Electric car rental in London

We bring the car to any address in the city and to Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Luton, London City and Southend airports, with the exact address, date and time agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed.

Electric car rental in London

Rent-Trip runs electric car rental in London with 10 battery-electric cars, every one automatic, from £71 to £500 a day.

What electric car rental in London includes

Our electric car rental fleet is 10 cars across six brands — Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Nissan, Tesla and Porsche — and four body types: five sedans, two crossovers, two hatchbacks and one SUV. Every car is automatic and rear-, front- or all-wheel drive depending on the model, with power outputs from 150 hp in the Nissan Leaf to 761 hp in the Taycan Turbo S. Nine of the ten seat five people; the Porsche Taycan Turbo S seats four. The return conditions for an electric car, the battery level included, are set out in the rental agreement, so check them before you hand the keys back.

Where we deliver an electric car rental in London

We bring the car to you rather than asking you to collect it from a depot, and the delivery address, date and time are agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed. Nothing on this page is booked by a form alone: the delivery address, the date and the time are agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed, and the same conversation covers the deposit, the insurance excess and any delivery fees, all of which are set out in the rental agreement rather than quoted here. In our practice the address is the part people get wrong most often — a hotel name without the postcode or a terminal without the arrivals hall can add half an hour to a hand-over. Have the full address and a mobile number ready before you call, and confirm the return time at the same moment you confirm delivery.

Outside the city and the six airports: delivery is arranged case by case and is not promised on the site, so ask the manager before you assume it.

What to check before the car arrives

• Charging cable: confirm the Type 2 cable is in the boot — public points in the city use it, and a missing cable turns a 40-minute top-up into a search.
• Zone position: if your address sits inside the Congestion Charge boundary, say so when booking — the manager will flag it before the car is on its way.
• Second driver: any additional driver is agreed when booking, not at the kerbside.
• Return fuel level: the return conditions, the battery level included, are set out in the rental agreement, so check them and plan a top-up near your last stop if needed.

The car arrives clean, which is the one thing we will not compromise on.

Choosing an electric car rental in London by model and body type

Our electric fleet holds 10 cars across six brands — Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Nissan, Tesla and Porsche — and four body types: sedan, crossover, hatchback and SUV. Nine of the 10 are five-seat, one is a four-seat. Everything is automatic, and every car is battery-electric, so the choice comes down to size, range expectation and budget rather than gearbox or fuel.

Electric car rental fleet at a glance

Cheapest electric car rental for a week

The cheapest way into the fleet is the Nissan Leaf at £71 a day, and the most expensive is the Porsche Taycan Turbo S at £500 a day — a spread that covers a family SUV, five sedans, two crossovers and two hatchbacks. Weekly bookings start at £426 and monthly at £1,491, calculated as daily rate multiplied by six and by twenty-one respectively. That structure rewards longer stays: the same Nissan Leaf held for a month costs £1,491. In our experience, travellers who land at Heathrow or Gatwick and stay four weeks do better on a monthly booking than on four separate weekly ones, because the rate is fixed at the point of booking and does not change with the length of each stretch.

Matching body type to the trip

• SUV (Volkswagen ID.4): one car, five seats, rear-wheel drive.
• Sedan (BMW i4, Mercedes-Benz EQE, Tesla Model 3, Tesla Model S, Porsche Taycan Turbo S): five cars, rear-wheel or all-wheel drive, and the best fit for two people with luggage plus motorway miles.
• Crossover (Mercedes-Benz EQA, Tesla Model Y): higher seating position and easier parking than a full SUV, with five seats and front- or rear-wheel drive.
• Hatchback (Nissan Leaf, Volkswagen ID.3): the shortest cars on this page, useful for tight street parking and short urban hops.
• Four seats only (Porsche Taycan Turbo S): 761 hp and all-wheel drive, but two adults in the back is the practical limit — check passenger count before choosing it.

If your trip mixes city driving with a run out to Oxford or the Cotswolds, pick by boot space and seats first and by power last: a rear-wheel-drive sedan handles a full boot and two passengers better than a high-output four-seater, and the daily difference between the ID.4 and the BMW i4 buys a lot of charging.

Charging an electric car rental in London

Every electric car rental in London from our fleet is handed over clean, and the battery level on return is set out in the rental agreement. The city has thousands of public charge points, and a Tesla from our 10-car electric line can also use the Supercharger network. What follows covers pickup, finding a charger, the Tesla option and what to do when the range drops faster than planned.

Picking up an electric car rental fully charged

Rent-Trip hands over every car clean, and the battery level at hand-over and return is set out in the rental agreement. Check the battery gauge against your first day's mileage before you leave the pickup point — a 20-minute top-up near your hotel beats hunting for a rapid charger at 8am on a Monday. The return conditions for an electric car are set out in the rental agreement, so read them before the last day and plan a top-up if they call for one.

Finding charging points

• Zapmap: the standard UK app for live charge-point status, connector type and tariffs across every network in the city.
• Pod Point: one of the largest public networks, with points at supermarkets, retail parks and many hotel car parks.
• Hotel charging: ask at check-in whether the car park has a point — overnight charging there removes the need to plan around chargers during the day.
• Type 2 cable: the connector on all 10 cars in our electric line; most public points locally are Type 2 or tethered rapid units.

Tesla models and Superchargers

Three Tesla models sit in our electric line: the Model 3 at £309 a day, the Model Y at £322 and the Model S at £309. All three are five-seat automatics — the Model 3 and Model Y rear-wheel drive, the Model S all-wheel drive with 670 hp — and all three can use the Supercharger network, which is the densest rapid-charging network in the country and covers long runs out of the city without a detour. On a long run out of the city, a Model Y at 299 hp will typically need one 25-minute Supercharger stop to reach Oxford or Bath and return. If your itinerary includes two or more days outside the city, the £13-a-day step from the Model 3 to the Model Y buys extra boot space — worth it when you are carrying luggage for four.

Range depends on the model, the weather and how you drive: the Nissan Leaf at 150 hp covers the shortest distance per charge in our line, while the Porsche Taycan Turbo S at 761 hp drains fastest under hard acceleration. Cold mornings cut usable range by roughly a fifth, and motorway speeds above 70 mph cost more than town driving. If the battery does reach a critical level, pull into the nearest service area or retail park with a rapid unit rather than limping to a destination charger — a 30-minute stop restores enough range to finish the day.

London charges and zones for electric car rental

Two charging schemes cover the roads here: the Congestion Charge, which electric cars pay, and the Ultra Low Emission Zone, whose standard electric cars meet. Which of them a renter pays, and how, is agreed with a manager when the booking is fixed — we do not decide it for you after the fact.

Congestion Charge and electric car rental

The Congestion Charge is £18 a day when paid on the day of travel or in advance, and £21 when paid by midnight on the third day after the trip. It operates 07:00–18:00 Monday to Friday and 12:00–18:00 on Saturday, Sunday and bank holidays, and is not charged from 25 December to the New Year bank holiday inclusive. The zone sits inside the Inner Ring Road — Pentonville Rd, City Rd, Old St, Commercial St, Mansell St, Tower Bridge Rd, New Kent Rd, Elephant & Castle, Kennington Ln, Vauxhall Bridge Rd, Park Ln, Edgware Rd, Marylebone Rd and Euston Rd form the boundary and are themselves outside or on its edge. A PCN is £180, reduced to £90 if paid within 14 days and rising to £270 after a charge certificate, with 28 days to pay. The 100% Cleaner Vehicle Discount for electric cars ended on 25.12.2025; from 02.01.2026 electric cars with Auto Pay pay 25% less — £13.50 instead of £18 — while without Auto Pay there is no discount at all. Registering the car on Auto Pay before you enter the zone is the one step that turns £18 into £13.50 — it takes minutes and is worth doing the day before travel.

ULEZ and electric car rental

The Ultra Low Emission Zone charges £12.50 a day for non-compliant vehicles and runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, except on 25 December. It covers all 32 boroughs of Greater London — over 1,500 km² since 29 August 2023, having started in the centre on 8.04.2019 and expanded to the North and South Circular on 25.10.2021; the M25 itself is outside the zone. Compliance is set by Euro standards: petrol cars and vans need Euro 4 or better, roughly 2006 and later, and diesel needs Euro 6, from September 2016. A PCN is £180, cut to £90 if paid within 14 days. Every car on this page is electric and therefore compliant, so the £12.50 charge does not apply to these cars — still, check the vehicle on the TfL vehicle checker by its registration plate before setting off.

Tolls and electric car rental

• Dartford Crossing (Dart Charge), M25: £3.50 per crossing for cars, class B, on a one-off or pay-as-you-go basis, or £2.80 when prepaid; payment is due by midnight the following day, and a PCN is £70, £35 if paid within 14 days and £105 if unpaid.
• Blackwall Tunnel and Silvertown Tunnel: £4.20 at peak — northbound 06:00–10:00 and southbound 16:00–19:00 on weekdays — and £1.55 off-peak with Auto Pay, from 6:00 to 22:00 on weekdays and all day at weekends, effective 21 September 2026; a PCN is £180, £90 within 14 days, with a maximum of one PCN a day.
• Tunnel discount note: the 25% electric-car discount on the Congestion Charge does not extend to the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels, where it is 0%.
• Who pays: road charges, tolls and any penalty notices are not settled by rule on this page — they are agreed when booking, so raise the question before the car is delivered rather than after a letter arrives.

Driving rules for electric car rental in London

Every car Rent-Trip hands over is right-hand drive, and traffic keeps to the left — Highway Code rule 160 puts it plainly: keep left unless signs or markings say otherwise. Rule 183 adds that at a turn you stay close to the left edge, and rule 185 covers roundabouts: traffic already on the roundabout comes from your right and has priority. For a driver arriving from a right-hand-traffic country the first hour is the awkward one, so we suggest collecting the car outside the worst of the morning flow and doing a slow loop of quieter streets before joining anything fast.

Licences for electric car hire

A full, valid foreign licence is accepted for 12 months from your last entry into Great Britain — England, Wales and Scotland alike. That 12-month clock starts on the date you came in, not the date you collected the car, so a licence that looked fine on arrival can run out mid-trip. Minimum age, driving experience and any young-driver surcharge are agreed when booking, and the agreement sets out the rest.

Speed limits and electric car hire

• Built-up areas: 30 mph (48 km/h) across England, Scotland and Northern Ireland unless signs say otherwise.
• Single carriageway: 60 mph (96 km/h) on the national limit.
• Dual carriageway and motorway: 70 mph (112 km/h) — the same ceiling for both.
• Lit roads: 30 mph by default where no sign contradicts it, and plenty of streets here carry 20 mph plates instead.

Signs beat every number in that list. A 20 mph plate on a residential street overrides the national 30 mph default, and enforcement cameras sit on exactly those stretches — read the plate before you read your speedometer. On the motorway, keep left unless overtaking — middle-lane cruising is an offence in its own right.

Phones, seat belts and electric car hire

Holding and using a phone, satnav or tablet at the wheel is banned even while stationary at a red light, and the penalty is £200 plus 6 points; a driver who passed their test less than 2 years ago loses the licence outright. Hands-free equipment is allowed as long as the device does not block your view. Seat belts are compulsory where fitted, and children need a child seat until they reach 135 cm or turn 12, whichever comes first — the fine runs up to £500. The drink-drive limit in England, Wales and Northern Ireland is 80 mg per 100 ml of blood, 35 µg per 100 ml of breath or 107 mg per 100 ml of urine; Scotland is stricter at 50 / 22 / 67.

Trips beyond the capital in an electric car rental in London

An electric car rental in London opens up the country beyond the M25, and we have a page for each of the routes below. The distances are short enough that most of them work as a day out, and the charging network on the way is dense enough that range rarely becomes the deciding factor.

• Oxford: about 60 miles west along the M40, an hour and a half of motorway driving, with city-centre parking and charging at the Westgate and Seacourt sites.
• Cambridge: roughly 60 miles north up the M11, and the park-and-ride sites on the edge of the city have charging bays so you can leave the car topped up while you walk in.
• Stonehenge: around 90 miles west on the A303, and worth a top-up at services near Andover before the return leg.
• The Cotswolds: 80 to 100 miles depending on where you stop, with slow roads and hills that cost more range than the motorway miles suggest.
• Bath: about 115 miles west along the M4, close to two hours each way, so plan a charging stop rather than relying on arrival with a full battery.

Longer trips from the capital by electric car

Brighton, Windsor, Canterbury, Cardiff & Wales, Edinburgh and the Eurotunnel crossing all have their own pages, and each is realistic in a car from the Rent-Trip fleet. Brighton is around 55 miles south on the A23 and Windsor about 25 miles west on the M4, so both fit into a morning without a charging stop. The Eurotunnel route means the Channel crossing itself, with the drive on the other side added to the day.

The model you pick changes how comfortable the longer routes feel. The Tesla Model S at £309 a day and the Porsche Taycan Turbo S at £500 a day carry the largest batteries on this page and the fastest charging, while the Volkswagen ID.4 and the Mercedes-Benz EQA at £171 a day are the sensible choice for Oxford or Cambridge, where you will not need the extra range. In our experience the Cotswolds and Bath are where drivers most often wish they had booked a longer-range model — the hills and the slower roads eat into the estimate. Delivery outside the places we cover is arranged case by case and is not promised on the site, so tell the manager your full itinerary when you book. That way the delivery address, the date and the time are agreed before the booking is fixed, and a drop-off at a hotel on the way back is not left to chance.

Why book electric car rental in London with Rent-Trip

The fleet on this page is 10 electric cars, all automatic, from £71 to £500 daily, with weekly from £426 and monthly from £1,491. What you see on the model table is what you get: no class upgrade surprises, no manual gearbox waiting at the kerb. We bring the car to you — to any address in the city or to one of the six airports — and the address, date and time are agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed.

Delivery and hand-over on electric car rental

• Airport arrivals: the car can be brought to Heathrow (LHR), Gatwick (LGW), Stansted (STN), Luton (LTN), London City (LCY) or Southend (SEN) — say which one when you book.
• City addresses: St Pancras & King's Cross, Euston, Paddington, Victoria, Waterloo, Canary Wharf, Wembley, ExCeL London and Mayfair all sit inside the delivery area.
• Timing: the delivery address, the date and the time are agreed with a manager before the booking is fixed — nothing is dispatched on an assumption.

What the rental agreement covers

The car comes clean, and the return conditions for an electric car, the battery level included, are set out in the rental agreement, so they are the ones to plan around.

The deposit, the insurance excess, delivery fees and any discount are also set out in the rental agreement rather than quoted here, and the minimum rental age, the young-driver surcharge and the cards accepted are agreed when booking. In our experience that conversation takes a few minutes and saves the argument at hand-over: ask about all four in one go, before the booking is fixed, and the paperwork matches what you were told.

A fleet that suits the trip, not the other way round

Every car is automatic and electric, which matters on the left-hand side of the road: there is no clutch to think about at a box junction while you are still learning which way to look. Nine of the 10 cars are five-seat and one — the Porsche Taycan Turbo S — is a four-seat. Five are saloons, two crossovers, two hatchbacks and one an SUV, so a family with child seats, a couple with two cabin bags and a driver who wants 761 hp are all served from the same list. The cheapest is the Nissan Leaf at £71 a day; the most expensive is the Taycan Turbo S at £500 a day. Pick the body type first, then the price band — that order gets you the right car faster than scrolling the whole table.