What drivers need to know

DETROIT – Ford Motor is rolling out Tesla Supercharging capabilities to owners of its electric vehicles in the U.S. and Canada. The launch begins Thursday, but is expected to be supply constrained at the start.

The Detroit automaker was the first to announce a deal with Tesla to utilize the EV maker’s Supercharger network. The vast majority of automakers in the U.S. have since followed. Under the deals, companies such as Ford will adopt Tesla’s charging port for future EV models.

In the meantime, an adapter is needed to connect non-Tesla vehicles, which utilize different charging technology, to Tesla’s network. Ford says the partnership will more than double access to fast chargers for its owners — but it may take some time to distribute the adapters to all customers.

“We are supply constrained as we move forward, and we do believe in the initial phases of launch demand will exceed supply,” Ken Williams, Ford director of charging and energy services, said during a media briefing. “We are going to try to manage that demand in a first-come, first-serve basis.”

Williams declined to disclose how many adapters the company currently has to offer its EV customers, who in the U.S. bought roughly 140,000 EVs from Ford since 2023. The adapters are expected to begin shipping to customers in late March, Ford said.

Tesla, which designed the adapter and is handling distribution of them to automakers, did not respond to request for comment on specifics.

Fast chargers are capable of adding hundreds of miles of driving range in an hour or less, depending on the vehicle. That’s compared to less powerful chargers that can take hours, if not longer, to do so.

Automakers last year started agreeing to adopt Tesla’s charging technology to gain access to its already extensive charging network in lieu of or in addition to building their own chargers (or waiting for others such as the federal government to do so).

Ford is not receiving any revenue or paying Tesla for access to the Tesla Supercharger network, according to a spokesman for the Detroit automaker.

Ford owners will be able to utilize the Tesla charger through the FordPass App, or Charge Assist App in the vehicle’s touchscreen, which eliminates the need for onsite credit card use. They also will be able to use Tesla’s app.

The adapter is needed to connect what’s known as a Combined Charging System (CCS) charger port, which was the U.S. industry standard, to Tesla’s North American Charging Standard (NACS) system.

Under the Ford-Tesla agreement, Ford says owners as of Thursday will be granted access to more than 15,000 Tesla Superchargers across the U.S. and Canada.

Tesla says it has more than 50,000 Supercharger connectors worldwide. The company does not break out how many are in the U.S. The U.S. Department of Energy reports the country only has about 6,900 CCS fast chargers publicly available.

With the addition of Tesla Superchargers, Ford says its BlueOval Charge Network customers have access to more than 126,000 chargers, including more than 28,000 fast chargers.