I charged the apparent gravity with a Tesla supercharger. The results surprised me

The Lucid Gravity has a DC fast charging rate of up to 400 kilowatts, making it one of the fastest-charging electric vehicles in America. It also has a Tesla-style North American Charging Standard (NACS) plug for access to the original Supercharger. I tried this and it went from 40% to 80% in about 15 minutes with a very flat charging curve.

I’ll be honest. I didn’t like the new 2026 Lucid Gravity at first. First and foremost, I was bothered by the $122,950 price of our Gravity Grand Touring tester. The American electric car market has had a lot of expensive spaceships over the years, and I’m not convinced it really needs another.

But as far as expensive starships go, Lucid Gravity has proven to be a very well executed ship. With a range of up to 450 miles, some luxury features, amazing power and plenty of space, it’s actually one of the best electric cars I’ve ever driven. (Yes, even with some issues with the smart keys, which Lucid has promised to fix soon.)

One of Gravity’s best party tricks is charging prowess. Using a powerful enough fast charger, it can charge at 400 kilowatts, more than any other electric car on the US market – although it will soon face competition from the likes of BMW and Porsche. On a mph basis, the Gravity charges faster than any electric car outside of China.

At a 350-kilowatt plant, we saw gravity go from 0% to 25% in just five minutes before reaching 80% in 27 minutes. Not bad for something with a large 123 kWh battery.

Photography: Patrick George

But the Gravity also has a Tesla-style North American Charging Standard (NACS) plug from the factory for access to the original Supercharger. How does it work on one of these, considering that the most common V3 Tesla chargers operate at up to 250 kilowatts, and not all EVs necessarily work well on them?

In short, gravity crushed her. Lucid’s new SUV exceeded my expectations for a Tesla Charger, and bested its bigger brother, the Lucid Air. Here’s how my test went.

The obvious appeal: Tesla charger test

Photography: Patrick George

I should start by saying that this was not the most scientific test. It wasn’t a carefully scored test, or a start-from-scratch test, the way our colleague and friend Tom Moloney does on his State of Charge YouTube channel.

You could alternatively call this a real test. I was out in Gravity, running some errands, and decided to see how it would work on a nearby Tesla charger. I was charging at 40% with 175 miles of range, so I manually configured the battery in the charging settings — something you can configure to happen automatically when you set a fast charger as your destination. I fired up my handy Tesla app, powered the Gravity into space, and plugged it in.

Photography: Patrick George

I started charging at 6:52pm, and immediately the G-force reached 105kW very quickly. It rose from there faster to 180 kilowatts, then 200 kilowatts. One minute later, the SUV was drawing 220 kilowatts, which is not much less than the supercharger’s top speed, and not bad for starting with a 40% state of charge. If the Gravity’s battery had been flat, I’m sure it would have gone higher.

(Lucid says Gravity should peak at 225 kilowatts on 500-volt chargers, including Tesla’s V3 units. And since the car itself runs on 926 volts, it needs higher-voltage chargers to reach full charging potential.)

Photography: Patrick George

Photography: Patrick George

Photography: Patrick George

Photos by: Patrick George

The car took me 15 minutes to reach the 80% limit I had for DC fast charging. With everything going well, I went about running my errands while monitoring speeds from the Tesla app. Gravity remained steady for a while before dropping to 165 kW and 65% by 7:02 p.m., then 145 kW and 75% by 7:08 p.m., then powered up to 140 kW at 78%, then ended a few minutes later.

In the end, the car’s charge went from 40% to 80% with the Tesla charger in about 17 minutes. During that time, I added a 175-mile range and 47 kWh battery capacity, and I was ready to drive with a total range of 351 miles. The charging session was over before I finished my shopping trip.

Photography: Patrick George

I would say not bad here – not bad at all. The Gravity’s charging performance on the Tesla plug easily passes my question of “Does this get the job done on a road trip?” and “Is it doing what it was supposed to do?” Tests. I was able to see a lot of people charging at 40%, finding a Tesla plug nearby, and wanting to get back on the road quickly. Getting from there to 80% in less than 20 minutes is a solid result.

Lucid engineers said the Gravity’s 926-volt architecture — easily the most powerful on sale in the U.S. — enables faster charging with a Tesla plug even from Tesla cars. Although my testing wasn’t comprehensive against the Model Y or anything else, I think this is accurate.

In the last Tesla Model Y I tested, it went from 10% to 80% in 27 minutes, adding approximately 228 miles of EPA range. Tesla itself says the Model Y can add 144 to 182 miles of range after 15 minutes of supercharging. I basically matched this in my testing, and in suboptimal conditions, charging starting at 40%.

For more context, the last Hyundai Ioniq 9 I tested — which has a 110 kWh battery — went from 20% to 80% when using the Tesla plug in about 30 minutes. This slower result makes sense, since the Ioniq 9’s 800-volt motor maxes out at 126 kilowatts on most superchargers.

Again, it’s fair to say the Lucid does better than both. Any car company that makes 800-volt EVs needs to do some work to make their cars work well with Tesla chargers, and the Gravity does very well. By comparison, Lucid’s Air sedan can only reach 50 kilowatts on most superchargers.

So what does this mean for the average person, who doesn’t accurately record charging times and charging curves for articles and YouTube videos? This means that the gravity plug on the Tesla plug — of which there are more than 20,000 in North America alone — can charge and get back on the road very quickly. If they can find something with a speed of up to 400 kilowatts, they should be able to add 200 miles of range in less than 12 minutes.

I’m impressed with the appeal so far. Next: See what you can do at America’s fastest electric vehicle charging station.

Photography: Patrick George

Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com

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