Easee One vs Andersen A3: Budget Champion vs Design Icon

Best Value vs Best Looking: Is the Andersen A3 Worth £590 More?

These two chargers sit at opposite ends of the home EV charging philosophy. The Easee One is the charger you buy when you want reliable, connected charging at the lowest possible price. The Andersen A3 is the charger you buy when you want your neighbours to compliment your driveway. Both deliver identical 7.4kW single-phase charging — the maximum most UK homes can support — but the journey from plug to full battery couldn't feel more different.

The price gap here is striking: £590 separates these two units before installation. That's enough to cover your electricity costs for well over a year of commuting. So the question isn't really about charging performance — it's about what else you're getting for your money, and whether those extras matter to you.

In a nutshell:

• Easee One (£405): The lightest, cheapest smart charger on the UK market, with built-in lifetime 4G connectivity and dynamic load balancing.
• Andersen A3 (£995): A design-led charger with 247 finish combinations, a hidden cable system, and the longest warranty in the business at 7 years.

Spec Comparison

Smart Tariff Integration and Connectivity

This is where the Andersen A3 pulls ahead in a meaningful way. It offers direct smart tariff support for popular UK EV tariffs like Octopus Intelligent Go (~7p/kWh off-peak) and OVO Charge Anytime. That means the charger itself can schedule your sessions to hit those cheap overnight windows automatically, potentially saving you hundreds of pounds a year. On Octopus Intelligent Go, charging a typical 60kWh Tesla battery from 20% to 80% could cost around £2.50 — compared to roughly £12 at standard daytime rates.

The Easee One, by contrast, has no direct smart tariff integration. You can still schedule charging through the Easee app, so you could manually set it to charge during off-peak hours on a tariff like Octopus Go (7.5p/kWh between 00:30 and 04:30). But you won't get the seamless, automated optimisation that the Andersen delivers with supported tariffs. For Tesla owners specifically, the car's own app can handle some of this scheduling, which softens the blow — but it's still a genuine advantage for the A3.

Where the Easee fights back is connectivity. Its built-in eSIM provides lifetime 4G at no ongoing cost, with Wi-Fi as a backup. This is a genuine differentiator — if your Wi-Fi signal doesn't reach your driveway or garage (a surprisingly common problem in UK homes), the Easee will stay connected regardless. The Andersen A3 relies on Wi-Fi only, so you may need a Wi-Fi extender if your router is at the front of the house and your charger is round the back. As mcnallyev.uk notes in their charger comparison, the Easee's connectivity approach is "straightforward and reliable."

Build Quality and Design

Let's be honest: the Andersen A3 is in a league of its own here. With 247 colour and finish combinations — spanning metals, woods, and custom colours — plus anodised aluminium construction, it's less a charger and more a piece of exterior design. The hidden cable system is genuinely clever, storing the full 5.5m tethered cable inside the unit when not in use, leaving your wall looking clean and uncluttered. If your charger sits prominently on the front of your house, this matters. It's British-designed, and it shows.

The Easee One takes a different approach entirely. At just 1.5 kg, it's astonishingly light — five times lighter than the Andersen — with a compact, minimalist Scandinavian design. It's neat and inoffensive, but nobody is going to stop their car to admire it. As an untethered unit, there's no cable hanging from the wall, which does keep things tidy, though it means you'll need to fetch your own Type 2 cable from the boot each time. Most Teslas come with one, so this is less of an issue than it sounds. bestchargers.co.uk highlights the Easee as a strong all-round option, and its compact footprint certainly helps on smaller walls or in tight garage spaces.

The warranty difference is significant too. The Andersen's 7-year warranty is the longest on the UK market — more than double the Easee's 3 years. For a unit costing nearly £1,000, that's reassuring, and it suggests Andersen EV has real confidence in its build quality.

Installation Considerations

Both chargers fall into the standard £400–600 installation bracket, and both are OZEV-approved. But the Easee One has a practical edge that installers genuinely appreciate: at 1.5 kg, it's the lightest charger on the market by a considerable margin. That makes it easier to mount, easier to handle, and potentially quicker to install. It also includes integrated RCD Type-B and open PEN protection, which means fewer additional components in your consumer unit — a detail that can occasionally shave cost off installation.

The Andersen A3, at around 7.5 kg, is heavier but still perfectly manageable. One thing to watch is the 5.5m tethered cable — it's shorter than average, and there's no option for a longer one. If your parking spot is more than about 4 metres from the charger (accounting for routing around bumpers and wheel arches), you could find yourself stretching. Measure twice before you commit.

The Easee One also supports dynamic load balancing across up to 3 chargers on one fuse, making it a strong choice for households with multiple EVs — though additional Easee hardware is required for this. The Andersen doesn't offer comparable multi-charger capability.

Price and Value

The value equation here is stark. You could buy two Easee One chargers and still have change from the price of a single Andersen A3. Both deliver identical 7.4kW charging — a full overnight charge for a typical 60kWh EV in around 8.5 hours. The Andersen's smart tariff support and solar integration add genuine functionality, but the Easee counters with lifetime 4G connectivity and dynamic load balancing.

The Andersen A3 is, fundamentally, a design purchase. You're paying for the hidden cable system, the premium materials, the 247 finishes, and the 7-year warranty. If those things matter to you — and for a charger mounted prominently on the front of a period property, they absolutely might — then the premium is justifiable. But if you just want a reliable, well-connected smart charger that does the job quietly and affordably, the Easee One is extraordinarily hard to beat at £405.

Who Should Buy Which?

Buy the Easee One if:

• You want the most affordable smart charger on the UK market
• Your Wi-Fi doesn't reliably reach your charger location (the built-in 4G solves this)
• You have or plan to have multiple EVs (expandable to 3 chargers with load balancing)
• You prefer a clean, untethered wall mount and don't mind fetching your cable
• You want the simplest, lightest installation possible

Buy the Andersen A3 if:

• Your charger is prominently visible and aesthetics genuinely matter to you
• You want direct smart tariff integration with Octopus Intelligent Go or OVO Charge Anytime
• You have or plan to install solar panels and want app-based solar integration
• You prefer a tethered charger with the cable neatly hidden when not in use
• You value a long warranty (7 years vs 3) and premium build materials

Our recommendation: For the majority of UK Tesla owners, the Easee One is the smarter buy. At less than half the price of the Andersen, it delivers the same charging speed, better connectivity, and multi-charger expandability. The lack of direct smart tariff integration is a genuine weakness, but Tesla's own app scheduling and manual timer settings in the Easee app can work around this. The Andersen A3 is a beautiful product that earns its place on the wall of a design-conscious home — but you need to go in with your eyes open about what that £590 premium is actually buying you. It's buying you looks, not kilowatts.

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Read our full Easee One review or Andersen A3 review.

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