Man reveals total cost of owning his Tesla Model 3 in UK for four years

A man has revealed the total cost of owning his Tesla Model 3 in the UK over four years.

Whether you’re a fan of them or not, the reality is more and more electric cars are hitting the roads and over time, and owning one is likely to see you spending less over a longer period.

The cost of running one depends entirely on the make and model, and one bloke broke down all of the costs he has had to take into consideration.

Electric Vehicle Man shared a video back in April 2024, explaining his Tesla Model 3 has done 60,000 miles over his four years of ownership.

Tesla Model 3 (Sjoerd van der Wal/Getty Images)

He began by explaining he had two MOTs and a service over the period, starting the ‘grand total’ at £221.50.

Then, at the time of filming, the bloke had a tax cost of just £0. Yep, zero. However, from 1 April 2025, the vehicle tax on vehicles like this will be going right up to £195.

Electric Vehicle Man then moved on to the costs associated with his tyres, as he explained he’s had replacements over the years and has factored in that he is planning on doing more replacements.

So, he’s essentially collating the cost of 12 tyres, racking up a cost of £1,980.

Now, moving on to ‘fuel’, something he’s ‘obviously had to some guestimations on based on the mileage’.

He says he’s ‘lucky enough’ to have done the ‘vast majority’ of charging from home, breaking it up 50,000 miles there and 10,000 from charging using the public charging network – well, ‘the Tesla supercharging network’.

He opts to charge at home most of the time (Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)

Looking at the varying charging costs thanks to differing energy prices and changing prices outside of the home, he said: “I’ve deliberately biased this whole thing to make it more expensive than it realistically is just to be on the safe side.”

He ends up working out £1,000 on home charging and £750 elsewhere for 60,000 miles over the past four years. And that’s quite a save, as he reckons petrol in the same time period would have racked up to £7,855.

With some further calculations, he works out a ‘depreciation’ cost of £22,000.

Electric Vehicle Man didn’t particularly want to include insurance in his total as it’s ‘so variable’ but for him, it’s been around the £600-£650 mark for four years.

So, skipping that out as he wishes, he gets a grand total of £25,952, meaning his Tesla Model 3 has cost him £6,488 a year here in the UK.

Commenters were torn on his breakdown as some still aren’t sold on the depreciation, but others say it’s ‘really interesting’ and are grateful for getting the deets.