Electric car sales fell last year in the European Union. 1,447,934 electric cars between January and December 2024 were sold slightly below 1,538,106 electric sold in the same period of the year 2023.
Specifically, we talk about a 5.9% drop that came dragged largely by German figures. The largest electric car market In Europe it put 380,609 on the market, well below the 524,219 cars sold in 2023. A 27.9% drop that, incidentally, confirmed that the electric car continues to need purchase aid where more electric vehicles are bought.
In line, the electric car market share also lowered in the general photography of the European Union. In 2023, 14.6% of the cars bought in Europe were electric. Last year the figure was reduced to 13.6%. But the performance was very different between countries.
In GermanyAs we said, the fall was so great that the electric ones stayed at 13.5% of sales and, therefore, in a technical draw with the European average. Until now, they had helped lift the figures, with 18.4% in the year 2023. Then, practically, two out of 10 cars that were bought in Spain were electric.
The year 2024 for our country in the electric car market was not especially good. If more cars were sold, moving from the 51,611 electric cars sold in 2023 to 57,374 electric of 2024 (+11.2%) but the market share barely improved two tenths, reaching 5.6% at the end of 2024.
The first month of the year, however, has started strongly. In January, 5,012 electric cars were sold, well above 3,376 vehicles of this type sold in the same month of 2023. It is a growth of 48.5%. The results are noticed in a 6.9% market share when last year did not reach 5% in the same month.
But all these data pale compared to a small country. One that has managed to explode its sales in mid -2023, has consolidated them in 2024 and manages to keep them in 2025.
We talk about Belgium.
Belgium, one of the most promising countries in Europe
If we look back, Belgium sold in 2024 127,703 electric cars. 36.9% more electric than in 2023 when they signed 93,285 units. The figure allowed him to add a market share of 28.5% when at the end of 2023 they stayed in an already optimistic 19.6%.
That is, in 2023 it already bought a greater amount of electric cars that Germany, if we attend to its total market. In Europe, only Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and, of course, Norway sold more than 30% of electric cars in their local markets. Of the rest, only Finland (29.5% market share) managed to sell more electric than Belgium.
Electric market share in Europe in 2023. Belgium was at the same level as France and Germany.
But the case of Belgium is special because in the first month of 2025 the fee of electric has risen to 33.8%. In January 2023, the market share was 14.3% but in that same month of 2022 it barely reached 8.1%. It was in mid -2023 when the final explosion of the electric car is located.
They have achieved it in a very simple way: paying the electric cars of companies.
As in Norway, success in electric sales has not been based so much on aid for the purchase of new vehicles and yes on the fiscal deductions that are allowed with the electric ones. In the Nordic country, electric car owners did not pay VAT and some other taxes, that promoted electric sales as any other place.
In Belgium they have focused on the fleets of companies. Yes, there were purchase aids (although only in one part of the country) but this year they have ended and has not been felt in total sales. This is because companies can be deduced up to 100% of the purchase of electric cars depending on their income.
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This has led to the country to 80% of bought electric cars being registered in the name of a company. And it has been achieved because getting such a car is simply more attractive than a gasoline. In 2025, companies can be deducted 75% of vehicles with combustion engines but will be an aid that falls in a very short time. In 2027 only 25% of these cars can be deduced and in 2028 the aid will fall. However, that same year the employer can continue deducting up to 90% of the electric car.
They explain in Bloomberg that in Belgium the car is usually salary change currency And instead of increasing this, companies use it as a claim to reward the employee. If you provide an electric car, the worker can go to his job at a much lower Price than if he had to fill the gas tank.
The price is higher than in Spain but gasoline is also slightly higher than the Spanish price. It records, according to the last Bulletin of the European Union, a price of 1,630 euros/liter, for the 1,558 euros/liter of Spain.
To make numbers with the Spanish figures, a car that consumes 6 l/100 km of gasoline will disburse 9.35 euros to travel 100 kilometers. An electric vehicle with a consumption of 18 kWh/100 km and pays the light to 10 cents/kWh at home (neither of the two figures are especially optimistic), 1.8 euros will be left to travel the same amount of kilometers.
The program faces Two challenges. The first is that the State is the one that puts from its money all that money that the employer stops paying, which can be a hole (as happened in Norway) that must be compensated on the other hand.
The second problem is also collected in the article of Bloomberg. At the moment, the state push has helped boost the sales of electric among companies due to the pure demand of employers. However, it is a step that the rental, owners of a good part of the renting and leasing vehicles do not find in other countries the interest to sell them since they are cars that are second -hand are losing great value in the market and, finally, they are difficult to place.
Photo | Cosmin Serban and Volkswagen
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