EV vs Petrol Calculator Saudi Arabia — With Capped Petrol, Does It Still Pay?
This is the market where the answer is least obvious, because Saudi petrol is capped: Gasoline 91 at SAR 2.18 a litre and 95 at SAR 2.33. Against a residential electricity rate reported at 18 halalas, electric still wins on fuel — but by a margin that a single assumption about your consumption can swing.
Both defaults below are corroborated secondary figures, not primary citations: aramco.com did not respond and SERA’s tariff page was unreachable when we checked on 5 August 2026. They are labelled that way on the fields, and they are yours to overwrite.
Every field below is editable, and every default carries its source and date on the field itself — the defaults are a starting point, not a claim about your bill. We sell no hardware and take no installer commission; see how we verify.
7 fields on this page ship blank, on purpose
No source we can cite publishes these figures for Saudi Arabia, so the fields start empty rather than pre-filled with something plausible. The calculator prints no result until you supply your own.
- Units per month per installed kW — No Saudi irradiance or yield source we could reach publishes a figure we are willing to print, so this ships empty rather than guessed — the same call the Saudi payback guide made when it published break-even in kilowatt-hours instead of years. Ask your installer for the annual production estimate and divide by 12 and by the system kW.
- Installed cost per kW — low (SAR) — Installed rooftop pricing in Saudi Arabia is quote-only: verified checks of the major suppliers found no published prices at all. Type the per-kW figure from your own written quote.
- Installed cost per kW — high (SAR) — Same reason as the low figure: no Saudi supplier we verified publishes an installed price.
- Battery cost (SAR per kWh) — Our Saudi index prices gel batteries by amp-hour and portable power stations by unit, not fixed home storage by kWh — see /sa/prices/batteries for the dated rows. Deriving a SAR/kWh for home lithium from those would be arithmetic on the wrong product, so this stays blank.
- Battery modules added to a new system (SAR per kWh) — Same reason as the battery cost above — no Saudi source we verified prices fixed home storage by kWh.
- Price of one panel (SAR) — Saudi panel listings quote a per-watt rate that is only comparable within a module class — our own index has a legacy 270W poly at SAR 0.93/W sitting UNDER current 630–660W modules at 1.19–1.44 SAR/W. A single default would flatten exactly the distinction that matters. See /sa/prices/solar-panels and type the price you were quoted.
- Usable kWh per panel per day — Follows from the yield figure above, which we could not source for Saudi Arabia. Use your installer’s estimate.
Petrol: SAR 145/month · EV: SAR 19/month
Monthly saving: SAR 127 (SAR 1,519/year). Charging from rooftop solar pushes the EV cost toward SAR 0/km.
How this calculator works — the actual arithmetic
- Petrol cost = (km per month ÷ your km per litre) × the pump price. The default is Gasoline 91 at SAR 2.18, the capped rate; 95 is SAR 2.33.
- EV cost = (km per month ÷ 100) × kWh per 100 km × your charging tariff, defaulting to the reported 18-halala residential slab.
- Both defaults are corroborated secondary figures — aramco.com and SERA’s tariff page were unreachable when we checked on 5 August 2026 — and both are labelled that way on the field.
- Nothing else is netted off: this is fuel against electricity, not total cost of ownership.
Worked example — 800 km a month at the calculator’s own defaults
These are the figures the result box prints when you load this page.
| Kilometres per month | 800 km |
|---|---|
| Petrol price | SAR 2.18/litre (Gasoline 91, capped) |
| Your car’s km per litre | 12 km/l |
| EV consumption | 13 kWh per 100 km |
| Charging tariff | SAR 0.18/kWh (residential, up to 6,000 kWh/month) |
| Petrol | SAR 145/month |
|---|---|
| EV | SAR 19/month |
| Monthly saving | SAR 126 |
| Annual saving | SAR 1,517 |
Where these numbers come from
Our home-charging guide runs the same comparison per 100 km and at its own labelled assumptions gets roughly SAR 3.73 electric against SAR 19.62 on 91-octane. Different assumptions, same direction — and the guide adds the line this calculator cannot: charging from your own array costs the forgone 7-halala export credit, about SAR 1.26 per 100 km.
The 6,000 kWh slab threshold is the trap. A car charger is exactly the load that pushes a household over it, at which point every further unit costs 30 halalas rather than 18 and this sum understates your charging cost.
Sources for this market’s defaults
- SERA (Saudi Electricity Regulatory Authority) — consumption tariff categories. The page exists; it was NOT reachable from our research session, which is why the Saudi tariff is labelled corroborated rather than primary. accessed 2026-08-05
- GlobalPetrolPrices — Saudi household electricity SAR 0.200/kWh all-in (December 2025), the cross-check that reconstructs from 18 halalas + meter fee + 15% VAT accessed 2026-08-05
- pv magazine — Saudi rooftop PV provisions: net billing, 7 halalas/kWh residential and 5 halalas/kWh non-residential export credit accessed 2026-08-05
- Aramco — retail fuels, Saudi Arabia pump prices (Gasoline 91 SAR 2.18/litre under the cap). Not reachable at time of writing; corroborated across independent trackers. accessed 2026-08-05
What this calculator does not know
- Public charging is not modelled at all: Saudi public-charging tariffs are not published, so there is nothing to put in the field.
- Both defaults are corroborated reporting rather than primary sources. Treat them as a starting point and check your own bill and receipt.
- Purchase price, insurance, servicing and residuals are outside this comparison — with petrol this cheap, those are usually what decides it.
Frequently asked
How much does it cost to charge an electric car in Saudi Arabia?
At the reported 18-halala residential rate, a car using 13 kWh per 100 km costs about SAR 2.34 per 100 km at home. Watch the 6,000 kWh monthly threshold — a charger is exactly the load that pushes a household over it, after which every unit costs 30 halalas.
What is the petrol price in Saudi Arabia?
Gasoline 91 is SAR 2.18 a litre and Gasoline 95 is SAR 2.33, under the government price cap in place since 2021. Aramco publishes these; its site did not respond when we checked on 5 August 2026, so we label the figures corroborated rather than primary.
Is an EV still cheaper to run when petrol is capped?
On fuel alone, yes — the gap is narrower than in markets with unsubsidised petrol, but electricity at 18 halalas against petrol at SAR 2.18 still favours electric by several times per kilometre. Purchase price and servicing usually decide the question in this market.
What about public charging costs?
Saudi public-charging tariffs are not published, so they are not modelled here at all. This calculator is home charging only.
Guides that explain the numbers
Products this applies to
Real SAR rows, with the module class attached — per-watt rates only compare within one.
Saudi battery prices (dated survey)Saudi inverter prices (dated survey)