UK rapid charging prices span about 39p-93p/kWh

The snapshot includes low-cost app, off-peak and promotional offers alongside standard contactless rates. Chargenet lists examples including Be.EV at 39p/kWh for app or RFID users during its stated off-peak window, MFG at 59p/kWh under a temporary September promotion, Lidl Plus at 59p/kWh and contactless peak prices around 92-93p/kWh at some major networks.

The same network can now have several prices

Pricing is increasingly segmented by network, location, time, app, membership, payment method and loyalty programme. Tesla prices vary by site and time, Osprey has introduced dynamic pricing, InstaVolt advertises lower overnight app rates than its peak contactless tariff, and Lidl applies a substantial loyalty-app discount against its standard tariff.

That means the price printed in a network comparison may describe only one route to purchase. A driver using contactless can pay materially more than a member charging at the same network off peak, while a temporary promotion can move a network down the ranking for only a few weeks.

The 79p/kWh average needs careful treatment

Chargenet gives a headline UK rapid/ultra-rapid average of around 79p/kWh for 11 September. This is a third-party comparison, not an official usage-weighted market statistic. It should not be interpreted as the price paid by the average driver or the average price of every kWh delivered in the UK.

A robust weighted market price would need charging-volume data by network, site, tariff, time and payment method. Those data are generally not published at the granularity required, so simple network averages are best used as comparison indicators rather than national expenditure statistics.

Public charging is becoming a tariff-design story

The widening spread matters because public charging is moving away from the simple model of one CPO and one national pence-per-kWh figure. Time-of-use pricing, subscriptions and retail loyalty schemes increasingly determine the actual price a driver sees.