What you should know about EV charging accessories in 2024

Compared to internal combustion vehicles, EVs are pretty simple creatures. There are fewer systems to worry about as well as considerably less moving parts. This simplicity doesn’t mean that there isn’t a whole panoply of accessories that you can buy for your EV, though. The real question is whether or not you should.

The question of whether or not you should buy third-party accessories for your electric car is sort of a loaded one. Sure, there are some theoretical situations where having a charge adapter in your trunk might get you out of a sticky situation, but there are also really dangerous charging adapters that could damage your car or get you killed. 

Knowing which products are well-engineered and safe isn’t always easy either, but there are a few good rules you can follow to help improve your chances of getting something decent. The first is that if something is super cheap, it’s probably junk at best or dangerous at worst. For example, if a J1772 to North American Charging Standard (NACS) adapter is $30, then it’s safe to say that there hasn’t been a great deal of engineering put into it or thought put into how it’s made.

Another red flag is that if an accessory is made to circumvent some kind of safety feature, it’s probably a really bad idea to use it. EVs operate with potentially lethal amounts of current, and while charging according to manufacturer guidelines with properly functioning equipment is totally safe, once you go outside that box, you’re on your own.

Below, we’ll discuss the types of EV charging accessories available and how to pick the best for you.

Electric vehicles in America almost exclusively use one of three charging standards to get their juice:

• J1772 is the most common charging plug in use in the US today and is usually paired with another plug to become the Combined Charging Standard (CCS) for DC fast charging. 

• The North American Charging Standard (NACS), pioneered by Tesla, is becoming more widely adopted by other manufacturers. 

• CHAdeMO was popularized by the Nissan Leaf and is still in use by some Japanese manufacturers

Understanding the role of adapters

Charge adapters are made to allow a vehicle made with one connector – say, J1772 – to charge at a station that uses another standard, like NACS. These adapters not only make the car and charger interface physically, but they're wired to allow charging to occur despite the different plug designs, sometimes called pinouts, for each standard.

The best and safest use case for these adapters is to give you a bit more freedom when you're choosing an in-home wall-mounted L2 charger. Tesla’s charger is very well regarded in terms of build quality and features, but if you don’t have a Tesla, you can’t use it without an adapter. 

You can also use charging adapters at public charging stations, but even the best ones will reduce your overall charging efficiency and you should only use them in emergency situations.

Pricing data for EV charger adapters from EnergySage Marketplace:

Charging extension cables are fairly self-explanatory. They feature a male end that plugs into your vehicle and a female end that accepts the plug from a charger. Most cables are between 20 and 40 feet in length, and good ones meet the IP66 standard for water and dust resistance. These cables will often limit your charging amperage as well, so charging speed will suffer.

The best use case for one of these is when you’re taking an extended trip in your EV where you’ll have to charge multiple times. Given the less than reliable state of America’s EV charging network, finding a working charger could mean dealing with it being blocked by a non-electric vehicle or situated such that you can’t position your vehicle’s charge port close enough for the charger’s cable to reach.

Those situations aren’t super likely and charging extension cables are expensive, heavy and take up a lot of space. If you do buy one, make sure you’re buying the correct cable for your car’s charging standard and one that’s from a reputable manufacturer.

Pricing data for EV charging extension cables from EnergySage Marketplace:

Cable guards are pretty much exactly what they sound like. They’re devices which wrap around your cable in some way to protect it from damage. Most are designed to stop your garage door from closing on a cable if your charger is in the garage and your car is outside of it while offering the security of a closed garage door.

Considering that these aren’t electrical and they’re pretty simple devices, we don’t really have any caveats for buying or using them. If your specific charging situation necessitates something like this where the alternative is just letting your garage door repeatedly close on your charging cable, we say go for it.

If you're a renter and you can’t have a dedicated NEMA 220-volt socket installed for your Level 2 charger, some companies have a solution for you in the form of socket splitters. These work like a power strip, but for NEMA sockets. So, for example, if you have one NEMA socket in your garage for your clothes dryer, but you want to add an EV charger, one of these would allow you to have both plugged in at the same time.

As to whether these are a good idea, again, it comes down to whether or not you’ve gotten a quality splitter. A good one of these will cut power to the non-EV charger circuit when a vehicle is plugged in, ensuring that enough current is available for your car. Cheap ones could potentially overload and start a fire.

There are a few different kinds of portable EV charging stations, and most of them are expensive commercial units meant for roadside emergency vehicles or other temporary charging stations. The ones you’d likely be considering as an EV owner essentially look and work like the 110-volt Level 1 charger that likely came with your EV, only they use a 220-volt NEMA plug and deliver Level 2 charging speeds.

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with using one of these, especially if you can’t install a dedicated wall-mounted L2 charger, you’re again going to have to look for one from a reputable manufacturer and you’re going to need to know whether you have a three-prong NEMA 10-30P plug or a NEMA 14-50P four-prong plug before buying. Also, don’t expect wallbox performance from a portable charger, or wallbox longevity either.