Chinese electric car manufacturer Nio has reportedly already passed 130 million cumulative battery swaps, 88 days after the company’s CEO and founder, William Li, revealed that the company had hit 120 million battery swaps.
Nio, a premium smart electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer, has doubled down on battery swapping as the wave of the future, boasting over 4,000 battery swap stations in China alone. The company also boasts 62 stations in northern and western Europe.
William Li took to X (formerly Twitter) in August to announce that the company had surpassed 120 million battery swaps. And now, only 88 days later, Li announced again on X that the company had already surpassed 130 million battery swaps.
That works out to be 10 million battery swaps in 88 days, or around 110,000 swaps per day, according to Li.
Li’s announcement also demonstrates the pace at which Nio is rolling out its battery swap stations. In his August post on X, he revealed that he was on his way to Quanzhou to launch the 4,000th Nio Power Swap Station.
But as can be seen in the background of his latest post on X, the total number of stations had increased to 4,236.
At the time of writing, Nio Power’s official chargemap for China shows that it has already added another Power Swap Station in the approximately 15-hours since Li made his post, and swaps are already ticking past 130,055,000.
Battery swapping offers an alternative to plugging in, allowing drivers to exchange a depleted battery for a charged one at an automated station in a matter of minutes. It also allows batteries to be leased separately from the car, lowering the upfront purchase price.
The catch is that it requires compatible vehicles and a dedicated network of stations – infrastructure Nio has spent years building, while most car makers have focused on conventional charging.
For Australia, the prospect remains uncertain. Nio’s battery-swap-capable Firefly hatchback has been approved for local sale, but an Australian swapping network has yet to be confirmed. Bringing the cars here is only part of the equation, Nio would also need to invest in dedicated stations to make swapping a practical option. Until such a time, the Firefly can use conventional plug-in charging.
