Can I just upgrade to three-phase power to get 22kW?

Sometimes, but it's a bigger and more expensive job than the charger itself — it can mean upgrading the supply from the street, not just your switchboard. Worth confirming what's actually involved before assuming it's a simple add-on.

Does my car even support 22kW charging?

Not all EVs do — many are capped at a lower onboard charging rate regardless of what the wall unit can deliver. Buying a 22kW charger for a car that can't use it past a certain point doesn't get you a faster charge.

Is 7kW actually enough for daily driving?

For the vast majority of daily commuting and errands, yes — a 7kW charger overnight comfortably replaces what most people use in a day, several times over.

7kW vs 22kW: What Do You Actually Need?

The instinct is to assume bigger numbers are better, and a 22kW charger sounds like the obvious upgrade over 7kW. In practice, most homes can't use the extra speed anyway, and here's why.

The Basic Difference

7kW chargers run on a standard single-phase home supply — what the vast majority of Australian homes already have. 22kW chargers require three-phase power, which not every home is connected to, and upgrading to it isn't a small job — it can mean work back to the street connection, not just your own switchboard.

What "Faster" Actually Means in Real Terms

A 7kW charger adds roughly 30–40km of range per hour, depending on the vehicle. Left charging overnight — eight, ten, twelve hours — that's several hundred kilometres of range replenished, which covers a full week of average driving for most households in a single overnight charge. The extra speed of 22kW mostly matters if you're regularly needing a fast top-up during the day, not overnight at home.

The Car Itself Is Often the Real Limit

Plenty of EVs have an onboard charger capped well below 22kW regardless of what the wall unit can supply — meaning the car, not the charger, ends up being the bottleneck. Buying the faster, more expensive unit doesn't help if your specific vehicle can't actually draw that much.

When 22kW Genuinely Makes Sense

If you already have three-phase power at the property, drive high daily distances, or need to top up multiple EVs quickly during the day rather than overnight, the faster option earns its cost. That's a smaller share of households than the marketing around EV chargers implies.

The Honest Recommendation

For most homes doing normal daily driving with overnight charging, 7kW does the job completely, costs less to install, and doesn't require an expensive supply upgrade to get there. Check your actual driving pattern and your car's onboard charging limit before paying for speed you can't use.

Our EV Charger Installation page covers circuit sizing in more detail, or get a quote and we'll tell you honestly which spec actually suits your situation.