You are Welcome, Tesla Homeowners. Kia Simply Moved Its Charging Port

• Kia unveiled the facelifted 2025 mannequin of its EV6 crossover on Thursday. 
• The massive replace: The EV6 now comes geared up with a Tesla-style NACS charging port from the manufacturing unit. 
• Plus, Kia moved the charging port to the left aspect of the car, which ought to assist drivers extra simply entry Tesla Superchargers beginning subsequent 12 months. 

Kia will transfer the charging port on the 2025 EV6 crossover to the left aspect of the car from the suitable aspect, the model introduced on Thursday. In case you ask the Tesla homeowners who will quickly share their beloved Supercharger stations with Kia drivers and plenty of others, that is the suitable aspect to have it on. 

That replace comes as a part of a wider refresh to the EV6 that broke cowl on Thursday. The 2025 mannequin will get a brand new mug, extra vary and, maybe most significantly, a Tesla-style charging port constructed proper in. Due to an built-in North American Charging Customary (NACS) port, the EV6 will quickly have the ability to cost up at 1000’s of Tesla Superchargers with out utilizing a dongle of any sort. That entry opens up in January. 

However merely working with Tesla to grant Supercharger entry (they was reserved for Tesla homeowners solely, however that is progressively altering) does not assure the charging course of at these places will simple or hiccup-free. Since Tesla started letting outsiders use its stations, it is change into clear that the placement of a automobile’s charging port could make or break the charging expertise—each for the automobile’s proprietor and the station’s different patrons. 

Supercharger stalls are designed with brief cords and for Teslas solely, and all Teslas have their charging port on the the again left of the car. So when a non-Tesla reveals up with its port within the “incorrect” place, the proprietor cannot merely again into the suitable spot like a Mannequin Y or Mannequin 3 might. They might should straddle two parking areas or park horizontally throughout them simply to get the wire to succeed in.

Understandably, that is been pissing off Tesla homeowners left and proper. It is awkward for the particular person inflicting the nuisance too. 

Picture by: InsideEVs

Enter Kia. The model not solely gave the 2025 EV6 a NACS port—it additionally relocated the port the left rear fender to imitate Tesla’s setup. (The high-performance EV6 GT will not get the identical replace, nevertheless.) Kia did not explicitly point out the parking drawback in its press launch, solely saying that the brand new port and placement serve to “make charging extra handy.” 

However everyone is aware of this is a matter, together with Tesla. On its web site, it recommends that non-Tesla homeowners “keep away from parking diagonally to succeed in the cable and attempt to hinder as few cost posts as potential,” and reveals how they need to accomplish that in a useful illustration. 

“Moreover, we encourage all car producers to standardize cost port places to the rear driver aspect or entrance passenger aspect,” Tesla provides. 

This will likely solely be a short lived bug of the nice NACS transition, although. Fuel stations haven’t any drawback coping with vehicles which have their fuel caps on both aspect of the car. We’re beginning to see EV charging stations with that sort of pull-through design coming on-line too. And Tesla says its new V4 charging cupboards will higher accommodate different EVs.

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