Electrify Canada plans to add Tesla-style plugs to its chargers

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Volkswagen-owned electric-vehicle charging network Electrify Canada has announced it will add Tesla-style connectors to its chargers, as more automakers say they plan to put charging ports in their vehicles that are compatible with that proprietary fast-charge plug. Naturally, Electrify America made the same announcement, and in both countries, the company will offer the connector option at its existing and future charging stations by 2025. The company has approximately 4,000 chargers across some 850 stations in the two countries.

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The connector is called the North American Charging Standard, or NACS – although, as our Matthew Guy previously reported, that isn’t an actual industry standard, but the name Elon Musk gave to the plug that Tesla uses. Most electric vehicles (EVs) in North America use CCS (Combined Charging System) connectors, while some Japanese vehicles use a CHAdeMO connector, when they are being fast-charged on a DC charger. Tesla’s proprietary NACS plug only fits the automaker’s equally-proprietary Supercharger DC units.

That becomes an issue for drivers, because Tesla is pretty much the only automaker that also provides its own public fast-charging stations. There are a lot of them, each one usually has a lot of chargers, and – very importantly – overall, they’re well-maintained, whereas many owners of non-Tesla EVs regularly complain about broken or out-of-service chargers at third-party stations.

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Electrify Canada will offer the Tesla connectors, but will also continue to provide CCS connectors. The differing plugs are really only an issue with DC fast-charging, not with Level 2 (240-volt) chargers, which are typical of home chargers or many public chargers found in parking lots.

Tesla’s superior charging network was initially an exclusive selling point for the cars themselves, but early in 2023, the automaker quietly began allowing some brands to access a small number of chargers. Then, in May of 2023, Ford made the surprising announcement it had partnered with Tesla to allow its EV customers to use a Tesla-developed adapter to plug into Superchargers — and further, that it planned to equip upcoming EVs with a Tesla connector right from the factory.

Since then, other automakers have announced similar plans to offer Tesla-style charging, including General Motors, Rivian, Volvo, and Polestar. It’s rumoured that Hyundai may do the same, and, if so, it’s expected that Kia will follow; while Stellantis, the parent company of Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Jeep and Ram, has outlined its plans for a charging ecosystem but, in a conference call, didn’t rule out a Tesla partnership.