Three Pin

What cable do I need to charge an electric car at home?

One connector won the standards war in Europe, and it is almost certainly the one on your car.

Quick answer

To charge an electric car at home you need a Type 2 cable, the seven-pin European standard fitted to virtually every EV sold in the UK since 2018. With a tethered home charger you need no cable at all, since one is built in. With an untethered charger or at public AC chargers, you need your own Type 2 to Type 2 cable (£100 to £200). Pre-2018 cars like early Nissan Leafs use the older five-pin Type 1 connector instead.

Last reviewed 18 July 2026 · 4 min read · 3 sources

Which connector does your EV have?

Almost every electric car sold in the UK since 2018 uses Type 2 for AC charging: a round, seven-pin connector standardised across Europe under IEC 62196 (you will also hear it called Mennekes, after the company that designed it). The seven positions carry three phase lines, neutral and earth for power, plus two small signal pins that let the car and charger talk to each other before any current flows.2

Diagram of a Type 2 (Mennekes) connector showing its seven pins: CP and PP signal pins at the top, L1 L2 L3 power pins in the middle row, neutral and earth at the bottom CP PP L1 L2 L3 N PE
Fig. 1 / Type 2 connector, face view. Single-phase cars use L1, N and PE; three-phase power uses L1 to L3. CP and PP are the signalling pins.

The legacy alternative is Type 1: five pins, found mainly on pre-2018 cars like early Nissan Leafs and the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV. If your charge port has five holes it is Type 1; seven holes, Type 2.2

When do you need your own cable?

Tethered home charger: never. The cable is attached; there is nothing to buy.

Untethered home charger: always. You need a Type 2 to Type 2 cable (or Type 2 to Type 1 for an older car), typically 5 metres, rated at 32A for full 7kW speed. Budget £100 to £200 for a decent one.3

Public AC chargers: usually. Kerbside, lamppost and destination chargers are mostly untethered, so street parkers should treat the cable as standard equipment that lives in the boot.1

What about the three-pin granny cable?

Most EVs ship with a portable EVSE: a cable with a normal BS 1363 three-pin plug on one end, a control brick in the middle and a Type 2 plug on the other. It delivers about 2.3kW, adding 36kWh in around 16 hours. Keep it in the boot as the emergency option, and never run it through a domestic extension reel, which can overheat under sustained load.

What do you need for rapid charging?

Nothing. Rapid and ultra-rapid chargers use CCS (Combined Charging System), which extends the Type 2 shape with two large DC pins below, and their cables are permanently attached to the unit. You just plug in. The older CHAdeMO rapid standard survives mostly for the Nissan Leaf and is likewise tethered to the charger. The UK had more than 119,000 public chargers by spring 2026, the rapid end of which is effectively all CCS now.1

Does the cable rating matter?

Yes, quietly. Type 2 cables come in 16A and 32A versions and in single-phase and three-phase versions. For UK home charging you want 32A, single-phase: that carries the full 7kW. A 16A cable caps you at 3.6kWh’s worth of current (about 3.6kW), which doubles your overnight time. Three-phase cables are for 22kW public AC posts; they work on single-phase too, but they are heavier, dearer and pointless at home. Check the printing on the cable itself if you are unsure what you own.2

How do you look after an EV cable?

Cables die from abuse, not age. The habits that extend their lives: coil loosely in big loops rather than tight wraps, keep the plug off the ground and out of puddles (the cap exists for a reason), never drive over the cable, and do not leave it connected in standing water. The pins are precisely machined and the socket tolerances are tight; a plug dragged across gravel fills with grit that grinds the contacts down over months. Stored dry, coiled loosely and kept capped, a good cable outlasts the car it came with.

Can you use an extension lead?

Not a domestic one, and this is a hill worth dying on. A standard 13A extension reel is not rated for ten hours of continuous 10A load, and coiled cable on a reel makes it worse by trapping heat. Manufacturers and fire officers say the same thing: plug the EVSE directly into a fixed socket. If the socket will not reach, the answer is a professionally installed outdoor socket or a proper chargepoint, not a daisy chain of extension leads across the lawn.

How much do replacement cables cost?

A good 32A Type 2 to Type 2 cable runs £100 to £200 depending on length; 5 metres is standard, 10 metres exists for awkward parking. Buy from a recognised EV accessories brand, check the rating matches your car (single-phase 32A is right for almost everyone), and skip marketplace bargains with suspiciously thin cable. Second-hand cables are a gamble on invisible damage to pins and insulation; given that a tired cable fails slowly and expensively, new is the sane default here.3 Treat the purchase like the safety equipment it is.

If you are still choosing the charger itself, our tethered vs untethered guide settles that question, and how long charging takes covers what each power level does to your overnight window.

Key facts
UK standard connector
Type 2 (7 pins)
Legacy connector
Type 1 (5 pins)
Replacement cable cost
£100 to £200
Rapid charging
CCS, cable attached

Sources

  1. Zapmap, EV charging statistics and connector guides Accessed 18 July 2026
  2. ev-database.org, electric vehicle database Accessed 18 July 2026
  3. CertifiedInstaller, best home EV charger UK comparison Accessed 18 July 2026