The Daily Observer London Desk: Reporter- Victoria Smith
You’re excited to hit the road and drive home to see your friends and family for Christmas.
But while the end destination provides merriment, the journey itself can be a taxing annual slog because the roads are busy, services are crammed, and the miles are often long.
This Christmas, more people than ever before will be taking on this yearly task in electric cars, with an estimated 1.7million EVs on our roads. And for many, it’ll be the first time they make the festive pilgrimage in a car powered by electricity.
Yet, even for seasoned pros this particular time of year is still a worry. A poll of 2,253 drives by Auto Express has found that more than a third of EV drivers are worried about range as they plan their Christmas journeys.
Fifty-five per cent of EV drivers are taking a trip of 100 miles or more, and while many don’t have range anxiety, two in five admitted they have some apprehension about making it to their destination.
So, here are our top tips to make sure you have the smoothest journey possible and can charge easily and quickly – whether you’re new to electric driving or a dab hand.
This Christmas more people than ever will be driving home in an electric car as there an estimated 1.7million EVs on our roads
Will there to be queues for charging stations at Christmas?
The RAC is predicting a record 37.5million journeys home for Christmas in the week running up to the big day.
Saturday was expected to be the busiest getaway of any year since the RAC first started recording drivers’ festive plans.
And with more EVs than before – up to 400,000 new EVs were registered in 2025 – on our roads, no one wants the kind of charging chaos that saw three-hour queues for Tesla Superchargers in 2022.
But fear not because that is unlikely to happen this year – as it also hasn’t in the last two Christmas periods. And this is largely due to the growth of the UK’s charging network, which is bigger than ever.
Between October 2024 and 2025, Britain’s public charging infrastructure grew by 23 per cent with 15,000 additional chargers installed.
Today there are over 86,000 EV devices across the UK, with a charger being added every 33 minutes on average.
In particular for speedy Christmas getaways and long distance EV range top ups, 17,356 rapid and ultra-rapid chargers have been added to the network, with the fastest growth in regions outside of London.
New EV ultra-rapid charging superhubs like the new InstaVolt Winchester Superhub – the largest EV charging forecourt in the UK – have opened this year making Christmas getaways much easier
