Charged EVs | New version of Chargeway EV routing app embeds real-time charger info for drivers

EV drivers shouldn’t have to grasp kilowatts—or drive as much as a lifeless charger. Chargeway has a solution for all that.

The Chargeway EV charging app should be the best electric-car idea you’ve never heard of. Not as well-known or as extensively distributed as Plugshare or A Higher Route Planner (ABRP), it stays among the many most graphically intuitive and best-attuned to EV drivers’ wants.

Whereas extra EV makers have constructed Tesla-style routing and charging software program into their navigation techniques, a shocking quantity don’t have it—and even fewer have it to the diploma that EV drivers may have. One instance: A sure maker has added extra particular routing amongst charging stations to its EVs by way of an over-the-air replace. However it treats all fast-charging websites as basically equivalent, no matter their charging charges, which it reveals solely in an info panel.

Chargeway 2.0

Now Chargeway has redesigned its app, releasing Model 2.0 with a wide range of updates that reply to requests from its customers and suggestions from EV drivers throughout the nation. The consumer interface has been redesigned, and the journey planner not solely takes under consideration climate circumstances and driving speeds, it recommends the optimum charging stage for every EV.

Utilizing the app nonetheless begins with the consumer choosing the EV they’re driving that day—and coming into the present battery cost share so the app is aware of exactly how far the automobile can journey initially of the route. Present Chargeway customers will discover the brand new interface acquainted, however a lot of the logic beneath the floor has been improved.

Among the many adjustments in Chargeway 2.0 are extra concentrate on the precise energy out there from a given charging station, and recommendation for EV drivers on which station(s) to make use of based mostly on the utmost charging price their particular mannequin can settle for. To make this simpler for drivers, the brand new model combines the timing required for a cost (at greater than 40 totally different charging networks) with the mapping operate to route amongst them en path to a vacation spot.

In selecting a route, this implies any station a consumer clicks on within the app will instantly present how lengthy the automobile will take to cost to the specified stage—proper within the popup—based mostly on the automobile’s particular charging curve and the current conduct of the station.

Importantly, the app now wraps within the real-time conduct of stations in most of the main North American charging networks. It reveals which chargers can be found, and that are occupied—and it gained’t route an EV driver to a lifeless or occupied charging station.

Optimizing station utilization and throughput

As well as, Chargeway 2.0 reveals a really helpful energy stage for the particular mannequin—so it gained’t ship the driving force of a Chevy Bolt EV, with a most fast-charging price of about 55 kW, to a 350-kW station if a lower-power station is open. This optimizes station utilization—and improves station throughput by matching vehicles to essentially the most acceptable charging station.

 “Anybody can place kilowatts or plug acronyms right into a brochure or software program,” mentioned Chargeway founder Matt Teske, “however that places the onus on the general public to turn into specialists in advanced calculations to grasp how charging works.”

“We’re doing all of the pondering for you,” he continued, relieving drivers from having to know the cost ranking of a station, the boundaries of a selected coupler, and the charging curve of their very own EV. “For each single model of car, all over the place in North America,” the app figures out the one actually vital factor for the driving force: how lengthy it’s going to take to cost that EV at that charging station.

Worthy of notice: Chargeway is now the only independently owned EV charging/routing app. Rivian bought ABRP in June, and charging community EVgo has owned Plugshare since July 2021.

Teske ended by quoting Steve Jobs: “It takes numerous laborious work to make one thing easy, to actually perceive the underlying challenges and provide you with elegant options.” Until or till each EV maker has equal ranges of charging consciousness inside their in-dash navigation, the brand new model of Chargeway could come closest to that mark. The brand new model of the Chargeway app is accessible in the present day in each the Google Play Retailer and the iOS App Retailer.

The Electrify Expo convention supplied airfare and lodging to allow the creator of this text to interview Chargeway founder Matt Teske concerning the new launch, on stage, for its attendees.