China adds fewer private and public charging points for EVs
At the end of September, China had 24.8 million charging points for electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids.
China added nearly 4.7 million electric-vehicle charging points in the first nine months of 2026, 10.7% fewer than in the same months of 2025, according to the China Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Promotion Alliance (中国电动汽车充电基础设施促进联盟), an industry group based in Beijing. Public additions fell hardest: 490,000 public charging points were added, down 45.4% from about 897,000 one year earlier. That leaves charger makers and installers with fewer new charging points to supply in China than a year earlier.
Private (home) chargers slipped too. Their additions fell 3.5% from a year earlier to just under 4.2 million, the Alliance said in its September release, as reported by Zhitong Finance (智通财经). Only about one in ten of the new charging points was public.
The slowdown is recent. From January through May, additions rose 51.9% from a year earlier to 2.4 million, and private additions more than doubled, according to Alliance figures reported by Gasgoo. Public additions were already falling then: 234,000 were added, 53.5% fewer than a year earlier. The September release gave no reason for the turn.
The network itself keeps growing. At the end of September, China had 24.8 million charging points, counted by connector, up 37.2% from a year earlier, the National Energy Administration (国家能源局) said in an Oct. 22 release. Use is climbing too. Chargers in the Alliance's count delivered 12.46 billion kilowatt-hours in September, up 62.3% from a year earlier.
The Alliance says construction "can basically meet" the fast growth of electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles, with one charging point added for every 1.8 of those vehicles sold in China in the first nine months. A national plan issued by China's economic planning agency and other departments aims for 28 million charging points by the end of 2027, China Energy News reported (中国能源报).
Sources: 国家能源局 National Energy Administration, 智通财经 Zhitong Finance (via NetEase), Gasgoo, 中国能源报 China Energy News
Editor: Ian Lamont
