Exclusive: Spring may be in the air, but Europe's electric market has failed to blossom this year.
The West European BEV fully-electric new passenger car market saw this year's opening quarter registrations (Q1 2024) grind to a halt, with year-on-year quarterly growth rising by just 3.5 per cent over the same quarter last year (Q1 2023), to 433,520 units (2023 Q1: 418,700).
March saw the West European electric car market fall by 11% y/y
March saw two-thirds of the region's monitored West European markets (twelve out of eighteen markets) see new BEV registrations fall over the same month last year, which combined to drag the region downwards by 11%.
This resulted in March witnessing a decline in BEV penetration of the total new car market, dropping to 15.2 per cent (a decrease of 1.4 percentage points year on year).
Similarly, the opening three months recorded a BEV penetration level of 14.2 per cent, down from 14.4 per cent during the same quarter last year.
The potentially worrying aspect for those associated with the EV industry is that the opening quarter last year was running at a low level, given the pull forward of registrations into the final quarter of 2022 in markets such as Germany, Sweden, and Norway, which saw purchase subsides reduced from 2023 or tax rises for BEVs. Our full studies detail why this trend is taking place alongside in-depth research and analysis giving a forward-looking commentary. A key industry-leading resource for all those associated with the European electric car industry. ◼︎︎
The European Electric Car Study published by Schmidt Automotive Research each month and is available to purchase as a single edition or an annual subscription.
The study now also features a double page in-depth look at the Chinese OEMs as their European expansion slowly begins.
*Western Europe 18 Markets: EU Member States prior to the 2004 enlargement plus EFTA markets Norway, Switzerland, Iceland, plus UK