How much does the HVAC drain from the battery?
We've conducted multiple tests on our Model 3 Highland. However, we’ve never directly compared it to our 2019 Model 3 Performance… until now.
Today, we measured the PTC's and lithium-ion batteries' energy consumption while running climate controls for two hours. Then, we repeated the same experiment with the heat pump and the LFP battery to see how they stack up.
[If you prefer a visual breakdown, watch the video below.]
**Test Design**
To ensure a fair comparison, we used the same conditions for both vehicles. The climate was set to 23°C, and seat heaters were turned on. To prevent the cars from falling asleep, we enabled the Keep Climate On feature before leaving them for two hours. We used the S3XY App to keep track of the remaining capacities of both batteries.
One key difference between these models is their heating systems. The Model 3 Highland is equipped with a heat pump, which extracts energy from the air to warm the cabin efficiently. Meanwhile, the 2019 Model 3 Performance relies on a PTC, which consumes more energy but provides direct heating.
This experiment gives us a great opportunity to see how the heat pump performs against the PTC and whether it proves to be more efficient.
**2019 Model 3 Test**
We first ran the test on our Model 3 Performance, and after two hours, the final results were as follows:
Initial Stats:
- Outside Temp: 3°C
- Cabin Temp: 8.9°C
- SOC: 24%
- Remaining Capacity: 20.9 kWh
Final Stats:
- Outside Temp: 3°C
- Cabin Temp: 23.4°C
- SOC: 20%
- Remaining Capacity: 18.5 kWh
After we left the climate controls running for two hours, the cabin temperatures increased by 14.5°C, at the cost of 2.4 kWh of energy from the Lithium-ion battery. Let’s see how it compares with the Model 3 Highland!
**2024 Model 3 Test**
We repeated the experiment, but this time with our new Model 3. Here are the final results:
Initial Stats:
- Outside Temp: 0°C
- Cabin Temp: 8.4°C
- SOC: 81%
- Remaining Capacity: 47.9 kWh
Final Stats:
- Outside Temp: 0°C
- Cabin Temp: 24.5°C
- SOC: 79%
- Remaining Capacity: 46.8 kWh
After the test was completed, we saw that the LFP battery lost only 1.1 kWh of energy, and in return, we got a 16°C increase in cabin temperature. To put this into perspective, our test showed that the heat pump warmed the interior more effectively and did so at half the energy cost.
**Conclusion**
The results from both tests showed how far Tesla has come in terms of efficiency and reducing energy loss from the old to the new models.
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Stoyan Gyurov
02/18/2025