Porsche has a smartphone-style wireless charger for its new electric Cayenne

The new electric Porsche Cayenne can be charged wirelessly like a smartphone, thanks to a new weatherproof, inductive wireless charging pad.

Despite being contactless, with an air gap between the charger and the car itself, Porsche says the Cayenne’s battery can be filled at a rate of 11 kW – the same as most wired home EV chargers – and with an efficiency of up to 90 percent.

Porsche isn’t the first carmaker to adopt wireless charging for EV batteries. BMW showcased its own contactless charging pad back in 2018, but that system charged at just 3.2 kW and never expanded beyond a few small pilot programmes. Porsche, on the other hand, says it will offer a wireless charger to customers for use with the new electric Cayenne in 2026.

Suitable for indoor and outdoor use, the charging plate is installed in the floor of your garage, drive or parking space. The plate measures 117 x 78 x 6.0 cm, and connects to mains electricity in the same way a normal wired home EV charger does. All the driver has to do is park their Cayenne over the charger – Porsche says the car’s parking cameras help to align everything correctly – put it into Park, and the car automatically lowers to get closer to the plate. The charger, which Porsche says is CE and UL certified and meets all EU and US safety and environmental requirements, then gets to work.

It can be given a charging scheduling or told to stop at a certain battery percentage, like most other home EV chargers, and Porsche says it automatically stops if a living creature is detected between the car and the floor plate. It is also designed to stop if a metal object is between the two and starts to heat up. The charger sends electricity to a receiver, which is mounted between the front wheels of the car and protected against stone chips and the weather, Porsche says.

Used by smartphones, toothbrushes, wireless earphone cases and other tech products, inductive wireless charging transfers energy through the air via a magnetic field. The Porsche charger uses a transmitter coil, made from copper and ferrites (magnetic ceramic materials), and through which alternating current flows, generating a magnetic field. A rectifier in the car then converts this to direct current, which is used to charge the battery. Ultra-wideband technology is used to determine the vehicle’s location relative to the charger.

What’s particularly impressive is how Porsche claims the charger works at up to 90% efficiency – and that’s from the electricity grid to the car, not just the air gap between the charging plate and the receiver. Regular EV chargers tend to deliver power at between 85 and 95% efficiency, so splitting the difference means drivers are unlikely to notice much difference, in terms of charging time and cost, when charging wirelessly instead of wired.

Michael Steiner, Porsche board member for development, said: “Ease of use, sustainability for everyday use and charging infrastructure are still the decisive factors when it comes to the acceptance of electric mobility. We are proud that inductive charging will soon be available in series production at Porsche. Charging an electric car at home has never been so easy and convenient.”

Pictured as a camouflaged test vehicle in these images, Porsche says the new electric Cayenne will be fully revealed at the end of 2025.