Volkswagen Group on Wednesday announced that it doubled global EV deliveries in 2021, delivering 452,900 EVs worldwide, including about 17,000 Volkswagen-brand EVs in the United States.
Those are respectable numbers for what was in many respects the first year of VW's mass-market EV push, with the VW ID.4 arriving in the U.S. and the ID.3 ramping up to higher volumes in Europe. But VW remains well behind Tesla, which delivered 936,172 EVs in 2021.
The ID.4 and ID.3 accounted for most of the VW Group's 2021 EV deliveries, at 119,600 units and 75,500 units, respectively. The Audi E-Tron accounted for 49,200 deliveries (including the Sportback variant), and was followed in the rankings by the Skoda Enyaq (44,700), VW E-Up! (41,400) and Porsche Taycan (41,300, including Turismo models).
That means 2021 global EV deliveries from all of these brands combined were still less than half of Tesla's 2021 total. Tesla also plans to scale up production in Texas and Germany in 2022.
VW 2021 global BEV and PHEV sales
The VW brand itself delivered 263,000 EVs globally through the end of 2021, so it appears on track for hitting its original goal of 1 million EVs annually by 2025. But in light of Tesla's growth, should the goal be even higher?
VW does have its own plans to continue ramping up EV production, including full-scale ID.4 production at its Chattanooga, Tennessee, factory beginning this year. However, most Tennessee-built cars aren't likely to arrive at dealerships until the 2023 model year.
The automaker in 2019 upped its target to 28 million EVs cumulatively across the VW Group by 2028. That's an ambitious plan that will depend on VW's own ramp-up of multiple EV factories—something not all analysts are convinced is within reach.
