For electric vehicle owners commuting daily between Abu Dhabi and Dubai, one persistent concern has lingered: Will I find a charger when I need one, and will it actually work? Adnoc Distribution says its newly launched EV megahub on the E11 highway is designed to answer that question.
Located at Saih Shuaib, one of the UAE’s busiest inter-emirate corridors, the site brings 60 superfast chargers into a single highway location, a scale rarely seen in the region and aimed at eliminating queues, detours and range anxiety for long-distance commuters.
“This isn’t about the charger itself, it’s about the hub,” said Jacqueline Elboghdadi, Chief Marketing Officer at Adnoc Distribution. “A typical station might have five or six chargers. Here, the magnitude changes the experience entirely.”
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The hub is part of Adnoc Distribution’s plan to electrify the UAE’s main highway corridors, linking cities with charging locations drivers can rely on during everyday travel, not just weekend trips or city errands. According to Elboghdadi, uncertainty around highway charging is one of the main reasons EVs often end up as a household’s second car.
“People worry: Will the range be enough? Will the charger be free? Will it even work?” she said. “When you put a large hub on a vital highway, you remove that mental barrier. You can commute with confidence.”
The E11 site was designed using traffic flow and demand modelling, with the number of chargers set to ensure drivers do not have to wait, a key factor in whether EV charging feels reliable for commuters, she added.
Although the hub officially launched this week, it has been operating since December, with a soft opening that already attracted more than 100 vehicles a day, even before major public marketing. Fleet operators and taxi services were among the early users, but Adnoc Distribution says private motorists commuting between emirates are increasingly using the site, the audience it was built for.
The company plans to open a second EV hub in Ghantout, directly opposite the Saih Shuaib location, to serve traffic in the other direction and cover both sides of the Abu Dhabi-Dubai commute, “so motorists wouldn’t have to detour,” explained Elboghdadi.
Recognising that EV charging takes longer than refuelling, the site is designed to help drivers use that time productively. Unlike other stations, this hub includes dedicated work pods, enclosed spaces with desks, Wi-Fi, bathroom facilities and basic amenities, allowing motorists to take calls or work briefly while their vehicle charges.
“This is a commuter-first hub,” Elboghdadi said. “People might need to jump on a conference call, answer emails or just stop comfortably during a weekday journey.” While a full charge can take under 20 minutes for most vehicles, the added facilities are meant to make that stop feel purposeful rather than inconvenient.
Another feature aimed at reducing EV anxiety is the presence of trained attendants at the charging points, something many early EV adopters say has been missing from public charging.
The charging process is app-based and fully digital, but Adnoc Distribution found that first-time users often hesitate when charging away from home. “There’s always that first-time fear — will it glitch, will I do it right?” Elboghdadi said. “Having someone on the ground to help you through it makes a big difference.”
The E11 megahub is the first in what Adnoc Distribution says will be a network of highway EV hubs across the UAE, aimed at enabling long-distance electric travel between emirates. The company plans to roll out additional hubs along other major corridors, including routes connecting Dubai and Sharjah, with the number of chargers at each site based on traffic demand rather than a fixed template.
For motorists who live in apartments or buildings without home chargers, Adnoc Distribution says highway and city charging infrastructure must be as routine and dependable as fuel stations once were. “We don’t want EV drivers to change their habits,” Elboghdadi pointed out. “We want them to find us where they’ve always found us — just with a different kind of energy.”
