12 hours do
not count, nor do those that overlap a data source blackout. Per site and
connector type the median of all occupancies is taken, if there are at
least 30. Counted are
9,136 CCS and
15,355 Type 2 sites. The power
class is the site's maximum power from the search pack
(9,077 CCS sites with a power
value).
Duration by time of day (the third chart): status changes from the same sources over the 8 weeks to 7 November 2026. Only status changes that arrived at most 6 hours after their timestamp are counted; Ladepark's backend treats older ones as a re-publication of an old state, not as a fresh change. A session is a change from available to charging whose next change at the same charge point is from charging back to available. Sessions last between 3 minutes and 24 hours; AC or DC per charge point comes from the search pack. Counted are 2,977,424 AC and 7,483,052 DC sessions.
Ladepark shows on a map how many charge points are free right now, and when a site is usually free. The iPhone app is free in public testing: get it on TestFlight.