France has crossed a threshold it has been approaching all year: as of 31 July 2026 the country counts 200,045 charging points open to the public, according to the monthly barometer published by Avere-France. That works out at 297 points per 100,000 inhabitants, which puts France among the best-served large markets in Europe on a per-capita basis.
For drivers, the number that matters more than the headline is what kind of charging those points actually deliver — and where they are.
What the 200,000 points actually are
The network is dominated by slower AC charging. Just over three quarters of all public points in France are AC, and only around a fifth can be described as rapid or ultra-rapid.
| Power class | Share of network |
|---|---|
| AC three-phase (7.4–22 kW) | 50% |
| AC single-phase (up to 7.4 kW) | 27% |
| DC rapid (up to 150 kW) | 9% |
| DC ultra-rapid (above 150 kW) | 13% |
More than 5,000 points now deliver up to 350 kW, which is the segment that matters for long-distance travel and for anyone charging a car that can actually use that power. For a Tesla on a French motorway route, the relevant pool is that 13% ultra-rapid tier plus Tesla's own Supercharger network, not the 77% of AC points sitting in car parks.
Where they are installed
The distribution explains why the AC share is so high. Retail and commercial sites account for 47% of all public points, parking areas another 30%, and on-street charging 13%. Workplaces contribute 4%. Motorways — the locations that carry the most range anxiety — account for just 2% of the total, though those sites skew heavily towards high power.
Regionally, Île-de-France leads with 33,830 points, ahead of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes on 24,511 and Nouvelle-Aquitaine on 21,524.
The slowdown behind the milestone
The less comfortable finding in the same barometer is the installation rate. France added 14,544 public points in the first half of 2026, down from 19,880 in the first half of 2025 — a drop of roughly a quarter year on year, at a point when the vehicle parc is still growing.
That matters because of the government's stated target of 400,000 public points by 2030. Doubling the network in the remaining period requires more than 22,000 new points per half-year, well above the current run rate. On the first half of 2026's pace, France would arrive at 2030 short of the goal rather than at it.
What it means for European drivers
For owners driving into or through France, the practical picture is good and getting slowly better: the ultra-rapid tier is growing, 350 kW sites are no longer rare, and coverage in the major regions is dense. The caveat is that a headline network size counts every 7 kW post in a supermarket car park equally with a 350 kW motorway charger, so 200,045 overstates what is useful on a long trip.
The slowdown is the signal worth watching. France's charging rollout has been one of the more reliable stories in European EV infrastructure, and a quarter-on-quarter decline in new installations is the first real sign that the pace is not automatic.