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GM EV Charging Status Lights Explained

As all-electric vehicles continue to become more popular on American roads, many folks are finding themselves in the relatively new world of EVs. Of course, one of the most notable differences between electric vehicles and ICE-powered machines is the way in which they fuel up, so with this in mind, GM has released a guide that explains its EV charging status lights.

According to a writeup from GM Techlink, there are three charging status indicators on GM EVs that help owners quickly identify the current state of charging. These three colors include:

  • Green – power is flowing
  • Blue – power is not flowing
  • Red – action is required

If the all-electric vehicle is properly equipped, a charging status indicator on the top of the instrument panel will light up, along with the charging port light. There are several tones, flashes, and blinks to indicate status, including:

  • Solid blue – Successful initial plug-in.
  • Flashing green and single tone – Vehicle is plugged in; battery is charging. Flashes indicate the current percentage of battery charge. As the vehicle charges, the flashes get longer
  • Consistent pulsing green – Indicates that the vehicle is discharging energy. Four tones may sound when the discharge session is near completion based on the remaining battery percentage.
  • Flashing blue with double tone – Vehicle is plugged in; battery charging is delayed based on the programmed charging schedule.
  • Flashing green and four tones – If the amount of time needed to complete charging for the programmed Charge Later setting is not sufficient, or there are Preferred Charging settings, the vehicle may start charging immediately.
  • Solid green – Vehicle is plugged in; charging complete. The solid green indicator will turn off after a certain amount of time. Pressing the Unlock button on the key fob or opening a door will illuminate the indicator again.
  • Flashing red – Vehicle is plugged in; not charging. Check the charge cord connection. It’s normal for a red indicator to appear when disconnecting the charge cord during DC Fast Charging.
  • No light – Vehicle is not plugged in, or there is an issue with the charger or outlet. Check the charge cord connection. Four tones may sound.
  • No light and three tones – The charge port door is open.

Photo of GM EV charging setup.

As for the charge cord itself, it will perform a self-test after being plugged into an appropriate electrical outlet. Just like the GM EV’s charge port, the charge cord has its own set of tones, flashes and blinks, including:

  • Solid blue – Ready for use.
  • Flashing blue – Electric vehicle actively charging.
  • Solid amber, blue and red – An error has occurred; charge cord is rebooting.
  • Solid amber and flashing blue – Internal control box is overheating.
  • Flashing amber and blue – AC plug or electrical outlet overheating.
  • Solid amber – Charge cord requires a reboot.
  • Flashing red – Ground Fault Circuit Interruption (GFCI) fault.
  • Solid red – Internal cord fault.

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As a typical Florida Man, Trey is a certified GM nutjob who's obsessed with anything and everything Corvette-related.

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Comments

  1. Dear everyone,

    Could we please stop using green and red indicators?

    Love,
    Color-blind people

    Reply
    1. What do you propose as replacement?

      How do you handle traffic lights: red, green and yellow?

      Reply
      1. Placement obviously.

        The one on the bottom means go. The one in the middle means prepare to stop. The one on top means stop.

        Or in the case of sideways…, light on the left means stop and the one all the way to the right means go.

        As a colorblind person myself, I’d prefer the use of symbols for changing status indicators over solid colors.

        Reply
      2. Shape, location, or pattern as a secondary indicator. Having a single indicator change colors is useful for a significant segment of the population, especially green and red. It is highly likely I would be able to differentiate between “fault” and “fully charged” in this scheme.

        (Traffic lights are in a predictable order (and generally speaking there is enough difference in the luminance of the green and red lights to differentiate between them).

        Reply
  2. Yes, even in user interface design any color change needs to be accompanied by another visual change. These status indicators should be structured with different numbers and/or shapes of lighted area to correlate the status they represent.

    Reply
    1. Some of our red lights have white strobes in the center.

      Reply
  3. This is just more GM gobbledygook – every EV model I’ve ever bought from GM has a totally different scheme to tell you the charging state – and my current LYRIQ is the worst of them all.

    Why do they waste time on this crap? Much earlier cars had 1 blink to 4 blinks indicating which 25% band of charging the car was currently in. A feature which TESLAs have always had (even my early ROADSTER) is to choose the charge rate if you are charging on a limited facility which sometimes happens at KOA camping facilities.

    GM usually had 8 or 12 amp 110 volt choices – interestingly my 2023 LYRIQ was frozen at 12 amperes until a recent software update added the 8 ampere rate. But no choice at all if you are charging at 190-250 volts. I accomplish a work-around at home by plugging it into a smaller wallbox, but a feature TESLA has always had is strange that GM EVs have NEVER had it.

    Reply
  4. So…..my 2024 Lyriq Lux1 could be sitting for a week in the garage unplugged w 50 to 80% charge. I will look out and see the dash indicator light slowly flashing red.
    Tried Cadillac ev tech line but they couldn’t answer. They blamed it on non GM charger; even though it wasn’t plugged in at the time.
    Several trips to dealer; they said they couldn’t replicate and no codes.
    Everything works; just drives me crazy to see blinking red light with no explanation.

    Reply
    1. Hi Yugo Bob –

      Yeah that goes along with the frustrating nonsense I’ve been talking about.

      For comparison – the BOLT EUV has the normal green 1-4 flashes green charging light and a small red flashing light , obviously a different bulb than the charging indicator… It flashes red in between the green flashes of the charging indicator to indicate the car is fully locked.

      The LYRIQ flashes red if there is a charging fault …. O R ….. if the car doors are locked. Brilliant !!!!!

      So try unlocking all the doors and see if the red flashing stops… If not its another trip to the dealer under warranty.

      By the way, that nonsense you were told about not using a ‘Cadillac Approved’ charger is just nonsense. I charge the car sometimes at 8 amps 110 with an ancient 2011 volt charger , and sometimes at 240@16 amperes using a low cost Duosida in line charger cord. It all just works flawlessly.

      It just HAS to be this way if the car is going to function at various public (level 1 or level 2) chargers. Level 3 (fast charging or supercharging) works fairly well also. So forget about the ‘approved’ nonsense.

      Reply
  5. Thanks Bill Howland;
    It is the door locks that is causing the problem. I do not lock the car, but it seems to lock itself randomly. Dealer suggests the keys are to close to vehicle ( inside house). It might search for key fob and lock itself after a period of time.
    Truly an experience. Like the car. the dealer? eh!

    Funny thing, the dealers “expert” mechanic explained to me I was ruining the battery by charging to 85%, and even worse by leaving it plugged in for several days at a time! (Wisconsin winter anyone?)

    Reply
    1. Hi Yugo Bob….

      I’m glad you got that Ironed out…

      As far as ruining the battery, Any ‘at home’ charger – yours probably peaks at 48 amperes (around 11kw), or else if you use the 240 volt cord it will be 7.7 kw roughly. Or you might be one of the rare people with the $1,695 – 19 kw (80 ampere) charger option and 80 ampere wall box at extra cost. These are trickle charge rates compared to the size of the 102.5 kwh battery (I think it is really a bit larger, like around 106 kwh)..

      As far as the percentage state-of-charge to stop charging it, I would say 90% or less is fine… I regularly charge mine up to 100%. The battery should last a while unless you are a travelling salesman and put 80,000 miles per year on your car. I’d expect several hundred thousand miles of life even if you do ‘abuse it’ a bit since in most cases the car will experience so few charge-discharge cycles. 2,000 of them at 300 miles / charge is 600,000 miles. So I’d expect a few hundred thousand miles minimum even if you supposedly abuse the battery.

      Not to belabor the point, but that ‘190 kw’ fast charge rate I’ve never seen above 184 kw and its only for a few minutes…. The sweet spot for fast charging seems to be those EVGO 100 kw fast chargers, which while providing 99 kw on an HUMMER or a KIA EV-9, will start charging at about 64 kw and end charging at around 76 kw with little tapering at very end.

      In other words, the ULTIUM system seems to charge the LYRIQ proportionally about as fast as the 55 kw Bolt Rate, if not slightly slower…. Fine with me. Both cars are in certain respects built down to a price, and only have sufficient air conditioning / refrigeration systems to charge the cars slowly. This also extends battery life since the LYRIQ never actually ‘fast charges’, at least in comparison with other vehicles.

      What it probably also means is that upcoming ‘Ultium’ vehicles with half the battery that our cars have will charge only proportionally as fast… As I say I have no problem with the charge rates for the car.

      Reply

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