[jader201]

1. Maintenance isn’t just about cost. It’s about the number of things that move and/or need fluids, and can fail/leak. It’s about dealing with service centers trying to upsell you on every little possible thing that could go wrong.

When I take my EV in, it’s for one of two things: I need my tires rotated, or I need new tires. That’s it. There’s no “curtsy inspection” that comes back with literally 40 different things that I could have done to it.

2. Our household has four vehicles: one EV, three ICE vehicles. There’s no way the occasional new tires (rotations are free where we bought our tires) amount to 2/3 the cost of the maintenance needed on our ICE vehicles. It’s probably closer to 1/10.

I think you’re overestimating what all needs maintenance on an EV.

[Marsymars]

> I think you’re overestimating what all needs maintenance on an EV.

I'm not doing any estimating, I kept a detailed spreadsheet of every dollar I put into the car, and am familiar with which items are common to an EV.

[jader201]

> and am familiar with which items are common to an EV.

This is the overestimating I was referring to. I think you’re either mistaken in what items are common to EV, or you’re overestimating the cost of those items.

There is only one thing that needs maintenance on an EV: tires.

Unless you’re saying that tires amount to 2/3 of an ICE vehicles maintenance. In which case you may want to shop around for more reasonably priced tires.

[devmor]

I think you also might be overestimating what the average ICE owner has to take care of.

Most Americans don’t keep a car long enough to even pay it off - they’re in an endless loop of trade-ins, meaning that most non-accident damage is covered by warranty.

I’ve had my current ICE car for just over 5 years now and finally paid my first out of pocket repair cost: $40 for a new washable air filter. Other than that, my expenditures have been tires and a couple hundred bucks in oil changes that I didn’t want to do myself.

[jader201]

> I think you also might be overestimating what the average ICE owner has to take care of.

> Most Americans don’t keep a car long enough to even pay it off - they’re in an endless loop of trade-ins, meaning that most non-accident damage is covered by warranty.

No, I think you may be underestimating. According to this article [1] at least, it’s close to 13 years. That’s well into large/costly maintenance items.

Maybe on HN, people don’t keep their cars long enough to need new brakes or transmission flush, but that’s not typical.

[1] https://www.spglobal.com/automotive-insights/en/blogs/2025/0...

> I’ve had my current ICE car for just over 5 years now and finally paid my first out of pocket repair cost: $40 for a new washable air filter.

Repairs are only a subset of maintenance. Maintenance includes oil changes, brakes, transmission flushes, etc.

All of this is part of the maintenance that ICE vehicles need that EVs don’t.