Most EV-versus-petrol comparisons you'll read are really fuel comparisons, and fuel is the bit EVs win easily. The honest answer is messier. Once you add tax, insurance, servicing, finance and depreciation, the gap narrows — and for some drivers it flips. We built a whole calculator because this question doesn't have one answer. But here's the shape of it.
Fuel and charging: the EV's big win
Drive 10,000 miles a year in a 40 mpg petrol car with fuel around £1.40 a litre and you'll spend roughly £1,590 on petrol. The same mileage in an EV charged overnight on an EV tariff costs £160–£200. That's a saving of around £1,400 a year, and it's the engine of the whole pro-EV argument.
But the saving depends entirely on where you charge. Move that charging to a standard variable tariff and the cost roughly quadruples. Do most of it on public rapid chargers and the saving disappears altogether — at 79p per kWh, an EV costs more per mile than the petrol car. If you can't charge at home, read our public charging guide before you read anything else.
Road tax: no longer free, not yet equal
The free ride ended in April 2025. EVs now pay the standard VED rate — £195 a year — the same as petrol cars registered after 2017. Worse, EVs over £40,000 list price pay the "expensive car supplement" of £425 a year for five years, and an awful lot of EVs cross that line. Check your exact figure with our car tax checker.
And from April 2028 there's a new cost coming: a pay-per-mile charge for EVs, announced in the November 2025 Budget at 3p per mile. At 10,000 miles a year that's £300 — a real number, big enough to matter in the comparison. We've covered what's actually been announced separately, and the calculator has a checkbox to include it in your results.
Insurance: quietly more expensive for EVs
This is the one EV owners grumble about at dinner parties. Like-for-like, EV insurance has tended to run 10–25% higher than an equivalent petrol car, mainly because of repair costs — battery packs make insurers nervous, and a damaged pack can write off an otherwise repairable car. The gap has been closing as repair networks mature, but get real quotes for the actual cars you're comparing. A £200 annual difference wipes out a chunk of the fuel saving.
Servicing: the EV wins, boringly
No oil, no oil filter, no spark plugs, no timing belt, no clutch, no exhaust. EV servicing is mostly checking brakes (which last ages thanks to regenerative braking), tyres (which wear a bit faster due to weight), and the cabin filter. Budget roughly half what you'd pay to service a petrol car over three years. Not life-changing money, but it arrives every year without fail.
Depreciation and finance: the wild card
Here's where honest people disagree. EVs depreciated brutally in 2023–2024 as used prices corrected, which was terrible for early owners but means used EVs are now genuine bargains — a three-year-old EV often costs less than the equivalent petrol car while costing far less to run. If you're buying used, depreciation has largely already happened to someone else. If you're buying new on a PCP, compare the monthly payments rather than list prices, because the finance houses have already priced the depreciation in. And if your employer offers salary sacrifice, the tax maths can beat every other way of running a new car.
So which is cheaper?
A blunt summary of how it usually lands:
- Home charger + average-or-higher mileage: the EV wins, normally by £800–£1,500 a year, even after the tax changes.
- Home charger + very low mileage: close to a draw. The fuel saving is small, and insurance can tip it either way.
- No home charging, mostly rapid chargers: the petrol car is often cheaper to run. A subscription like Electroverse or a manufacturer scheme narrows it, but rarely flips it.