Doing the math, even in the worst circumstances (very cold or very hot temperatures) with a 300 mile range battery that you max out at 80% charge and avoid going below 10% charge, I can get back the majority of my commute and even have enough charge to go into the city over 50 miles away on the weekend. I would only need to stop at a level 2 charger every other week or so. 2 weeks if I don’t need to go to the city. My work is nearby a level 2 charger and places in the city even have level 3 charging. And that is worst case scenario getting only 2 miles an hour off a standard wall outlet as opposed to the optimum 4 or 5 miles.
I feel far more confident about battery range. The 3-4 trips that are more than 250 miles round trip a year are fine if you plan the route and are okay stopping for half an hour. With kids and a dog a stop in a ICE vehicle could easily take that long anyway.
I commuted to Switzerland (1200 km) in a Tesla 4-5 times over the span of a year. The more frequent 40 minute stops for charging are honestly a quality of life improvement, because you don’t get tempted to muscle through. But the total travel time when you start driving 06:00 AM might still exceed 18 hours, if something unlucky happens on the highway, at which point I need to pull over and nap before having reached my final destination. If I were to travel with family, I’d have to split it across two days.
I've done a 3000 km trip with kids 4 times in a Tesla. On one trip the Tesla took 15 minutes longer than a gas car would have. Only once did we did we do a small charge with the kids sleeping where we had to wait for the charger. Every other time we spent longer bathrooming or eating or checking out the roadside attraction than we did charging.
Remember that a big battery car is really good at averaging out intermittent usage. If you're plugging into a standard outlet which can only add 40 miles a night, you'll almost always be OK if you average less than 40 miles a day. The occasional 100+ mile day is fine as long as you average less than 40. Only if you need several consecutive 100+ mile days will you need to resort to a DC level 3 charger.
I think this depends too much on your car and how you use it to make generalizations like "is usually overkill".
With an 11kW charger and assuming 12h in the garage, I can charge 132kWh in a day, which is far more energy than my battery can store. Thanks to this, when I park my car and decide whether to plug it in, all I need to think about is whether the car has enough charge now for my needs tomorrow. If it does, I leave it. If it doesn't, I plug it in.
With a 1.8kW charger, I'd only get 21.6kWh overnight. In my car, this is ~100km of range (~60mi) and about 30% of the battery. Now I either need to charge it every day (and add the hassle of unplugging/plugging every time I use the car) or I need to think about it more.
It's a matter of individual preference whether it's worth a few hundred dollars to avoid that friction but to me it's more than worth it for something that's part of my daily life.
Now I either need to charge it every day (and add the hassle of unplugging/plugging every time I use the car) or I need to think about it more.
I can't fathom not plugging my car in to charge when I park in my normal spot. It doesn't seem like much effort.
But my comment isn't to ridicule you - it's to point out how diverse and different our home charging experiences are, without awareness of others. I had no idea that anyone charged differently than I do.
Meanwhile, I have a motion-activated light switch in the garage. So I guess I don't want the hassle of flipping light switches, yet I plug/unplug daily.
From what I've read, standard nickel-cobalt lithium ion batteries last longer with lots of little charges to keep the battery at around 60% than they do with less frequent larger charges.
The effect is really minor, though. The important thing is to keep the battery between 20% and 80% as much as possible. Going below 20 or above 80 is the most significant thing that shortens life.
I feel far more confident about battery range. The 3-4 trips that are more than 250 miles round trip a year are fine if you plan the route and are okay stopping for half an hour. With kids and a dog a stop in a ICE vehicle could easily take that long anyway.