EV Savings Calculator

Calculate how much you'd save by switching to an electric vehicle, including fuel, maintenance, and CO2 reduction.

Switching from gas to electric changes two separate cost lines: what you spend on energy per mile, and what you spend on maintenance per year. This calculator computes annual gas cost as miles driven divided by fuel economy, times price per gallon, and annual electricity cost the same way — miles driven divided by EV efficiency (in miles per kWh), times electricity price (converted from cents to dollars per kWh). Electricity is consistently cheaper per mile in typical U.S. rate scenarios because EVs convert a much larger share of stored energy into motion than gas engines, which lose most of their energy as heat — that efficiency gap is what drives most of the fuel savings line, separate from any maintenance difference. Maintenance savings come from a second, independent comparison: EVs have no oil changes, far fewer moving parts in the drivetrain, and regenerative braking that reduces brake wear, which is why the calculator lets you enter different annual maintenance figures for each vehicle type rather than assuming a fixed gap. Total savings over your comparison period simply multiplies the combined annual savings (fuel plus maintenance) by the number of years, without compounding or discounting for the time value of money. Tailpipe CO2 avoided uses the EPA's standard 8.89 kg CO2 emitted per gallon of gasoline burned — it counts only the gas vehicle's exhaust emissions the switch eliminates, not any emissions from generating the electricity the EV uses instead, which is why it's labeled tailpipe rather than net or lifecycle CO2. The trees-equivalent figure divides that tailpipe figure by roughly 21.77 kg of CO2 a mature tree absorbs annually. What this tool does not account for: the EV's purchase price premium (or any tax credits offsetting it), battery degradation over the comparison period, or the carbon footprint of the electricity itself, which varies enormously by local grid mix — on a coal-heavy grid, netting that out would meaningfully reduce the true CO2 benefit versus the tailpipe-only figure shown here.