China’s National Energy Administration (NEA) has revealed that the country is now home to 18.645 million charging points.
In a short note published on its Chinese-language website on Wednesday, the NEA said that, as at the end of October, the number of charging points – what it refers to as individual “guns” – had increased by 54 per cent from the same period in 2024.
Of the 18.645 million charging points, 4.533 million are public charging ‘guns’, a year-over-year increase of 39.5 per cent, and 14.112 million are private charging ‘guns’, a year-over-year increase of 59.4 per cent.
The registered power capacity of all China’s EV charging points is 124 million kilovolt-amperes (kVa).
To put the number of chargers in perspective, data published in July by Car News China pegged the number of ‘new energy vehicles’ (NEVs) – a term covering both battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and plug-in hybrid EVs (PHEVs) – at 36.9 million, with BEVs accounting for around 69.2 per cent.
That works out to be around two cars per every EV charging point, and around 8 cars per every public charging point.
Joshua S. Hill is a Melbourne-based journalist who has been writing about climate change, clean technology, and electric vehicles for over 15 years. He has been reporting on electric vehicles and clean technologies for Renew Economy and The Driven since 2012. His preferred mode of transport is his feet.