Ontario vehicle energy lab

Compare the cars, not just the fuel.

Pick any two Canadian model-years. See what each uses, what that energy costs where you drive, and whether a higher purchase price can earn itself back.

Step 1

Choose the two cars

Every make, model family and model-year comes from the Canadian NRCan catalogue. Where grouped trims share one compatible energy type, the result uses the midpoint and shows the full range.

Vehicle A2023 Tesla Model 3

Optional. Add it to unlock price-gap and break-even math.

Unit: Canadian dollars.
Vehicle B2023 Toyota Corolla

Optional. Add it to unlock price-gap and break-even math.

Unit: Canadian dollars.

Step 2

Make it yours

Use exact typed values with generous safety bounds. Change one input and the explanation below changes with it.

How far ahead?

Your annual total.

Unit: kilometres per year.

How long you expect to keep the car.

Unit: years.
Gas and diesel

CAD per litre

Unit: Canadian dollars per litre.

CAD per litre

Unit: Canadian dollars per litre.

CAD per litre

Unit: Canadian dollars per litre.

Toronto, week of 2026-08-31. Type over any price if your station differs.

Home charging

Enter your marginal all-in rate for a fuller estimate.

Unit: cents per kilowatt-hour.

Use this only for charging that occurs during the OEB off-peak period.

One-time estimate. Use $0 if you already have charging or do not need an installation.

Unit: Canadian dollars.

Comparison updated. 2023 Tesla Model 3 uses $177 less energy each month.

Energy-only comparison

20,000 km/year

2023 Tesla Model 3 uses $177 less energy each month.

Energy difference$177 each month
Price + energy differenceAdd both prices

This compares the entered purchase price, home charger and energy. Insurance, maintenance, financing, incentives and resale value are intentionally outside this result.

Electric

2023 Tesla Model 3

A

Energy each month

$28
Official combined rating used
17.2 kWh/100 kmMidpoint of 15.8–18.6 kWh/100 km
Electricity a year
3,440 kWh
Energy over 5 years
$1,686
Official tailpipe CO₂
0 kg/yearZero at the tailpipe; not lifecycle emissions
Rated range
438–576 km

5 NRCan test rows sit behind this model-family range.

Gas or diesel

2023 Toyota Corolla

B

Energy each month

$205
Official combined rating used
6.8 L/100 kmMidpoint of 6.7–6.8 L/100 km
Fuel a year
1,350 L
Energy over 5 years
$12,326
Official tailpipe CO₂
3,180 kg/yearNRCan laboratory rating; not lifecycle emissions

3 NRCan test rows sit behind this model-family range.

Break-even

Add both vehicle prices to find the catch-up point

Energy savings alone do not answer when a more expensive vehicle pays back. Enter the prices you expect to pay above; the charger is added only to an electric or plug-in option.

Step 3 · Whole ownership stress test

Add financing, depreciation, tax and incentives.

The model cards above compare two real vehicles on energy. This second lens holds the vehicle price equal so you can isolate the costs the energy-only result deliberately leaves out. It is a generic powertrain stress test, not a model-level resale quote. On a fresh visit, the visible $30,000, used and good-credit values are a neutral example, not facts about you.

Set the ownership case

This starts as a visible example. Change only the fields you want to test; no hidden income, debt or personal profile is created.

The same price is used for both columns so this lens isolates the powertrain.

Condition

Used loans carry a higher rate band than new ones.

How’s your credit?

Sets the rate range used for the interest line.

Where would you charge?

Public fast charging costs several times the home rate. Our sourced figure is 63% at home.

km a year

A year. Blank uses the sourced band.

Start a fresh full affordability plan

Every field here is optional. Leave one blank and we use the sourced figure listed under the comparison, dated and with its source.

Over 5 years, on a $30,000 car

How the charging and fuel bills are built

Electric costs $13,385 less.

The electric column comes to $31,900 over 5 years and the gasoline one to $45,285. Charging costs $13,385 less than gasoline. Both paths use the same depreciation estimate, so resale does not change the difference. Used-car resale follows the same Canadian used-market annual-rate assumption in both paths. Neither is a forecast for a specific vehicle.

The two columns tie at a pump price of $0.49 a litre. Above that the electric car wins, below it the gasoline one does. That single threshold holds only while the other inputs stay the same.

Electric

$714/mo

9.64% APR60 months7.29% to 11.99% for your credit

  • Value lost over 5 years

    $14,168, 47.2%

  • Charging over 5 yearsHow the charging and fuel bills are built

    $4,875

  • Interest over the same years

    $8,957

  • Sales and luxury tax

    $3,900

  • Cost over 5 years

    $31,900

Gasoline

$714/mo

9.64% APR60 months7.29% to 11.99% for your credit

  • Value lost over 5 years

    $14,168, 47.2%

  • Fuel over 5 yearsHow the charging and fuel bills are built

    $18,260

  • Interest over the same years

    $8,957

  • Sales and luxury tax

    $3,900

  • Cost over 5 years

    $45,285

Where the difference comes from

Energy, at your own charging mixHow the charging and fuel bills are built
At 20,000 km a year with 63% of charging done at home, electricity costs $81 a month against $304 for gasoline. Over 5 years that is $13,385. Public fast charging costs several times the home rate, so changing that mix is the single biggest thing you can do to this page.
Depreciation under these assumptions
The electric path loses 47.2% of their value over five years against 47.2% for the gasoline path. The estimates are equal, so neither path gains an advantage from resale. Both used vehicles use the same Canadian used-market annual-rate assumption; the data does not support a separate rate for each powertrain. Actual Canadian and model-specific resale can differ materially.
What this comparison leaves out
Maintenance is identical in both columns, because our maintenance model bands by vehicle age and carries no powertrain dimension. An electric car usually costs less to service, and this page does not claim that saving. Nor does it price a home charger installation, which is real money a gasoline buyer never spends.
How we calculated this29 figures, all dated and sourced

Every figure below was read by this scenario while it was being calculated, in the order the calculation read it. Nothing here is decorative: remove one and the number above changes. Assumptions version 2026-10, compiled 2026-09-01.

  • Official energy, Weekly observed fuel price$1.826 a litre

    Government of Ontario regular gasoline reading for Toronto (East/West average). This is a weekly observed market average, not a forecast or a station quote.

    As of 2026-08-31high confidencerefreshed weeklySource

  • Official energy, Reference tou commodity rate$0.128 per kWh

    Ontario Energy Board time-of-use commodity rates, weighted with the OEB reference consumption shares and effective 2025-11-01 through 2026-10-31. Electricity commodity rates only; fixed service and utility-specific delivery charges are excluded.

    As of 2025-11-01high confidencerefreshed monthlySource

  • Ontario tax, Harmonized sales tax rate13%

    Registered dealer sale, new or used. Charged on the negotiated all-in selling price and collected by the dealer at the point of sale.

    As of 2026-08-29high confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Licensing, Private sale transfer total CAD$60 to $120

    Typical total for a private-sale transfer path, including the UVIP and the plate and permit issuance. Excludes the safety certificate, which report 01 section 2.7 leaves unpriced. Small and honest beats a padded guess here; the dollar impact is minor but the accuracy is a credibility signal.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Licensing, Used vehicle information package CAD$20

    Mandatory for private sales. Set fines for failing to provide or deliver a UVIP rose to 140 dollars in January 2026.

    As of 2026-08-29high confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Financing, Apr by credit band, Prime5.99% to 9.99%

    Credit score 670 to 719. Most dealers and lenders set a mid 600s minimum score for standard approval.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed monthlySource

  • Financing, Used vehicle apr spread1.30% to 2%

    Derived, not separately sourced. Low end is blendedAprUsedVehicle low minus blendedAprNewVehicle low, 0.082 minus 0.069. High end is 0.095 minus 0.075. Report 01 section 2.3 states the spread exists and must be modelled but gives no spread figure of its own.

    As of 2026-08-29low confidencerefreshed monthlydocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

  • Insurance, By city, Toronto, Annual premium CAD$2,348 a year to $2,483 a year

    Second-source pass, 1 September 2026. Toronto had one publisher behind it, ThinkInsure, and now has two. ThinkInsure publishes 2,483 for the window 31 May 2025 to 31 May 2026, confirmed this pass by direct fetch of https://www.thinkinsure.ca/car-insurance/toronto-quote.php rather than the search-indexed excerpt the previous note relied on. MyChoice independently publishes 2,348 for Toronto in its 22 June 2026 Ontario city table, up 5.26 percent year over year. The two are 5.7 percent apart measured on the lower figure, inside the 10 percent agreement bar, so the figure is the range spanning both published values and confidence stays medium on two agreeing publishers rather than one. Neither value was altered. asOf stays 2026-05-31, the close of the ThinkInsure window that sourceUrl points at.

    As of 2026-05-31medium confidencerefreshed quarterlySource

  • Insurance, Ontario year over year increase4.45%

    Ontario premiums rose roughly 4.45 percent year over year in 2026. The July 1 2026 reform made most accident benefits other than medical, rehabilitation and attendant care optional, which may lower premiums modestly, but the real movement will not be observable until Q1 2027.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed quarterlySource

  • Insurance, New driver, Full licence average annual premium CAD$2,105 a year

    The all-ages full-G average from the same dataset, published beside the G2 one so the two are comparable. ThinkInsure, an Ontario brokerage, over a stated data window of 2022-01-01 to 2023-03-31. The as-of date is the close of that window rather than a publication date, because the window is the honest limit on the figure: no named publisher has released a G2-specific band since it closed. No insurer and no regulator publishes a G2 band at all, so a broker's dataset is the ceiling of the available evidence, which is why nothing in this group is high confidence.

    As of 2023-03-31medium confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Insurance, By licence class and age, Full age 26 to 30 annual CAD$2,437 a year

    Full G licence, 26 to 30. The gap to the G2 figure opens to about 25 percent here, having been near zero in the teen bands. ThinkInsure, an Ontario brokerage, over a stated data window of 2022-01-01 to 2023-03-31. The as-of date is the close of that window rather than a publication date, because the window is the honest limit on the figure: no named publisher has released a G2-specific band since it closed. No insurer and no regulator publishes a G2 band at all, so a broker's dataset is the ceiling of the available evidence, which is why nothing in this group is high confidence.

    As of 2023-03-31medium confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Operating, Average annual kilometres16,000 km a year to 24,000 km a year

    Derived proxy, not a measured average. Report 01 publishes no average-annual-kilometres figure anywhere. Section 2.13 gives a typical lease annual km allowance of 16000 to 24000 km per year, which is the only kilometre band in the research, so it stands in as the driving-distance band. A lease allowance is set to cover typical driving rather than to measure it, so this band runs high. Cross-check against report 01 section 2.8's 150 to 250 dollar per month gasoline band, at the same section's 1.70 per litre price: at 16000 km every class consumption figure below lands inside that band, 159 dollars for a sedan to 249 for a pickup, and at the 20000 km midpoint the lighter classes stay inside it while a pickup runs above at 312. That band is not class-specific, so the overrun is expected rather than a contradiction. Source a StatCan or Natural Resources Canada annual vehicle-kilometres figure before any page quotes a driving distance.

    As of 2026-08-29low confidencerefreshed annualdocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

  • Operating, Fuel consumption litres per 100 km, Suv10 L / 100 km

    Modelled, not sourced. Same derivation and same caveat as the sedan figure.

    As of 2026-08-29low confidencerefreshed annualdocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

  • Maintenance, Monthly five to ten years$125 a month to $150 a month

    Vehicle 5 to 10 years old.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed quarterlySource

  • Depreciation, Used vehicle annual rate8% to 16%

    Annual value loss for a vehicle that is ALREADY USED, from Canadian Black Book's 2026 Market Preview, published February 2026. Its "Annual Depreciation, 2-6 Year-old Vehicles" chart carries a sixteen-year series of printed bar labels: 2011 -12, 2012 -13, 2013 -13, 2014 -14, 2015 -9, 2016 -12, 2017 -11, 2018 -13, 2019 -13, 2020 -8, 2021 +19, 2022 -9, 2023 -16, 2024 -15, 2025 -10, 2026 forecast -15. The range stored here, 8 to 16 percent, is the full span of that series with 2021 excluded, and 2021 is excluded because it is an APPRECIATION year and not a rate of depreciation at all. The midpoint the engine uses, 12 percent, is close both to the 2011 to 2020 pre-pandemic mean of 12.2 percent and to Canadian Black Book's own 2025 forecast, which its 2025 Market Preview of 2025-02-24 stated as "12% depreciation is expected for two-to-six-year-old vehicles this year". The report's prose gives 15 percent for 2024 and 14.5 percent expected for 2026, slightly different from its own chart labels, and the wider range absorbs both readings. Confidence is medium rather than high: this is a named Canadian valuation authority publishing a dated series, which is the best available, but the values are read off printed chart labels rather than a table, and CBB attributes the recent years to a tariff-driven correction unwinding the elevated pricing that began in 2020 rather than to ordinary ageing. DELIBERATELY NOT SEGMENTED. The same report says the current decline "is expected to be more widespread across light truck segments, while passenger cars are anticipated to follow the same trend but to a lesser degree", which is the opposite of what depreciation.segmentMultiplier says: those multipliers are derived from five-year NEW-vehicle losses and make trucks the slowest depreciating segment. Until a segmented Canadian used-market series exists, one flat rate is the honest reading.

    As of 2026-02-01medium confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Lender ratios, Total debt service maximum44%

    CMHC maximum. Housing plus all other debt divided by gross income. Car loans and leases count at the full monthly payment, which is what makes the mortgage-impact figure derivable.

    As of 2026-08-29high confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Mortgage, Amortization months300 months

    Modelled, not sourced. 25 years is the conventional Canadian mortgage amortization for qualification math. Report 01 publishes no amortization period. Paired with the derived qualifying rate to set the annuity factor behind the mortgage-capacity figure.

    As of 2026-08-29low confidencerefreshed annualdocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

  • Mortgage, Conventional five year fixed rate6.09%

    Bank of Canada series V80691335, labelled "Conventional mortgage: 5-year" and described by the publisher as "the interest rate for a 5-year conventional mortgage offered by chartered banks in Canada". The weekly reading was 6.09 percent on 2026-08-26 and unchanged over the five preceding weeks. This is the CONTRACT rate the qualifying rate is derived from. IT IS A POSTED RATE, WHICH IS THE CAVEAT THAT HAS TO RIDE WITH IT. A posted rate is what a chartered bank advertises, and it sits well above what most borrowers actually sign: discounted and broker-sourced contract rates are routinely one to two points lower, and the Bank publishes no series for those. So the greater-of rule applied to this number returns a qualifying rate higher than the one a real borrower would be tested at, which makes the mortgage capacity a car payment costs a FLOOR rather than an estimate: a borrower on a discounted rate loses more capacity than the figure shows, never less. The direction is deliberate, because understating the cost of a car payment is the failure this product exists to correct. Replace with the reader's own contract rate the moment a field collects one; nothing in ScenarioInput does today. Replaces the 2026-09 vintage's single modelled qualifyingRate figure of 0.0525, which was the stress-test floor used directly as an annuity rate and named no source.

    As of 2026-08-26high confidencerefreshed weeklySource

  • Mortgage, Qualifying rate stress points2%

    The two percentage points added to the contract rate under the OSFI minimum qualifying rate for uninsured mortgages, which the publisher states as "the greater of the mortgage contract rate plus 2% or 5.25%". Page last updated 2026-01-29.

    As of 2026-01-29high confidencerefreshed quarterlySource

  • Mortgage, Minimum qualifying rate floor5.25%

    The other half of the same greater-of rule: the 5.25 percent floor that binds only when the contract rate is below 3.25 percent. It has not bound since 2022 and does not bind at the current 6.09 percent conventional rate, but it is held as a figure rather than as a constant because it is the published rule and a falling rate environment would make it bind again.

    As of 2026-01-29high confidencerefreshed quarterlySource

  • Verdict thresholds, Easy maximum income share10%

    Total transportation cost at or below 10 percent of gross income is 20/4/10 compliant. Report 01 section 2.15 is blunt that with total ownership cost near 1373 dollars a month the 10 percent rule is out of reach for all but the wealthiest Canadians, so present it as a guardrail rather than a gate.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Verdict thresholds, Manageable maximum income share15%

    10 to 15 percent of gross income is realistic for most Canadians.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Verdict thresholds, Tight maximum income share20%

    15 to 20 percent is stretched. Above 20 percent carries a high risk of payment stress.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed annualSource

  • Financing, Bank of canada average auto loan rate6.57%

    Bank of Canada average car loan rate, April 2026. Held in the mid 6 percent range through early 2026, roughly 6.37 to 6.72 percent month to month. Use as a market anchor, never as a quoted rate.

    As of 2026-04-30high confidencerefreshed monthlySource

  • Lease, Residual share 36 months sedan or electric48% to 55.00%

    Report 01 section 2.13 gives 36 month residual benchmarks of 48 to 55 percent for sedans and for electric vehicles without rebate support. The research names no band for SUVs, crossovers or minivans, so they take this lower one rather than the truck band. That is the cautious direction: a lower residual raises the modelled lease payment, so the comparison never flatters a lease on a body style the research does not cover. Same sourcing caveat as the truck and hybrid band.

    As of 2026-08-29low confidencerefreshed quarterlydocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

  • Lease, Annual kilometre allowance16,000 km a year to 24,000 km a year

    Report 01 section 2.13 puts a typical annual kilometre allowance at 16000 to 24000 km a year. The same band backs operating.averageAnnualKilometres, for the reason recorded there: it is the only kilometre band anywhere in the research. A contract states its own allowance and its own excess kilometre rate, and the research publishes no benchmark rate at all, so the comparison prices an overage only when a reader supplies the rate from their own quote.

    As of 2026-08-29low confidencerefreshed annualdocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

  • Operating, Home charging share45% to 80%

    Derived, not sourced. The share of charging done at home rather than at public DC fast chargers. Solved as the band that reproduces report 01 section 2.8's 50 to 80 dollars per month EV charging figure, using the same section's time-of-use rates averaged across on, mid and off peak, its public rate of 0.35 to 0.55 per kWh, its 16 kWh per 100 km consumption and the averageAnnualKilometres midpoint. An 80 percent home share lands at 49.32 dollars a month, a hair under the 50 dollar floor, and a 45 percent home share at 80.24. This is a user-facing slider in the product, so the figure only sets the starting position.

    As of 2026-08-29low confidencerefreshed annualdocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

  • Electricity, Public dc fast charging per kWh$0.45 per kWh to $0.75 per kWh

    Up from [0.35, 0.55] in the 2026-08 vintage. Confirmed twice via search-indexed content directly attributed to this URL, but other current sources give materially different ranges (0.30-0.65, 0.37-0.80), so confidence is downgraded to low pending a direct fetch of the live page, which this audit environment could not reach.

    As of 2026-08-30low confidencerefreshed quarterlySource

  • Operating, Electric vehicle consumption kWh per 100 km16 kWh / 100 km

    Stated in report 01 section 2.8 as the mid-size EV reference: 16 kWh per 100 km, which at the off-peak rate of 0.076 per kWh gives the 1.22 dollars per 100 km the same section quotes. That internal arithmetic checks out exactly, which is why this is the one figure in this group above low confidence. It is still a single mid-size reference and does not vary by vehicle class.

    As of 2026-08-29medium confidencerefreshed annualdocs/research/01-product-and-market.md

Figures marked low confidence are modelled from the research rather than taken from a single source, and each one says what would replace it. Estimates, not advice.

Each column is depreciation plus tax plus interest plus energy, less any rebate and any trade-in equity. Insurance and maintenance are the same in both and are left out, which is why these totals are smaller than the real cost of owning either car. The all-in monthly figure on the calculator carries them.

Estimates, not advice. Figures dated 2026-09-01, every source shown. Depreciation is a market-level assumption, not a forecast for a particular car. Driving distance follows your input or the shown planning default. The selected vehicle uses its matching model-year consumption where available; the alternate powertrain uses a generic consumption assumption.

Read the answer correctly

What this comparison teaches

01

Price the energy you can actually access

ULO overnight power can be very cheap, but only while that period applies. Public fast charging is not represented by a residential OEB rate, so enter its real price when that is how you charge.

02

A plug-in hybrid must be plugged in

The battery-share input separates electric kilometres from gasoline kilometres and even retains gasoline used during NRCan’s blended electric-mode test.

03

Tailpipe is not lifecycle carbon

The CO₂ line uses NRCan’s official laboratory tailpipe rating. It does not add electricity generation, fuel production, battery manufacturing or vehicle manufacturing.

Sources, dates and calculation method

Vehicle consumption, range and tailpipe CO₂ use the midpoint of official NRCan model-family ranges covering 30,824 rating variants. View the NRCan dataset.

Fuel is the Government of Ontario weekly survey, dated 2026-08-31. View the fuel dataset. It is not a live station price or a forecast.

Electricity commodity rates apply from 2025-11-01 through 2026-10-31. View the OEB source. Delivery, regulatory charges, fixed charges and tax are excluded unless you replace the number with your own marginal all-in rate.

Annual energy equals kilometres multiplied by the official combined consumption midpoint. Break-even equals the higher entered upfront cost divided by annual energy savings. No rebates or dealer quotes are assumed.

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No income, debt or credit answers will be assumed from this energy comparison.