Several studies have proven that if there's one aspect that is at the forefront of a lot of potential EV customer's minds, it's battery degradation, the fear that as a battery gets used, it's effective range will decline over time.
But how does that fear track with actual reality? A new study developed by Recurrent, which looked at real-world data from over 1000 active EV's on the roads today, battery degradation isn't as drastic as first thought.
They compared the effective range of the aforementioned 1000 EV's, that all crossed 150.000 miles, or 240.000 kilometers, with the range when they were new, and found that a relatively new model from 2023 have retained 91% of its effective range after crossing 240.000 kilometers.
Now, that percentage used to be lower, and a 14 year old car from 2012 "only" retains 81% of its effective range after crossing the aforementioned kilometer threshold.
This tracks with other studies by Recurrent, which claims that a mere 0.3% of newer EV's have needed a battery replacement, meaning cars sold after 2022.