Kiwi company Evnex has taken the wraps off a hard-wired home EV charger for budget-conscious buyers — the E2 Flex. Find out what it includes (and doesn’t) and how much it costs.
What Are The E2 Flex’s Specifications And Cost?
- 7.4kW output, single-phase.
- 5m tethered charging cable.
- Home overload protection.
- Includes power sensor (CT).
- Operating temperature range: -25°C to 55°C.
- Ingress Protection (IP) rating: IP55.
- Dimensions: 288mm x 185mm x 66mm.
- Weight: 4.2kg.
- Colour: Volcanic (dark grey).
- Mobile app for monitoring and scheduling.
- Warranty: 4 years.
- Cost: $649.00 before installation (introductory pricing).
- Starts shipping from December 1, 2025.
You’ll need an electrician to install a hard-wired charger such as the E2 Flex. That can cost anywhere from a few hundred dollars to a few thousand depending on installation scenario complexity, but most will pay $1,000 – $1,500 for installation.
Evnex says it can arrange installation, which works out to around $900 for a standard install. As to what is considered ‘standard’, the company says:
“… as a rough guide, this usually means you’re installing the charger within 1 metre of your switchboard, and it’s on the ground floor of your home.”
Note that if you install the E2 Flex within 1 metre of your switchboard, the 5-metre tethered charging cable may not be long enough to reach your EV and there’s no other option available.
What Is The E2 Flex Missing?
One particularly important feature missing if you have solar panels is support for smart solar charging. The E2 Flex will pull power from the grid, plus solar if you have a system installed — but it doesn’t have the smarts required to control solar charging.
Without that feature, the E2 Flex may be considered by some not particularly smart. But support for this can be added later through a software update (no return visit required from an electrician) that costs $399.
“Flexibility is in the name,” said Evnex CEO Ed Harvey. “Users can start simple, and if they install solar later, the upgrade is seamless.”
Also missing from the E2 Flex is Tesla integration. If you want solar smart charging from the get-go or Tesla integration (or both), there’s the E2 Plus (hardware: $1,173.00). The E2 Core ($988.00) also supports solar-only charging, but doesn’t provide Tesla integration.
The E2 Flex also doesn’t come with a cable hook or Amber integration.
A shortcoming of all Evnex chargers is in relation to Open Charge Point Protocol (OCPP), which facilitates communication with other OCPP devices and integration with third-party services. While Evnex chargers use OCCP, they don’t allow OCPP connections to be pointed to a different software platform. Given the growing number of third-party services using OCCP, compatibility might also be considered a must-have feature for some EV owners.
Harnessing Solar Sharer
A few weeks ago, Australian Federal Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen announced that electricity retailers in several states initially will be required to provide a standing offer time-of-use (ToU) electricity plan that provides free electricity to households for at least three hours in the middle of the day.
The Solar Sharer initiative *should* be implemented in in New South Wales, South-East Queensland, and South Australia from July next year; with view to expanding it across Australia in 2027.
“With its higher power output, the E2 Flex helps EV drivers take full advantage of this – fitting more charging into those free hours than standard chargers,” states Evnex. “Combined with smart scheduling, the E2 Flex smart charger ensures charging aligns with the Solar Sharer free hours of electricity, even without rooftop solar.”
The maximum 7.4 kW output of the Evnex E2 Flex provides up to 4 times the charging speed of some standard plug-in devices, which are also referred to as trickle, granny or brick chargers.
It’s worth noting some electricity retailers already offer “free hours” plans. An example is AGL’s “Three For Free” electricity plan we looked at a while back, which has higher usage and daily charges than its ‘Smart Saver’ plan. Another thing to bear in mind are the details and conditions of Solar Sharer are some way off from being finalised.
Evnex was established in 2014, and its factory is located in Christchurch, New Zealand. You can learn more about the company’s products and what Australian customers think of them on our Evnex EV charger reviews page.
So, what device from which company might be best in your circumstances for keeping an EV topped up at home? Learn everything you should look for and recommendations in SolarQuotes’ home EV charger guide. And if you’re searching for good-quality EV charger installation services, we can help there too.
About Michael Bloch
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Doesn’t sound earth shattering, but another option in the market is welcome!
A cable hook seems a bit primitive – unless it captures the otherwise dangling plug, not the cable? The round Victron EV charger serves as a cable drum, taking one very loose cable turn draped over it, and there’s a plastic dummy socket screwed to the wall beside. So the station resembles a petrol bowser, with the plug highly grabbable at shoulder height or so, and there’s negligible cable dangle.
Modern folk who buy some other model could probably 3D-print a similar dummy plug socket, and buy a garden hose curved-rack-thing to take the cable coil?
Doing solar-only BEV charging here, 40 kWh on a sunny day, but the on-grid 3 free hours ought to pay for an EV charger in less than a year, through ICE fuel cost savings, or slower when replacing a several-day trickle charger whose slow throughput slides you fast into non-free hours.
If out around midday, a capacious home battery can timeshift some EV charging just as well as meal cooking energy. (Here: BEV: 51 kWh, Home: 46 kWh)
In my opinion, any EV charger should have usable OCPP compatibitily. This should be able to be controlled by a retailer such as Amber, or integrated into a system such as Home Assistant. It seems the EVnex has limitations in this area.
Personally, on my ZJBeny EV charger, I park the cable over the charger & leave the plug dangling but I use the rubber cap to reduce contamination.
btw, with any EV charger, update the firmware. There are security concerns with any Electronic devices with Web access. In the 3 years I have used the ZJBeny, I have updated over 10 times. The software is now on ver 1.2.8, released a few days ago. The updates have fixed many problems.
I’m a licensed electrician and solar installer and installed the ZJBeny where I rent, as I wanted to see what an entry level charger could do, and if there were big differences with more “premium” models…
Besides a few software glitches (it sometimes takes 30s to connect to the charger), I’m really impressed with the device. It charges off the excess solar, you can put a charging schedule with a different charging power, and it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg. I charged my EV van 2,656kWh so far, and it still works fine after 1,5 years.
There are 2 distinct model streams with ZJBeny EV chargers: The OCPP model, which requires a connection to a server to manage the OCPP. fyi, I use Home Assistant with the OCPP integration. This allows me to change the configuration from my computer: Charge current, connect/disconnect charging (if the car is plugged in of course!) etc. It is possible to have Home assistant read all the inverters, batteries, loads etc, & write an automation to automatically control the charger, but I just l;ook at the sky & set the current!
The other model ZJBeny is a ´smart´ charger. this model does not have OCPP functionality (to my knowledge). Both chargers can use a DLB box that will control the charger. Early DLB boxes had problems in Australia, but Beny updated the DLB boxes to fix these issues. (With Home Assistant, the DLB box is not really required)
The connection issue you described might be fixed by a firmware update. I recommend running the latest firmware for security reasons.
A true ‘smart’ EV charger has its smart features built into its firmware, not reliant on third party software and a cloud connection.
Dynamic load management continues to be overlooked and not spoken about an essential feature of an EV charger. It’s compulsory under GBs smart charge regulations, a Tesla wall connector cannot be installed in the UK without additional hardware that enables load manangment. It is a must-have for any home to consume cheap grid energy, either from windows of free power or spot pricing via dynamic tariffs.
John, I feel you are only partly correct. I clarify this by saying if you have a single source system (eg SigEnergy), Dynamic Load Management will work successfully.
However, if you have a system such as I have: SolarEdge PV, Victron charger/inverters + battery, then an added EV charger, then the only option is to have a management system such as Home Assistant as the only option I know about. The ZJBeny EV charger (either OCPP or Smart) can use their DLB box, but the issue I find is one gets cluttered by current clamps, where with Home Assistant & in my case with distributed loads & generation (40 Meter split), I can read all my data on my network, then control from the Home Assistant server.
On my system, I use IoTaWatt for monitoring my house, then HA reads all the battery & inverter data directly off the inverters so I can have a desktop display of my system. HA also manages my OCPP EV charger.
Sounds like a brilliant setup Doug.
Do you have an idiots guide or a good website for people to get a feel for how these solutions can be put together?
I will add to my reply that I feel ALL permanently connected EV chargers should be OCPP compliant. OCPP is the only way we can control (ie load shed) our EV charging in the future. I feel it is only a matter of time until load shedding will be a part of Energy management, much as PV inverters can be externally controlled now. This would be loads such as A/C, pools, EV charging, & possibly discretionary loads such as dishwashers & W/M etc.
Plug-in Granny chargers I feel, should be the only EV chargers without OCPP compliance (ie 15a max)
Hi Doug,
In South Australia all EV chargers must be OCPP capable or they’re not compliant to install.
Something Bunnings didn’t know when they started offering EVSE equipment for sale.
Connection to centralised control isn’t yet standard but at some point soon enough I expect it’ll either be economically attractive or just mandatory.
The ability to centralise control and load shedding of EV chargers has been mandated in the UK since 2022. A majority of popular EV chargers such as Ohme and Hypervolt meet these requirements without supporting OCPP.