EV Charging Grants for Business in 2026

Government support for business EV charging changed meaningfully in 2026, and much of the advice still circulating online is out of date. The headline Workplace Charging Scheme grant went up, a major depot grant is now open, and several schemes that guides still reference have quietly closed. This guide sets out what your business can genuinely claim as at July 2026, corrects the stale figures, and points you to the numbers that decide whether an installation stacks up.

Quick answer

In 2026 a UK business can claim the Workplace Charging Scheme (up to £500 per socket, 75% of cost, up to 40 sockets, running to 31 March 2027), the Depot Charging Scheme (70% of cost up to £1m for van, HGV and coach depots), and a 100% First-Year Allowance on chargepoint capital spend. Staff charging their own EV at work is also Benefit-in-Kind exempt.

The Workplace Charging Scheme (WCS)

The WCS is the core grant most businesses use. It is a voucher-based scheme that discounts the purchase and installation of chargepoint sockets at your premises.

• Value: up to £500 per socket — increased from £350 on 1 April 2026. If you read an older guide quoting £350, that figure is out of date.
• Coverage: 75% of the total purchase and installation cost, capped at the per-socket figure.
• Limit: up to 40 sockets per applicant, across all sites.
• Deadline: the scheme currently runs to 31 March 2027.

The £500 is a cap, not a flat payment: on a 7kW bay costing £1,200 fitted, 75% is £900, so you receive the £500 maximum; on a cheaper install you may receive less than £500. Because the grant is per socket, a dual-socket unit can attract two grants.

See our full breakdown on the grants and funding page, and use the cost guide to sanity-check quotes before you apply.

The Depot Charging Scheme

New for fleet operators, the Depot Charging Scheme targets businesses electrifying vans, HGVs and coaches — where power demand and infrastructure cost dwarf a typical car park.

• Value: 70% of cost, up to £1m per applicant.
• Who it’s for: depots charging vans, HGVs and coaches — not general staff car parking.

This is a substantial pot aimed squarely at the infrastructure end: grid connections, groundworks and higher-power charging that the WCS was never designed to cover. If you run a logistics, distribution or passenger-transport depot, this is likely the more valuable route.

The tax reliefs that stack on top

Grants are not the whole picture. Two tax measures materially change the after-tax cost of an installation.

Relief	What it does	Deadline
100% First-Year Allowance	Deduct the full cost of chargepoint equipment and installation from taxable profits in year one	31 March 2027 (Corporation Tax) / 5 April 2027 (Income Tax)
Benefit-in-Kind exemption	Staff charging their own EV at work is BiK-exempt under s237A ITEPA — no taxable benefit arises	Ongoing

For a company car, the EV Benefit-in-Kind rate is 4% in 2026/27 — low, but no longer the 2% that older articles quote. It is rising year on year, so the historic “2% forever” pitch is a myth worth retiring.

The grants that have closed

A lot of stale content still points businesses at funding that no longer exists. The EV Infrastructure Grant for Staff and Fleets has closed — if a supplier or blog cites it, treat their information as out of date and question what else they’ve missed. The live, claimable business schemes in 2026 are the WCS, the Depot Charging Scheme and the tax reliefs above.

Which charger should you actually grant-fund?

The grant is only as good as the hardware it pays for, and over-specifying wastes money. Typical installed costs:

Charger	Typical installed cost	Notes
7kW AC	£800–£1,500 per bay	The workhorse for workplace car parks
22kW AC	£2,500–£4,500 per bay	Often oversized — see below
50kW DC rapid	£25,000–£45,000	For rapid turnaround / depots

The big trap is 22kW AC. Most cars cap their onboard AC charger at 7–11kW, so a 22kW unit frequently charges no faster than an 11kW one while costing far more — and it draws three-phase power you may not have spare. Paying grant money for speed the vehicles can’t use is a common and avoidable mistake. Our charger types guide walks through matching the unit to the fleet.

Power, load management and the grid connection

The hidden cost in any larger installation isn’t the chargers — it’s the electrical supply. This is where projects stall or blow their budget.

• Dynamic load management shares your spare supply across sockets, so you can fit more chargepoints on the same connection and often avoid a costly DNO reinforcement. See load management for how this works in practice.
• For three-phase or high-load installs you need G99 approval before works begin.
• A DNO quote takes 5–65 working days, so build this into your timeline early.
• Since 1 April 2023 there is no reinforcement charge for the connection itself — but the lead time still applies, so plan around it.

Getting load management right is usually the difference between a scheme that fits within your existing supply and one that triggers weeks of grid works.

Running costs: why the numbers work

Beyond the grant, the operating economics are what make electrification pay. Depot charging runs at around 7p per mile against roughly 22p per mile for diesel — a gap that compounds fast across a working fleet. That day-to-day saving, not the grant, is what usually carries the business case. We set the full argument out in is workplace EV charging worth it.

Regulations you can’t ignore

Two rule sets catch businesses out:

• Building Regulations Part S: any new non-residential building with more than 10 parking spaces must have at least one chargepoint, plus cable ducting to at least one in five of the remaining spaces. If you’re building or majorly refurbishing, this is a design-stage requirement, not an afterthought.
• Public Charge Point Regulations 2023: if you offer public or paid charging, these apply — covering pricing transparency, payment methods and reliability standards. Charging your own staff and fleet privately is outside their scope.

How to sequence a 2026 project

1. Confirm eligibility for the WCS or, if you run a van/HGV/coach depot, the Depot Charging Scheme.
2. Right-size the hardware — usually 7kW AC for workplace bays; don’t pay for 22kW your vehicles can’t use.
3. Check the supply early — get the DNO quote in (5–65 working days) and design load management before assuming you need reinforcement.
4. Stack the reliefs — apply the 100% First-Year Allowance and keep staff charging BiK-exempt.
5. Design to Part S if it’s a new or refurbished building.

The bottom line

In 2026 the funding is genuinely worth having: £500 per socket through the WCS, 70% up to £1m through the Depot Charging Scheme, and a 100% First-Year Allowance on top — all against operating costs of roughly 7p per mile. The pitfalls are old figures (£350 WCS, 2% BiK, the closed Staff & Fleets grant), oversized 22kW hardware, and grid timelines nobody planned for. Get those right and the case is strong.

Want a specced, grant-eligible quote for your site? Request a quote and we’ll size it correctly the first time.