New electric car registrations were solid in October, as the car market grew by 11% overall compared to the same month last year. Although electric’s market share fell slightly year on year, just over 1,500 more electric cars were sold in October 2022 than October 2021. This trend was not just limited to EVs; both diesel and petrol also saw a drop in market share whilst at the same time experiencing an increase in actual sales volume. Worryingly for the UK’s emissions targets, hybrid vehicles were the only fuel type to grow both in terms of market share and total sales volume, and just over one in four new cars registered in October 2022 was a hybrid vehicle.

⚡ What Our Data Shows

Ben Nelmes, Head of Policy and Research at New AutoMotive, said:

“Electric car sales continued to grow at a steady if not spectacular pace in October, and it’s great to see strong consumer demand for these cars.

“Despite rising energy costs, the continued high price of petrol and diesel means electric cars can be as much as 54% cheaper to run per mile, making them an attractive way for consumers to reduce the amount of money they spend on fuel.

“Amid a difficult economic outlook, it is vital that Ministers act to support sales of electric vehicles and restore investor confidence in the UK’s transition to electric cars and vans. The new Transport Secretary should publish plans for an ambitious California-style Zero Emissions Vehicle Mandate. This will ensure the UK meets its net zero targets, support green businesses, and help bring forward the cost savings that this transition offers UK motorists.

The full data release will be available here. You can view the data on our interactive dashboard, here when it is published.

📈 UK market overview

The car market grew again in October, in a positive sign new car registrations are beginning to pick up after a challenging few months. New sales increased by 13% year on year, building on the 4% increase in September. 2022 has been a weak year for new car sales thus far, with the cost of living crisis and inflation reducing consumer confidence and contributing to poor sales figures. Manufacturers will hope that the recent growth in the market continues over the rest of the year.

October was a steady if unspectacular month for EV sales. A slight drop in market share - 14.95% for October 2022, down from 15.26% in October 2021 - was balanced by a respectable increase in total sale volume, with just over 1,500 more electric cars being sold than in October last year. 2022 has been a strong year thus far for electric car sales, and October was the first month this year in which electric’s market share has fallen compared to the corresponding month last year.

Hybrids were the real winner this month, increasing both in terms of market share and total sales volume. It was the only fuel type to grow across both metrics, as both diesel and petrol saw a drop in market share despite growing in terms of actual sales volume. Whilst hybrids are preferable to petrol or diesel cars, they are substantially inferior to battery electric vehicles (BEVs). The green credentials of hybrid vehicles are often overplayed by manufacturers; earlier this year a study by The International Council on Clean Transportation found that “real-world fuel consumption of PHEVs in Europe is on average three to five times higher than WLTP type-approval values”.

Table 3 provides a full UK market overview, and will be updated from 3rd of the month, or the next working day after that.

📌 Regional highlights

We track regional registrations using a three-month rolling average, which masks big variations in EV market share from month to month. The DVLA regions with the highest share of EVs are as follows:

Oxfordshire - 39%
Anglia - 24%
North East England - 22%
London -21%
Birmingham - 20%

Refer to tables 4 & 5 for full regional statistics, and will be updated from 3rd of the month, or the next working day after that.

🚗 The race for EV market share

In the absence of Tesla, who did not make any deliveries in October, BMW continued to grow its electric credentials.The German brand was responsible for 13.23% of all electric car registrations last month, topping this chart relatively comfortably. BMW is becoming the prime example of the success incumbent manufacturers who are willing to embrace EVs can have, and are positioning themselves as a major player in the electric market going forward. Volkswagen recovered from a poor showing in September, claiming just over 10% of the EV market, to come second in this table. MG, in third place, saw a slight drop in market share from September, but was still responsible for a respectable 7.53% of all new electric car sales.

For the full data, and year-on-year comparisons, refer to table 1 in the full release.

📊 The brands who are quickest to electrify

Again, this table was dominated by niche marques in October; Jaguar was the only mainstream manufacturer to claim a place in the top four positions on this table, coming second with 44.33% of its sales being electric. Genesis (first place), Cupra (third place), and MG (fourth place) make up the rest of the top four, with electric sales being responsible for 65.67%, 41.57%, and 30.65% of their overall sales respectively. This is especially impressive in the cases of both Genesis and Cupra, as neither marque was present in the market in October 2021.

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.

⚡ The ZEV Mandate explained

What is the ZEV mandate?

The government has promised to introduce a scheme known as a ‘Zero Emissions Vehicle Mandate’, known more commonly as a ZEV mandate. The ZEV mandate is a system of legally binding targets that requires car and van manufacturers to sell an increasing number of zero emissions cars and vans as a proportion of all the cars and vans they sell. This is a kind of policy that has been used for cars in California and China, and is very similar to the system the UK has used to successfully incentivise renewable electricity, known as the ‘Renewables Obligation’.

How do the targets work?

The targets are set as a percentage figure, and will start at 22% in 2024. That means that in 2024, 22% of all cars sold by any manufacturer must be zero emissions. The targets will gradually increase over time. If a manufacturer cannot meet their target, they must either pay a penalty or buy some ‘surplus’ from a manufacturer who has exceeded their targets.

Is this the same thing as the 2030 and 2035 phase-out of sales of petrol, diesel and hybrid cars and vans?

Not quite. The ZEV mandate is the policy that will encourage car manufacturers to shift to selling only zero emissions vehicles in line with the 2030 and 2035 deadlines. This is the policy that will make that ambition a reality. There are also other things the government is doing to realise that ambition, for example investing in charge points and using tax breaks for cars and grants for vans.

When will the ZEV mandate come into force?

It will come into force from 2024. The scheme is currently being designed by the Department for Transport, who recently consulted on how it might work. You can read about their plans here.

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.

Electric car registrations were solid in October as the car market grew by 11%