Growth of EVs 'steady' as motorists grapple with prices at the pumps
April saw continued steady growth in sales of electric cars, with one in ten new cars registered in the UK being fully electric, up from 6.6% of all sales in April 2021. There was further evidence of a steady decline in the popularity of petrol as registrations fell from 77,500 in April 2021 to 58,400 in April 2022, or from 58% of new registrations to 54%.
⚡ What Our Data Shows
Ben Nelmes, Head of Policy and Research at New AutoMotive, said:
"There is growing interest in electric cars among UK motorists, fuelled by rising petrol and diesel prices, and increased pressure for the UK to reduce its reliance on Russian diesel.
“While this month’s data showed continued growth in the popularity of electric cars, a 10% market share for EVs could and should be better. The data highlights the need for the government to continue to support more people to access the benefits of switching to an electric car.
“It is regrettable that April saw 10,300 new diesel cars roll off forecourts. The UK is heavily dependent on Russia for its diesel imports, the lion’s share of which is used by a few drivers who do a lot of miles. These motorists are also the most exposed to rising fuel prices.
Ministers should use every tool in the box to support those who are most dependent on their cars and who do the most miles to be first in line to get an electric car.”
The full data release is available here. You can view the data on our interactive dashboard, here.
📈 UK market overview
The new car market was down overall in April, from 133,555 units in April 2022 to 108,540 units in April 2021. Electric cars were the only fuel type that saw growth in both the absolute numbers and market share.
📌 Regional highlights
For the fourth month in a row The Peterborough DVLA area (which includes Cambridgeshire), continues to be the leader in EV registrations. Maidstone (which includes all of Kent) comes in second with over 1 in every three new cars registered in both of these areas electric. Oxfordshire continues to fall down the list of EV hotspots now in third place.
We track regional registrations using a three-month rolling average, which masks big variations in EV market share from month to month. The DVLA areas and regions with the highest share of EVs are as follows:
Peterborough (inc. Cambridgeshire) - 40%
Maidstone (covering all of Kent) - 38%
Oxfordshire - 32%
Bristol - 22%
Birmingham - 22%
Refer to tables 4 & 5 for full regional statistics.
🚗 The race for EV market share
Tesla made no deliveries this month, meaning they do not appear in this table. Hyundai dominated the EV market in April, with 1206 new electric cars registered, up from 559 in April 2021. Electric Minis accounted for 6% of the market, which is notable because they have more than doubled deliveries since April 2021 when they registered 340 new electric cars.
For the full data, and year-on-year comparisons, refer to table 1 in the full release.
📊 The brands who are quickest to electrify
Fiat make an unexpected appearance in our league table of manufacturers sorted by those who sell the most electric cars as a percentage of their total sales - 1 in five Fiats sold in April was fully electric. Usually Fiat do not make it into this list.
We exclude brands that are 100% electric from this table since they do not need to electrify their sales. For the full data, refer to table 2 in the full release.
Notes
About Electric Car Count
Electric Car Count is a monthly data series from New AutoMotive, a not-for-profit independent transport research organisation with a mission to accelerate and support the UK’s transition to electric vehicles. You can find out more about New AutoMotive by visiting www.newautomotive.org/mission
Electric Car Count provides an overview of the newly licensed passenger cars. It is released monthly, in the first few days of each month, providing data on the previous month’s newly licensed cars. In the UK, vehicles must be licensed (also known as registered) to be legally driven on UK roads.
We provide an overview of the state of the market, showing the number of cars registered by each manufacturer, broken down by fuel type. This provides a new way to track the transition to EVs in the UK.
Visit our interactive data dashboard here: www.newautomotive.org/ecc
For more background information on the statistics we provide, you can read our blog about the race for EV market share: www.newautomotive.org/blog/the-race-for-ev-market-share-is-under-way
Data sources & methodology
The data is shows the number of type M1 vehicles (i.e. passenger cars) in the DVLA’s vehicle licensing database as it stands on, or shortly after, the 1st day of the month. The DVLA’s vehicle licensing database is the legal record of all vehicles licensed for use in the UK. We obtain the data from the DVLA’s vehicle enquiry service API, and the DVSA’s MOT history API.
The data covers all cars with a standard form UK vehicle registration mark (VRM, i.e. the vehicle’s number plate), but does not capture any vehicles with personalised VRMs.
Terminology
We use the following terms to refer to vehicle fuel types:
Pure electric: battery electric, or other purely electric-powered vehicles (such as hydrogen). These are vehicles where the drivetrain of the vehicle is only electric, with no facility to drive using a fossil fuelled engine.
Hybrid: vehicles that have the ability to drive under electric power or under fossil fuel power. These include vehicles classified by the DVLA as “hybrid electric”, “electric diesel”, for example.
Q&A
Why are the numbers different from other organisations, such as the SMMT?
Our numbers are typically slightly different from those published by the SMMT. We cannot speculate as to why this is because the SMMT do not publish the methodology for obtaining their vehicle data.
Our data is based on the DVLA’s legal record of vehicles licensed as it stands on the first of the month.
Our methodology does not capture newly registered vehicles with a personalised number plate. These take longer to appear in our database, and are not included in the monthly release. We do not believe that these are a statistically significant part of the market.
Will you make this data open and accessible to more organisations?
Yes, we are happy to supply the data to anyone where doing so will not conflict with our mission. We encourage people to reach out to us on data@newautomotive.org.
