Eight large automakers have come together to launch a single nationwide electric vehicle (EV) charging network. The joint venture, called Ionna, opens its first public charging stations today. It plans to have 1,000 charging bays available by the end of 2025 and 30,000 by decade’s end.
Ionna’s first charging locations are in Apex, North Carolina; Houston, Texas; Abilene, Kansas; and Willcox, Arizona.
Related: Electric Car Charging: Everything You Need to Know
BMW Group, General Motors, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz Group, Stellantis (parent company of Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, and others), and Toyota are the founding members of Ionna, which launched in 2023.
The charging landscape changed dramatically after the 2023 announcement. When the venture was first announced, Tesla cars used a charging plug of one shape, and most of the industry used another. That meant efforts to build two separate nationwide charging networks. It also left EV drivers hunting for a public charger to work with their car.
Since then, most of the industry agreed to move to the Tesla-style plug. Other charging networks will support it. Tesla is opening its nationwide Supercharger network for use by other automakers, one by one, as fast as it can reprogram the chargers (read: not fast).
After this year, most EVs will leave the factory with the Telsa port built in. For now, EV owners need to buy an adapter to use it.
Ionna chargers will offer both the Tesla NACS plug and the CCS plug most automakers used until this year, serving nearly everyone. Many will also have built-in retail spaces selling “refreshments and essentials.” Through a partnership with Amazon, those will use “just walk out” technology that can automatically charge shoppers for items they leave the store with, with no checkout process.
