Mercedes-Benz High Power Charging will unveil a new “multiport” charger: two NACS plugs and two CCS plugs on each side.
Each Alpitronic HYC 400 can deliver up to 400 kilowatts of charging power, which is the upper end for American fast-charging.
Mercedes’ network serves all EVs, and the plugs represent one solution to the sometimes-awkward transition from CCS to NACS.
Right around the time that Mercedes-Benz decided to launch its own charging network in 2022, Tesla dropped a bombshell. The electric automaker said it would open-source its proprietary plug design—called the North American Charging Standard, or NACS—and expand access to its vaunted Supercharger network to outsiders who don’t drive Teslas.
The dominoes fell quickly. In May 2023, Ford was the first manufacturer to adopt the Tesla plug standard for its future electric cars. Then came General Motors, followed eventually by just about every company selling automobiles in North America. The idea was that by adding seamless access to Tesla’s already expansive and generally reliable Supercharger network, these automakers could drive EV adoption more quickly.
“All of a sudden, I think within maybe a week or two, North America had a new charging standard,” said Madeline Ebert, who leads product development for Mercedes-Benz High Power Charging.
Right now, though, that transition is very much in its awkward phase. Some of the latest non-Tesla EVs now come with NACS ports and easy access to Tesla Superchargers, while many others on the road don’t. Drivers need to figure out which adapters to buy and when to use them, a daunting challenge for those new to EVs. Charging providers are caught in the middle, trying to figure it all out, too, by making sure that drivers who have the longstanding CCS ports aren’t left behind.
For Mercedes-Benz High-Power Charging, the answer is the new “multiport” charger, which is now rolling out in full force across its network.
Typical DC fast-chargers offer one or two plugs, the latter often allowing one unit to serve two cars at once. Multiport chargers have four: two NACS and two Combined Charging System 1 (CCS-1), with one set of each per side.
Mercedes told InsideEVs it plans to roll out exclusively multiport chargers going forward—and retrofit all existing locations.
Photo by: Mercedes-Benz
The idea is that any EV—whether it uses the new standard or old, whether it’s a Tesla or another make—can pull up to either side of a multiport unit and juice up without needing an adapter.
Mercedes began hunting for a solution to make public fast-charging straightforward in this new era, Ebert told InsideEVs. That was important since there are still so many customers who are reluctant to go electric, and because CCS-equipped EVs will be on the road for a very long time.
“We as an industry need to solve this so they don’t have to worry about it,” she said. “We’re going to have some of the older cars in the market for the next 10 years or so. So it’s a challenge that we will need to solve for the better part of the next five to 10 years.”
Photo by: Mercedes-Benz
Mercedes approached Alpitronic with the idea, Ebert said, right around the time that the European charging hardware manufacturer was plotting an entry into North America. And the multiport charger is the end result of that collaboration. Each Alpitronic HYC 400 can deliver up to 400 kilowatts of charging power, which is the upper end for America’s most cutting-edge electric models.
Today, some 30 Mercedes stations—about half—feature Multiport chargers. But that number should grow quickly.
Going forward, all new Mercedes stations will feature only multiport chargers, Ebert said. That effort began in earnest last quarter and includes three Canadian locations that opened for business on Tuesday. The company is also retrofitting all of its existing hubs with the new hardware. So someday every Mercedes charger will be accessible—dongle-free—to any EV.
Mercedes-Benz’s charging network has around 30 sites with multiport chargers today.
Photo by: Mercedes-Benz
That last part was crucial, Ebert said, both to take the confusion out of charging and also because adapters are “a black box.”
“You don’t know what people do with it. You don’t know how carefully they handle it or not. And all that can, at the end of day, lead to frustration on the customer side,” she said. Some people may also buy an adapter with the wrong current rating, which would slow down charging times, she said.
Mercedes and Alpitronic had to iron out some kinks to make it all work properly, Ebert said. Work needed to be done on cooling, and the companies needed to figure out the right configuration and length of cables to accommodate any vehicle’s port location.
Ebert believes Mercedes has done it, thanks to both shorter and longer cables of each flavor. The chargers needed firmware changes so that in-vehicle navigation systems would see the correct number of available stalls at each station and not be thrown off by the extra plugs.
This is just one solution to what’s been dubbed the “adapter hell” era, when EV drivers may need any of four different dongles depending on which car they own and which chargers they frequent. But it is one of the more elegant and user-friendly approaches.
Other networks are incorporating NACS too, to serve the growing number of non-Tesla electric models that now feature the port. EVgo and Ionna, the EV charging supergroup founded by several automakers, roll out both CCS and NACS cables at their new stations—but at separate chargers. Walmart, another growing player in the space, is deploying Alpitronic units with one CCS and one NACS plug each. ChargePoint has introduced the OminPort, an internal adapter that lets one cable interface with both CCS and NACS cars.
And the quad-cable HYC 400 isn’t exclusive to Mercedes either. Electrify America, for example, is piloting the hardware at two of its stations. But Mercedes is the first to commit to deploying it across its entire network.
MBHPC has installed over 650 ports today, and the total should surpass 1,000 this year, the company says. That suggests at least 350 more multiport chargers should be available soon.
Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com
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