An electric Renault 5 is charging in a supermarket parking lot.Image: Watson
Electric vehicles will continue to become more popular in the EU at the beginning of 2026. In Switzerland, however, sales have been stagnating for four years.
March 24, 2026, 08:57March 24, 2026, 08:57
Electromobility is increasing on the European car market. The share of fully electric cars in new registrations in the EU increased to 18.8 percent in January and February, while it was only 15.2 percent in the first two months of 2025. This was announced by the Acea manufacturers’ association in Brussels. Across Europe, including the EFTA countries and Great Britain, the share rose from 16.9 to 19.6 percent. In Switzerland, however, the share of electric vehicles fell slightly from 20.4 to 20.3 percent. Electric car sales in this country have been stagnating for around four years.
Norway and Denmark have the highest electric car shares at 98 and 82 percent. In Croatia it is only around 2 percent.
With the growth of e-mobility, sales of pure gasoline cars continued to fall. In February, sales in the EU fell by 23.3 percent compared to the same month last year.
Overall, new registrations of passenger cars of all drive types in the EU rose by 1.4 percent to 865,437 cars in February compared to the same month last year. In the first two months, however, there was a decrease of 1.2 percent to 1.665 million cars. In Switzerland the minus was 4.1 percent.
In February there was overall growth in the major markets of Germany, Italy and Spain, while new registrations in France fell. The Volkswagen Group remained the market leader in the EU with its brands, which together achieved an increase of 2.6 percent. Among the VW brands, sports car manufacturer Porsche AG saw a decline of a good 5 percent.
The Opel parent Stellantis was able to grow more significantly than the VW Group, at almost ten percent. Fewer cars from BMW and Mercedes-Benz were registered. The Chinese electric car manufacturer BYD was clearly up, almost tripling at a rather low level, and Tesla was up almost a third after the sharp decline in the previous year.
(sda/awp/dpa/oli)