Tesla Wall Connector (Gen 3) vs CTEK Chargestorm Connected 3

A home charger and a car-park unit walk onto the same wall

The Tesla Wall Connector costs £475. The CTEK Chargestorm Connected 3 costs £1,086. That is a £611 gap — wider than the price of many complete chargers on the market. The two units are not competitors in the usual sense. They are built for different electrical supplies, different use cases, and different definitions of what a home charger needs to be.

• Tesla Wall Connector — £475, tethered, 7.3-metre cable, Tesla app scheduling. The default for a Tesla owner on single-phase.
• CTEK Chargestorm Connected 3 — £1,086, untethered, 4-metre fixed tail, OCPP 2.0.1, MID-approved meter, built-in MRCD Type B. The default for a three-phase owner who wants commercial-grade metering on the side of a house.

The single-phase question that answers itself

Roughly 95% of UK homes run single-phase. On single-phase, both chargers deliver about 7.4kW. The CTEK's headline — native 22kW three-phase — becomes decorative. You pay £1,086 for a charger whose defining feature your supply cannot use, and the install is steeper too: £900–£1,300 typical for the CTEK versus £400–£600 for the Tesla.

The CTEK does include its own MRCD Type B protection, which saves the installer buying a separate one (typically £100–£200). The Tesla needs an external RCD and surge protection added at the board. Factor that in, and the real-world installed gap narrows slightly — but not enough to change the arithmetic. On single-phase, the Tesla is the smaller outlay by a wide margin, and it does the same job at the same speed.

One exception: if you are a renter or flat owner eligible for the £500 OZEV grant, the CTEK qualifies and the Tesla does not. That brings the CTEK's unit price to £586 — still more than the Tesla's £475, but the gap shrinks to £111 before install. Whether that matters depends on how much you value the CTEK's built-in metering and OCPP support. For most domestic users, the answer is: not £111-plus-higher-install-costs much.

Where the CTEK earns its price: three-phase and OCPP

The CTEK exists for a specific buyer. You have a three-phase supply — or you are getting one installed — and you want 22kW charging at home. You may also want OCPP 2.0.1 and a MID-approved energy meter because you plan to bill a fleet vehicle, reclaim business mileage precisely, or integrate with a building management system. The CTEK does all of this out of the box, with IP54 and IK10 ratings that make it comfortable on an exposed wall or in a shared car park.

The Tesla Wall Connector also supports three-phase 22kW, but it lacks OCPP, has no built-in energy meter, and carries only an IP44 rating. For a straightforward domestic three-phase install — one car, one owner, no billing — the Tesla still works. But the moment you need metering accuracy, protocol openness, or physical robustness, the CTEK is the more complete package. The Zaptec Go 2 at £638 sits between the two on price and also offers three-phase with OCPP — worth a look if you want the protocol support without the CTEK's full commercial spec.

Smart-tariff control: neither charger excels

Neither unit is a smart-tariff charger in the way an Ohme Home Pro is. The Tesla handles manual scheduling through its app — set a window, walk away. That works fine on fixed off-peak tariffs like Octopus Go (8.5p/kWh, 00:30–05:30). It does not chase half-hourly pricing on Octopus Agile.

The CTEK is worse off. It has no first-party consumer app at all. Scheduling depends on third-party OCPP platforms like Monta. There is no direct integration with Intelligent Octopus Go or OVO Charge Anytime. If tariff optimisation matters to you — and for most domestic EV owners it should — neither charger is the right tool. The Ohme Home Pro at £539 does this job properly, and it is covered in the Tesla vs Ohme comparison.

The verdict

Buy the Tesla Wall Connector if:

• You have a single-phase supply and a Tesla — £475, 7.3-metre cable, four-year warranty, done
• You want the simplest install at the lowest total cost
• Manual scheduling on a fixed off-peak tariff is enough

Buy the CTEK Chargestorm Connected 3 if:

• You have or are installing three-phase and want the full 22kW with MID-approved metering
• You need OCPP 2.0.1 for fleet billing, building integration, or future-proofing
• You are OZEV-eligible and value the built-in MRCD Type B saving the installer a return trip

For the vast majority of UK homes — single-phase, one car, one driver — the Tesla Wall Connector at £475 is the right charger. The CTEK is a fine piece of engineering aimed at a narrow audience. If you are in that audience, you already know it. If you are not sure, you are not.