While Tesla chose to abandon battery swap stations many years ago, Chinese EV automaker NIO has forged ahead with the idea.
On Wednesday, September 29 the company noted they had reached a significant milestone with NIO owners having completed more than 4,000,000 battery swaps.
Those 4 million swaps were completed at the 504 NIO Power Swap stations across China. The company is showing no signs of slowing down either.
They reached their target to have 500 stations operating by the end of 2021 three months ahead of schedule, and hope to have 700 open before the Chinese New Year Holiday in February 2022.
On September 29, 2021, our NIO users have completed over 4,000,000 battery swaps. As of today, we have 504 #NIOPower Swap stations up and running, a quarter ahead of schedule which expected 500 stations installed by the end of 2020. #AlwaysForward pic.twitter.com/oOCtBd4Kmp
— NIO (@NIOGlobal) September 29, 2021
The 4 millionth battery swap comes almost six months to the day after the 2 millionth swap, which took place on March 24, 2021, and three and half years after the first NIO Power Swap station opened in May 2018.
The latest second generation stations have the capacity to swap up to 312 batteries each day.
According to the company, the highest number of battery swaps in one vehicle is 927. The swap takes about three minutes to complete. Owners don’t have to get out of their car and can drive away with a fully charged battery after the process is complete.
You can watch an overview of the NIO Power Swap Station 2.0 below.
