Electric mobility is an important means to decarbonise the transport sector. Especially in cities, the use of zero-emission vehicles like electric vehicles is favourable, as emissions of conventional cars cause severe air pollution. Besides CO₂, the most important emissions are nitric oxides, particular matter and noise. Given the trend of urbanisation, the problem of air pollution in large cities will rather grow than diminish. Although electric vehicles are an infrastructure-dependent technology, one important advantage of plug-in electric vehicles (EV) compared to hydrogen-powered vehicles is the possibility to use the existing electricity infrastructure in households for charging. While additional public charging infrastructure is also needed for interim charging or overnight charging for the so-called ‘on-street parkers’ without own garage, the majority of vehicles could be operated as EVs without additional public charging infrastructure. However, public charging infrastructure is an important component for the large-scale diffusion of electric vehicles and political action seems necessary since no business models are presently available. In the present paper the authors combine different data sets concerning German charging points and mobility patterns to describe the different needs for charging infrastructure, and provide an overview of the underlying different technical options. Based on the current charging infrastructure stock, the set-up methodology and the impact of user needs on charging infrastructure, the authors compare a coverage-oriented and a demand-oriented approach. The authors also estimate the number of public charging points for those two approaches. Finally, criteria for charging infrastructure are categorised and related to the different approaches. It results that the number of charging stations needed for the two different scenarios and the actual distribution of this predefined number of charging stations are answers to fundamentally different questions. As one consequence, an explicit statement on the number of charging stations needed on large scale (such as Germany) is difficult to make on the basis of (local) user demand.