The Q1 2026 benchmarking report for UK EV charging companies has just been published. Learn how 12 of the largest UK EV charging companies perform across the digital space.
The latest Q1 2026 benchmarking report for UK EV charging companies has just been published. It covers 12 of the largest national EV charging companies, including InstaVolt, Osprey Charging, ChargedEV, bp pulse, IONITY, GRIDSERVE, Wallbox Chargers, Plug Me In, Pod Energy, Believ, Fastned, and Mer.
The research gives an inside track on who is winning the biggest share of voice online, and quantifies the gaps, risks and missed opportunities for other EV charging companies to win brand exposure locally, secure online views, and ultimately drive the installation and usage of their charging points. The report highlights quick wins that will improve enquiries from your online strategy and identifies the barriers that may be reducing your site’s ability to optimise digital performance.
To see a preview and contents page of the Q1 report, click here. To get a copy of the full report and the key takeaways, please complete the enquiry form or schedule a call.
For a glance into just 6 of the metrics we evaluated these top 12 EV charging companies on, check out our quick-look table below;
Continue reading for further detail on this quarter's best and poorest-performing EV charging companies, or request a copy of the report for the full review.
The 70+ pages of research benchmarks each retailer based on 50+ metrics and indicators of successful digital strategy, including organic visibility, domain authority, paid media ads, conversion performance, technical performance, site speed, universal search, content, social ads, accessibility, and mobile performance.
Some of the leading players in the space are high spenders on paid media channels such as Google, Bing & Facebook - but have a poor or sub-optimal conversion improvement strategy. Without an optimised, sophisticated conversion strategy that maximises the conversion rate, the return on investment is unsustainable or will underperform. Scaling spend on paid media is not achievable unless the conversion rate delivers optimal performance in the sector. Some in the space have paid media spend levels from 30k+ per month but dedicate minimal resources and budgets to conversion testing. Given the cost per clicks on ad networks will continue to rise, we recommend spending at least 10% of your paid media budget on ongoing conversion optimisation testing schedules to ensure your paid media ROI maintains long-term viability, competitive advantage, and sustainability.
Pay-Per-Click marketing is constantly evolving, with more and more advertisers being forced to hand over a lot of control to Google's algorithms as the push for automation grows ever stronger. There are still key elements of control that we have though, the main one of these being budget which is ultimately something the algorithms can't take from you. That's why being smart with your budget and ad coverage is essential to achieving strong results and bettering what your competitors have to offer.
For Q1 2026, the average monthly budget wastage across these UK EV charging companies was £308, with some of the top players in the market spending a considerable amount on areas and audiences unlikely to deliver a return. We can see this in more detail when looking at the average monthly cost per cost-per-click (CPC) amongst advertisers, with the average of this metric being £2 . This highlights how competitive the market is and how important it is to control your budgets effectively.
There are varying monthly ad budgets across the competitors in the report. While this gap highlights the competitive advantage that larger budgets can provide, it's not just about spending more; it’s about spending smarter. By focusing on driving efficiency in campaign management, targeting, and budget allocation, businesses with smaller budgets can still effectively compete with larger players. Investing in data-driven strategies and refining ad performance can help close the gap and maximise the return on every pound spent, enabling growth even in a competitive landscape. Relative to their spend, Pod Energy reported the lowest monthly cost-per-click (CPC) at £0, and Plug Me In has the highest at £24.
The report highlights the importance of budget efficiency by comparing monthly ad spend with estimated CPC in relation to your competitors, see who has the highest and lowest CPC. To maximise the effectiveness of your budget, it’s essential to focus on driving CPC down while maintaining or improving campaign performance. In this report, Plug Me In has the lowest estimate monthly ad spend at £10,200, and IONITY has the highest at £14,400.
By optimising targeting, refining ad copy, and leveraging data to identify high-converting opportunities, you can ensure every click delivers maximum value. This approach not only stretches your budget further but also boosts your return on ad spend (ROAS), enabling you to achieve stronger results without simply increasing expenditure.
Savvy digital marketers know that having a technically sound website is an essential component of a successful fully integrated digital strategy - plus a site capable of maximising conversion performance. For electric vehicle charging solutions, they’ll want to ensure their website is easy for consumers to navigate, which will help to increase sales and avoid consumers from leaving the website early due to frustration.
In our previous audit, Wallbox Chargers received the most 404 errors (94). This quarter, Wallbox Chargers has reduced their 404 errors to 30, no longer putting them at the bottom of the leaderboard. Currently, Fastned received the most 404 errors (62). Sometimes external websites link incorrectly, creating backlinks to pages that never existed or URLs that have since changed. This is frustrating for users, but it’s also bad for SEO because Google crawlers frequently hit dead ends, reducing the value of these inbound links.
When 62% of consumers are less likely to convert if they have a negative mobile site experience, ensuring that your site is quick and easy to load makes a significant improvement on your overall conversion rates. Electric vehicle charging solutions should adopt an easy-to-navigate website, as this will help to improve download speeds.
In our last audit, Plug Me In received the slowest mobile site speed (16). This quarter, Plug Me In has increased their mobile site speed to 35 — demonstrating progress. Currently, the mobile site speed ranges between 66 and 24, with Believ reporting the slowest speed. Mobile speed affects how users perceive a brand’s professionalism. A slow site feels outdated and gives the impression that the brand doesn’t prioritise user experience. In contrast, a fast site feels modern, efficient, and trustworthy.
Domain authority is an essential metric for measuring the effectiveness of SEO performance, and helps create a reliable overall gauge of how effective your site is at achieving organic traffic, i.e. ‘free’ traffic that isn’t gained through sponsored ads. As the market for products relating to electric vehicles widens, brands such as those in the EV charging sector must ensure they're building authority early, to land them in good stead as the industry develops.
A ‘good’ DA really comes down to how your competitors are performing, however it’s generally considered average between 40 and 50, good between 50 and 60, and excellent above 60. In our last audit, Believ reported the lowest DA score (35). This quarter, Believ has increased their DA score to 39, though they remain at the bottom of the leaderboard, along with ChargedEV. Domain authority acts as an indicator of how trustworthy and credible a site appears to search engines. Websites with higher domain authority are generally seen as more reliable sources of information, which can positively influence how well their pages perform in search results. This credibility helps build a stronger online presence over time.
A strong organic performance is strategically important as it ensures your site ranks above competitors for key, transactional keywords. When 93% of your customers won’t go past the first page of Google, your absence or lack of targeting for essential keywords will cost you conversions. Due to the cost-of-living crisis, we're seeing that many potential customers across a number of sectors are either cutting back on expendable items, or opting for cheaper alternatives. Electric vehicle charging solutions may feel the impact of this, though they can continue to follow a keyword strategy to improve the results for this category.
Three brands saw a decrease in organic traffic on desktop, with Mer reporting the biggest loss (-61%). On mobile, 5 brands saw a decrease in organic traffic, with Plug Me In seeing the biggest drop (-100%). Brands can consistently increase organic traffic on both desktop and mobile by focusing on high-quality, relevant content that meets user intent. Creating content that answers common questions, solves problems, and provides real value encourages search engines to rank pages more favourably. When content is useful across devices, it naturally attracts a wider audience.
Google Universal Search Results is an evolving opportunity to make your pages visible on a SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Universal results often appear before traditional listings and are eye-catching for users. Universal search results refer to rankings on a SERP that are not the traditional ‘blue line’ Google link, and a brand can appear for universal search results without being strong in standard rankings. For electric vehicle charging solutions, they'll want to ensure they're appearing for ‘image’ results.
GRIDSERVE has secured the most Universal Search appearances (1,604). The majority of their appearances came from ‘images’ (701).
Longtail keywords are often considered high intent and potentially more likely to convert as a searcher is being more specific. This builds on what we've discussed within our Organic Performance section, as EV charging companies will want to ensure they have key, transactional phrases within their approach. Optimising for longtail keywords also puts your content strategy in a strong position to rank for retailer new search terms as they enter Google’s index. For electric vehicle charging solutions, long-tail keywords could include, ‘home charging solution’ and ‘electric vehicle charging system’.
bp pulse secured most longtail keyword appearances for position 3 (258). Meanwhile, GRIDSERVE secured the most appearances for positions 4–10 (869). It’s important for websites to regularly review and update their longtail keyword strategy. Search trends, user behaviour, and competition change over time, so keywords that performed well previously may lose relevance.
With the number of Facebook users in the United Kingdom (UK) hitting over 44 million users in 2023, it is not surprising that companies have jumped at the opportunity to advertise on the social media platform. Facebook’s UK digital advertising revenue has been estimated to have breached 2.6b GB pounds in 2019. For brands that operate both at home and within the public, such as EV charge points, Facebook ads are an opportunity to build brand visibility and recognition.
We’ve included screenshots of Pod Energy’s sponsored Facebook posts. This UK EV charging company included coloured imagery — a great way to attract social media users’ attention.
When it comes to social media and on-site content strategies, it is important to release content that has a longer shelf life. An article is considered 'Evergreen' if it has maintained its relevancy to an audience for longer. It's great for your brand engagement, but great for Google too, who will recognise content which achieves traffic over a long period of time. EV charging companies can build on their content strategy for boosting visibility on 'people also ask' results and longtail keywords to identify trending topics that will be more likely to be shared on social media.
IONITY secured the most Facebook Likes (17,100), and Wallbox Chargers secured the most Instagram followers (15,000). Twitter was the most popular social media platforms of all brands. Bp pulse received the highest total engagement rate (49,974) and the highest average engagement (847).
20% of people in the UK have a disability – 2 million of which are people living with sight loss. In addition, 1 in 12 men and 1 in 200 women have some degree of colour vision deficiency. When websites are not designed to meet these needs, brands lose customer interest as they turn elsewhere. Brands will want to ensure that their websites have as few accessibility alerts and contrast errors as possible to help with readability.
In our previous report, IONITY flagged the most accessibility alerts (183). This quarter, IONITY has reduced their accessibility alerts to 35 — demonstrating they’re aware of the negative impact these alerts can have on their audience. Currently, Mer is the company to watch, reporting 114 accessibility alerts. Poor accessibility harms trust and credibility. When users encounter broken labels, low contrast text, or missing alt tags, the site feels unprofessional and poorly maintained. This lack of attention sends a message that the brand does not prioritise user experience, which can discourage repeat visits.
To get a copy of the full report, please complete the enquiry form. If you want to talk to us about accelerating your digital performance, please call us on 01543 410014 or schedule a call with Rory Tarplee.