Electric are solely powered by electricity. This means that you plug them into a charger, and it uses only available battery power to drive.
Plug-in-hybrid vehicles (or PHEVs) have petrol motor and electric motor components; a halfway point between fuel-powered cars and electric cars if you like. You need to charge the batteries for the electric motor component. However, their electric-only driving range is generally short – between 40 to 100 kilometres. From there it will switch over to the motor and conventional fuel.
The other type of hybrid is the more traditional non-plug-in hybrid (HEV). These have been in the market for around 20 years since the launch of the Toyota Prius. HEVs run on both an internal combustion engine and a battery, but the difference is you cannot charge HEVs; they use energy stored in the battery from what is called ‘regenerative braking’.
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