Mini Cooper Electric long-term test: report 8

The car Mini Cooper SE Exclusive Run by Eleanor Cooper, news writer

Why it’s here To find out if this cutesy small electric car is more than just a pretty face

Needs to Absorb the stress of morning stop-start commutes, shrug off pangs of range anxiety and slot into small parking spaces with ease

Mileage 3162 miles List price £32,105 Price as tested £34,655 Official range 247 miles Test range 200 miles

19 May 2026 – In charge of charging

Good things come to those who wait, as they say, and my Mini Cooper Electric finally got what it was waiting for this week.

If you've been following my time with the Mini, you might recall I’ve been waiting to get an EV charger installed at my house for some time, but due to various delays it’s been a long time coming. Well, my plight is finally over, and I welcomed my new charger last week.

I was really excited to have my home charger installed, because since I got my Cooper SE back in November, I’ve been fully reliant on the UK's often spotty public charging network to keep its battery topped up. While it’s not caused me too many problems so far, it has proved to be pretty pricey. So, the idea of being able to charge my car up overnight on the cheap and in the comfort of my own driveway has been very enticing.

The charger I have is a VCHRGD Seven Pro – and you’ll be able to hear more about that in our home charger survey after I’ve spent some time with it.

As soon as my charger was installed, I was keen to give it a try to see how it all works. We had switched to an EV-friendly energy tariff, which meant I could charge my car overnight when energy prices were at their lowest. Weirdly, Mini is one of the only brands that isn’t fully compatible with my energy provider’s app, which meant I couldn’t control my charging preferences through it.

It means I have to control my charging schedule partially through the Mini app, but that isn’t too much of a hassle. In fact, I’ve used the Mini app numerous times for its other features, including remote locking/unlocking, checking my car’s charging status and pre-conditioning the battery, which are all pretty straightforward.

All I had to do was connect my Cooper SE to my energy provider’s app, set up ‘smart charging’ and ensure all the settings in my Mini app were compatible with my charging schedule. I plugged my car in and slept soundly with the knowledge that my car was being topped up for proverbial pennies.

The next morning, I woke up to a notification on my Mini app that my car’s battery reached 100% at around 5am – with plenty of time to spare before I set off for work.

The whole experience was really straightforward, even if I couldn’t use my energy provider’s app for everything. The Mini app is simple and easy to use, and I’m very glad I no longer have to rely exclusively on pricey public chargers for the foreseeable future.

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