Will I have to pay per mile for an electric car?

Yes, from 1 April 2028. Electric Vehicle Excise Duty charges 3 pence per mile for battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell cars and 1.5 pence per mile for plug-in hybrids. Two details matter more than the rate: it is an extension of vehicle tax rather than a replacement, so it is paid alongside the vehicle tax an electric car already pays, and it applies to cars already on the road rather than only to new ones — so a used electric car bought today is in scope. You will not all start on the same day, because you begin paying at your first vehicle tax renewal after April 2028. You will give DVLA an odometer reading and an estimate of your mileage for the year ahead, pay up front or spread it, and the year-end reading reconciles the difference.

What was actually announced

Electric Vehicle Excise Duty was announced at Budget 2025, consulted on until March 2026, and confirmed in a policy paper published on 13 July 2026. It amends the Vehicle Excise and Registration Act 1994, and takes effect from 1 April 2028. The rates are 3p per mile for battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell cars and 1.5p per mile for plug-in hybrids, rising with Consumer Prices Inflation (CPI) from 2029 to 2030 onwards.

Source: HM Revenue & Customs — Electric Vehicle Excise Duty (eVED). Read 19 September 2026. This is announced policy that has not yet commenced, so the detail can still change before it does.

Two things almost everyone gets wrong about it

It is not a replacement for vehicle tax. The policy paper calls it an extension of the existing Vehicle Excise Duty regime, renewed alongside vehicle tax. Electric cars already pay vehicle tax; from 2028 they pay that and a mileage charge. If you have read that pay-per-mile “replaces road tax”, that is wrong.

It is not only for new cars. The legislation applies it to all UK-registered electric and plug-in hybrid cars, and the government expects around 5.6 million vehicles to be in scope in 2028 to 2029. A used electric car bought this week is included. Buying before the date does not exempt you, which is the single most important point for anyone shopping for a used EV now.

What it does to the cost per mile

The honest answer depends almost entirely on where you charge, and the difference is far larger than the 3p itself. Both rows below use the same car assumption and current published prices.

Where you charge	Per mile now	With the 3p charge
Charged at home	7.52p	10.52p
Charged on public rapid chargers	26.29p	29.29p
Petrol at 40mpg, for comparison	19.71p	unchanged

Charging at home, an electric car stays clearly cheaper per mile than petrol — the charge takes a bite out of the advantage rather than removing it. Charging mainly on public rapid units, the per-mile cost was already above petrol before any of this, and the mileage charge widens that gap. Anyone without off-street parking should read that second row carefully before assuming an EV is the cheaper car to run.

Assumptions, so you can check them: 3.5 miles per kWh — DfT assumption for a 70–80 kWh battery, including charging losses; Ofgem price cap, Direct Debit, Great Britain average, 1 Oct 2026 to 31 Dec 2026 — excludes VAT (GB domestic electricity is zero-rated 1 Oct 2026 – 31 Mar 2027); public rapid charging at 92p per kWh; petrol at 173.46p per litre, UK average pump price for the week commencing 2026-09-28, at 40mpg. Your own figures will differ, and an off-peak overnight tariff can put the home row well below what is shown.

What it costs a year

The charge scales with how much you drive, which is the whole point of it — it is meant to replace fuel duty, which also scales with mileage.

Miles a year	Electric (3p)	Plug-in hybrid (1.5p)
5,000	£150	£75
8,000	£240	£120
10,000	£300	£150
12,000	£360	£180
15,000	£450	£225
20,000	£600	£300

That is on top of the vehicle tax the car already pays, which our car tax calculator works out from the registration date, and on top of the Expensive Car Supplement if the car was expensive when new.

What is still unknown

Quite a lot, and it is worth being straight about which parts are settled. The rates, the start date, the scope and the odometer-reading mechanism are in the published policy paper. The detailed regulations have not been made yet — the paper gives the Secretary of State for Transport the power to make them “in due course”.

So the following genuinely do not have published answers yet: exactly how a mid-year sale is handled between seller and buyer, what happens when an odometer is replaced or reads in kilometres, and how a car with no MOT yet is checked. Anyone telling you how resale will work is guessing. We will update this page when the regulations are published rather than fill the gap now.

One thing worth noting for buyers: the government intends to cross-check the mileage you declare against the readings already taken at MOT, which are public on GOV.UK. Checking a used car’s MOT mileage history is already the best defence against a clocked car, and from 2028 that same record becomes a tax record too. GOV.UK’s free MOT history service shows that record for any registration, and what an MOT advisory means covers how to read the rest of it.

Questions people ask

Does pay-per-mile replace vehicle tax on an electric car?

No, and this is the most common misreading of it. The policy paper describes eVED as an extension of the existing Vehicle Excise Duty regime, renewed alongside vehicle tax rather than instead of it. An electric car already pays vehicle tax; from 2028 it pays that plus a mileage charge.

Does it apply to an electric car I already own, or only to new ones?

To cars already on the road. The legislation applies eVED to all UK-registered electric and plug-in hybrid cars from April 2028, and the government expects around 5.6 million vehicles to be affected in 2028 to 2029. Buying used does not avoid it, and neither does buying before the date.

Will I have to start paying on 1 April 2028?

Not necessarily on that exact day. The policy paper says motorists will need to pay when they first renew their vehicle tax after April 2028, so your own start date depends on when your vehicle tax falls due. For some cars that is within days of the change and for others it is nearly a year later.

How does DVLA know how many miles I have driven?

You supply it. Keepers give an odometer reading and estimate their mileage for the coming year, then pay up front on that estimate or spread the cost, with the year-end reading triggering a reconciliation. The government intends to check those figures against the mileage already recorded at annual MOTs, so for a car that already has an MOT there should typically be no extra step.

Is 3 pence per mile fixed?

No. The rates are set from April 2028 and then uprated from 2029 to 2030, and in later years, in line with Consumer Prices Inflation so the tax keeps its real-terms value. Treat 3p as the starting rate rather than a permanent one when you are working out the cost of keeping a car for several years.

Does it change whether an electric car is still cheaper to run?

It narrows the gap rather than closing it, and where you charge decides how much. Charging at home on the price cap, the mileage charge adds 3p to a figure in the mid-sevens, and petrol stays more expensive per mile. Relying on public rapid charging, the per-mile cost was already above petrol before this and the charge widens that gap further. The table on this page works both cases from current published prices.

Electricity costs on this page use the Ofgem price cap, Direct Debit, Great Britain average, 1 Oct 2026 to 31 Dec 2026 — excludes VAT (GB domestic electricity is zero-rated 1 Oct 2026 – 31 Mar 2027). eVED is announced policy that takes effect in 2028 and the implementing regulations are not yet made, so check GOV.UK for the position at the time you need it.