The Department for Transport (DfT) has awarded Zapmap a contract to deliver electric vehicle charge point open data as part of its work to improve the public rapid charging experience for current and future EV drivers.

Zapmap has provided charging data to the DfT since 2017, delivering information on the growth of the public charging network across the UK.

The new contract, awarded following a tender process, will build on this with enhanced and more granular open data focusing on charging sessions and downtime at an EVSE (electric vehicle supply equipment) level.

The Public Charge Point Regulations (PCPR) 2023, which came into effect in November 2024, mandate that charge point operators (CPOs) must make publicly available reference and availability data in a machine-readable format for all public charge points.

Under the EV Open Data contract, Zapmap will aggregate and supply all such data to DfT on a charge point and CPO basis.

This data will support continuation and development of the DfT’s official public EV charging infrastructure statistics, and will also enable a deeper understanding of patterns of usage across different types of charging, which will help to deliver targeted growth and to shape informed policy decisions.

The aggregated data will also be available to the rest of the industry via the Zapmap Insights product suite.

Melanie Shufflebotham, co-founder and chief operating officer at Zapmap, said: “The availability of this data to government will support them in their decision-making and policy development, which in turn should help organisations and EV drivers make the switch to EV with confidence.”