The love affair with electric cars is dimming.
Figures released by Europe’s car makers show sales of pure electric cars went down in May and buyers were inclined towards petrol hybrid models.
This is leading to a scramble among car makers to move BEVs with discounts and other incentives while also ramping up sales of hybrids to keep money flowing into their banks.
Legislation to force car makers into selling BEVs will add to the pressure this year and intensify in coming years as tariffs bite on percentages of pure electric cars sold and if they are sourced from China even by legend European car makers. The recently announced EU duties on Chinese brands will hit models made there for European companies such as Volvo, MINI and BMW.
In May 2024, registrations of battery-electric (BEV) cars declined by 12% to 114,308 units, with their total market share dropping to 12.5%.
Plug-in hybrid car registrations also saw a decline of 14.7% last month, with significant decreases in two of the largest markets: Belgium (-36.6%) and France (-19.4%). Germany managed a modest increase of 1.7%, but this was not enough to offset the overall negative trend.
In May, plug-in hybrids accounted for 6.5% of the total car market, with 59,333 units sold.
Despite the overall market decline, hybrid-electric was the only segment to post growth, with car registrations increasing by 16.2% in May to over 272,568 units.
Three of the four largest markets for this segment – France (+38.3%), Spain (+25.4%), and Italy (+7.4%) – recorded solid gains, while Germany experienced a slight decline of 0.7%. This growth pushed the hybrid-electric market share to nearly 30%, up from 25% in May 2023.
In May 2024, petrol car sales decreased by 5.6% to 323,551 units, with notable declines in key markets such as France (-20.3%) and Spain (-1.8%). On the other hand, Italy and Germany posted modest growth rates of 4.1% and 2.1%, respectively. As a result, the petrol market share declined from 36.5% to 35.5% compared to May of the previous year.
The diesel car market saw an even steeper decline of 11.4% to 118,733 units, accounting for 13% of the market. Significant decreases were observed in major markets like Italy (-30.5%), France (-24.8%), and Spain (-15.4%). Germany experienced a modest increase of 3.2%.
