Tesla Cybertruck Takes Agonizing Hour and a Half To Charge On Supercharger - Video

In a new test of the charging capability of the Cybertruck, a.k.a. The “Cyberglutton,” one of the leading experts on charging, Tom Moloughney of State of Charge, has demonstrated the charging capability and charging speed of the vehicle. The specific Cybertruck that Tom tested was a Dual Motor Foundation Series. For those new to the world of Cybertruck, this is a vehicle with a six-figure price tag. The title of the video, Mr. Moloughney created is "Supercharger Cyberdud?" You can view it at our link below. 

The Cyberglutton Charging Test - Preparation and Supercharger
The test performed by Mr. Moloughney began with the truck displaying a “0” range and state of charge. He had very carefully depleted the 123-kWh battery in a long-range highway test prior to initiating the Supercharging test. It would be very hard to conduct a test with a lower state of charge without towing the vehicle to the Supercharger.

The Supercharger that Mr. Moloughney used was a V3 Supercharger, so it offers the present day best charging capability. We can see in the video how he selected a mostly empty Supercharger site to conduct his test, so as not to violate any of the many charging etiquette rules. 

The Cyberglutton’s 0-100% Charge Time On Supercharger
The Cybertruck took an hour and a half to fully charge on the Tesla Supercharger. That did not include any time for parking, connecting, un-connecting, etc. That's the actual time pulling current. You can see the time vs. State of charge (SOC) curve at timestamp 9:50 in his (outstanding) video. Our best scrutiny of the graph shows an 87-minute charge time. We’ve rounded that to an hour and a half.

Cyberglutton’s 10% to 80% SOC Charge Time
In real-world use, almost no battery-electric vehicle owner would allow their vehicle to drop below a 10% state of charge. So, we took a close look at the charging graph and observed how long it took the truck to charge from 10% up to the 80% mark that many BEV owners discontinue charging at. By our observation, the chart shows it took 44 minutes. Quite a bit longer than one might stop for lunch or to use a restroom while traveling to a destination.

Related Story: Busting the Myth That an EV Can Be Meaningfully DC Fast Charged While Using a Bathroom or Grabbing Lunch

Cyberglutton’s 20% to 80% SOC Charge Time
Similarly, to charge the Cyberglutton from 20% SOC to 80% isn’t much different. By our observation of the graph, it takes 40 minutes. This similar time to a 10% start is attributed to the vehicle’s fast charge times near the empty part of the SOC. 

Cyberglutton Only Uses About 50% of the Supercharger’s Rated Output Above 50% SOC
The Supercharger that Mr. Moloughney used had a 250 kW charge rating. If you check out the 7:30 timestamp, you can see that the Supercharger delivers that power rating from roughly 2% to 14% SOC. After the 14% SOC point, the truck can no longer make use of the Supercharger's full power rating. After the 50% SOC point, the truck is charging below half the Supercharger’s rated power output. This is not unique to the Tesla Cybertruck. All battery-electric vehicles use batteries that take in power at a diminished rate as their SOC increases. This has been true forever. As an engineering student, I observed this behavior decades ago in an EV battery research study that I conducted, and it has not changed. Electrochemistry is a hard nut to crack. 

Cyberglutton Only Uses About a Third of the Supercharger’s Rated Output Above 65% SOC
The Cybertruck’s charging curve shows that it really is only using a third of the Supercharger’s rated output after it hits its 65% SOC. 

Cyberglutton’s Charging Speed Drops Dramatically After 85% SOC
If you look at the charging curve, it is easy to see why most BEV owners are so persnickety about folks stopping public charging sessions after 80% state of charge. The curve shows a steep decline in the charging rate after 85%. Basically a straight line leading from 80kW to about 5kW as the session reaches 100% SOC. Looking back at the charge time graph, we see that to charge from 85% to 100% SOC takes a whopping 40 minutes. 

The Total Range of BEVs Is a Lie When It Comes To Road-Tripping
This test clearly illustrates that when traveling, a BEV's battery capacity is diminished to roughly 70% of its total capacity. It’s unsafe to drop below 10% SOC, and it’s not practical (or socially acceptable) to charge above 80%. Therefore, a BEV’s total range is really exaggerated by about 30% when it comes to road-tripping and relying on public DC charging. This is true of all BEVs, not just pricey Cybergluttons. 

Related Story: It Costs More To Power The Lightning Than the Hybrid Ford F-150 In This State

Comparison - Time to Fuel A Hybrid Truck vs. The Cyberglutton
Ford’s F-150 Hybrid-electric vehicle (HEV) uses only gasoline input to the vehicle plus electricity it recaptures when braking. The truck has a 704-mile range, more than double the Cybertruck that Mr. Moloughney tested. The Ford HEV truck has a 26-gallon fuel tank. It can be refilled from empty to full in roughly seven to nine minutes, being conservative. Let’s call it ten minutes to make the math easy. What this means is that an owner could input approximately 6,300 miles of range in the same time that a Cybertruck owner could fill its battery from empty to full one time. That is roughly a half-year's worth of fuel added to a hybrid truck in the same number of minutes it takes to add about 300 miles of range to a Cyberglutton. 

Conclusion - Charging Super-Expensive, Ultra-Modern BEVs Is Still Slow
The Cybertruck is the latest (greatest?) new vehicle from the company that the world of EVangelists identifies as the leader in EV technology, sales to date, and pretty much every other metric. The Cybertruck is extremely expensive. The one Mr. Moloughney took such great pains to test is not the most expensive Cybertruck one can buy. Nor is it the base model. It’s a higher trim. Even using the world’s most respected charging network, with that network’s current fastest-charging technology, it still takes about an hour and a half to charge the vehicle from empty to full. 

About Home Charging
Most EV owners charge most EVs at home most of the time. This is a fact proven by numerous studies. This story does not intend to hide that fact. Rather, it examines public "fast" charging and the length of time required to perform public charging under the best of circumstances. 

About Mr. Moloughney and State of Charge
For any reader not familiar with Mr. Moloughney’s work, he is among the most respected experts on EV charging in the world. He tests and reviews EV chargers (EVSEs) on a regular basis, and he is also constantly trying new public chargers as well.  In addition to his State of Charge channels on social media, Mr. Moloughney is a Senior Editor at Inside EVs. We hold him the highest regard and enjoy his content. We hope you will watch his video and subscribe to his YouTube channel. 

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John Goreham is an experienced New England Motor Press Association member and expert vehicle tester. John completed an engineering program with a focus on electric vehicles, followed by two decades of work in high-tech, biopharma, and the automotive supply chain before becoming a news contributor. In addition to his eleven years of work at Torque News, John has published thousands of articles and reviews at American news outlets. He is known for offering unfiltered opinions on vehicle topics. You can connect with John on Linkedin and follow his work at our X channel. Please note that stories carrying John's by-line are never AI-generated, but he does employ Grammarly grammar and punctuation software when proofreading. 

Image of Cybertruck at Supercharger courtesy of Tesla, Inc.