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BYD's game-changing battery ‘charges as quickly as filling with fuel’
BYD’s new ‘Super-e’ battery tech has the potential to eradicate electric car range anxiety for good
Words by: Mark Nichol
Additional words by: Dan Trent
Last updated on 22 April 2025 | 0 min read
BYD has launched an EV battery that can charge up in about the same amount of time it takes to fill a car with fuel. The company’s ‘Super-e’ electric car platform is capable of one megawatt (1,000kW) charging speeds, which means it can gain 250 miles of range in just five minutes.
To put that number into perspective, a standard fast-charging home wall box runs at 7kW, or 0.7 per cent of the BYD’s proposed speed. At that rate, a typical EV will charge from empty to full in eight to 10 hours. Launching the Super-e technology at BYD’s Shenzen HQ in China, Chairman Wang Chuanfu explained that “to completely eliminate users’ charging anxiety, our goal is to make EV charging as fast as refuelling a gasoline car, achieving ‘oil-electric parity’ in charging speed.” So, BYD has changed the game, right? RIP petrol and diesel? Well, not quite. According to BYD, infrastructure is the main barrier to the tech’s effectiveness. The fastest that any current production EV can take charge is 350kW (the Porsche Taycan and Hyundai Ioniq 5, to name a couple), though they rarely actually do because there are so few 350kW charging stations in operation right now. BYD says that cars using its Super-e platform won’t come to the UK until a suitable charging infrastructure exists. Presently there are around 70,000 charging units in the UK, some 15,000 of those being rapid or ultra-rapid, capable of 50kW speed or above. Thousands of new units are being installed every year, but quite when BYD will deem the charging infrastructure “suitable” is unclear. But the company has proved the charging capability of its new battery by building an EV charging unit with an astonishing 1,360kW output. BYD has just released a couple of very impressive looking cars using the Super-e platform for its domestic market, called the Tang L and the Han L. An SUV and saloon respectively, both have more than 1,000 horsepower and cost less than £30,000. Sadly, there are no plans to bring either to the UK – and even if there were, the cost would be way north of £30k; the BYD Atto 3 costs £38,000 here. Regardless of how quick the Super-e technology comes to the UK, its existence is a huge step towards eliminating range anxiety, and the mass adoption of electric cars. Click here to find your perfect electric car on Auto Trader.
To put that number into perspective, a standard fast-charging home wall box runs at 7kW, or 0.7 per cent of the BYD’s proposed speed. At that rate, a typical EV will charge from empty to full in eight to 10 hours. Launching the Super-e technology at BYD’s Shenzen HQ in China, Chairman Wang Chuanfu explained that “to completely eliminate users’ charging anxiety, our goal is to make EV charging as fast as refuelling a gasoline car, achieving ‘oil-electric parity’ in charging speed.” So, BYD has changed the game, right? RIP petrol and diesel? Well, not quite. According to BYD, infrastructure is the main barrier to the tech’s effectiveness. The fastest that any current production EV can take charge is 350kW (the Porsche Taycan and Hyundai Ioniq 5, to name a couple), though they rarely actually do because there are so few 350kW charging stations in operation right now. BYD says that cars using its Super-e platform won’t come to the UK until a suitable charging infrastructure exists. Presently there are around 70,000 charging units in the UK, some 15,000 of those being rapid or ultra-rapid, capable of 50kW speed or above. Thousands of new units are being installed every year, but quite when BYD will deem the charging infrastructure “suitable” is unclear. But the company has proved the charging capability of its new battery by building an EV charging unit with an astonishing 1,360kW output. BYD has just released a couple of very impressive looking cars using the Super-e platform for its domestic market, called the Tang L and the Han L. An SUV and saloon respectively, both have more than 1,000 horsepower and cost less than £30,000. Sadly, there are no plans to bring either to the UK – and even if there were, the cost would be way north of £30k; the BYD Atto 3 costs £38,000 here. Regardless of how quick the Super-e technology comes to the UK, its existence is a huge step towards eliminating range anxiety, and the mass adoption of electric cars. Click here to find your perfect electric car on Auto Trader.