Briefing

Despite headwinds, EU electric car sales keep growing

February 1, 2023

T&E's dashboard shows that EU electric car sales remained stable in 2022, growing at a slightly slower pace. With huge waiting lists for electric vehicles, EU carmakers need to step up supply – or risk not just losing sales to foreign rivals but also their hopes for a European battery industrial chain.

Most up-to-date data is available here.


EU electric car sales remained stable in 2022, growing at a slightly slower pace.

Despite a difficult start to the year, the battery electric vehicle (BEV) market managed to overcome supply chain issues and finish 2022 with a 3%p growth in its share of the EU vehicles market:

  • Battery electric vehicles now make up 12.1% of sales;
  • Plug-in hybrid (PHEV) sales grew to make up 9.4% of the market;
  • Diesel cars were overtaken by plug-in vehicles (BEVs & PHEVs) as diesel cars’ share of the market is falling and now make up only 16%;
  • BEVs make up 56% of all plug-in vehicle sales, as PHEV sales share grew only by 0.5%p in 2022.

With huge waiting lists for BEVs, EU carmakers need to step up supply – or risk not just losing sales to foreign rivals but also their hopes for a European battery industrial chain.

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