New car sales

  • 2017 Toyota Prius Prime and 2017 Chevrolet Volt with Green Car Reports editor John Voelcker

    In May, the Toyota Prius Prime plug-in hybrid was the highest-selling car with a plug in the U.S. for only the second time ever. Last month, however, the Chevrolet Volt recaptured its usual spot at the top of the plug-in sales charts for those manufacturers who report monthly sales. Chevy sold 1,745 Volts, slightly down from the May number of 1,845, but still enough to push the six-month total into five figures, at 10,932. DON'T MISS: Plug-in electric car sales for May: best Bolt EV, Prime months yet; Leaf, Volt rise too Added to that were deliveries of 1,642 Bolt EV 238-mile battery-electric...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV electric cars outside dealership    [photo: Patrick Reid]
    When will major buyer demand for electric cars arrive? Poll results

    With modern electric cars about to enter their eighth year on sale, they remain a tiny fraction of the North American and global markets. While plug-in models now make up almost 1 of every 20 vehicles sold in California, in the U.S. overall and globally it's more like 1 percent. The hurdles to...

  • 2015 Nissan Leaf plugged in to recharge   [photo: John C. Briggs]
    Electric cars will cost less to buy than regular cars by 2025: analysis

    Studies have shown that electric vehicles have a number of strikes against them in the minds on consumers who don't know much about them. Range anxiety, the lack of electric vehicle charging infrastructure—or even awareness that it exists—and high purchase prices all play a part in the...

  • 2017 Renault Zoe
    European electric and plug-in hybrid sales for Jan-April 2017

    Electric vehicle sales are holding steady in Europe; the latest sales data shows popular battery electric vehicles remain popular. Plug-in hybrids continue to hold their own as well, according to data aggregated from numerous individual national markets. The Renault Zoe, in particular, continues to...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Volt in Vancouver, BC, Canada
    Plug-in electric car sales in Canada, May 2017: what dominance looks like

    As certain as LeBron James reaching the NBA Finals, the Chevy Volt led the Canadian plug-in electric vehicle market in May. Barring a sales collapse in June, it will have led the category for a remarkable two-thirds of the months (48 of 72) in which electric vehicles from major carmakers have been...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV added to Maven car- and ride-sharing fleet in Los Angeles, California
    Plug-in electric car sales for May: best Bolt EV, Prime months yet; Leaf, Volt rise too (final update)

    Sales of four high-volume plug-in electric cars rose last month, with new monthly record for the Chevy Bolt EV and the Toyota Prius Prime. The 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV 238-mile battery-electric hatchback logged its highest monthly total since sales began in December. Chevrolet delivered 1,566 Bolt...

  • 2017 Toyota Prius

    California has always been a bellwether for automotive trends, and it leads every other state by far in the volumes of plug-in electric cars sold. It also led in national sales of hybrid cars for many years. In fact, for several years running, the Toyota Prius was the single most popular passenger car sold in the state—setting it well apart from the rest of the U.S. DON'T MISS: Plug-in electric car sales for Apr: Bolt EV back over 1,000 Now, sales of electric cars have soared in the state, at the same time that hybrid sales actually lost ground as a proportion of the total. The data...

  • Longer-range Renault Zoe electric car, introduced at 2016 Paris Motor Show
    European electric and plug-in hybrid sales for Jan-Mar 2017

    The first quarter of 2017 is now behind us, which means we get to take a peek at the European plug-in electric vehicle sale numbers. The year-to-date numbers show a significant growth in sales for most electric models, according to the recent European Alternative Fuels Observatory report. The...

  • Tesla Store Los Angeles [photo: Misha Bruk / MBH Architects]
    Tesla faces battle over direct sales to buyers in Connecticut

    Another month, another Tesla battle with auto-dealer lobbyists in another state—or so it seems in the company's ongoing battle to sell electric cars online directly to buyers. This time, the action is in Connecticut, where on Monday the legislature's finance committee approved a bill letting...

  • Electric Avenue charging stations in Portland, Oregon [photo: Portland General Electric]
    Oregon mulls bonuses for salespeople who sell electric cars

    The Beaver State, otherwise known as Oregon, may implement an intriguing solution to spur higher sales of electric vehicles. A new piece of legislation introduced in the state senate calls for a $1 million fund to provide $250 bonuses to salespeople each time they sell an electric vehicle...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Volt
    Plug-in electric car sales in Canada, Apr 2017: plus ça change...

    The Volt remains the undisputed king of the Canadian plug-in electric vehicle market. In April, the Chevy Volt enjoyed its 13th consecutive month as Canada's best-selling plug in electric vehicle, and its 46th month overall. While overshadowed by other vehicles in its home U.S. market, the Volt's...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV electric car, owned by Brian Ro, Columbia, Maryland
    Plug-in electric car sales for Apr: Bolt EV back over 1,000 (updated)

    With four-figure sales for both its all-electric Chevrolet Bolt EV and the Chevy Volt plug-in hybrid, GM probably led April's plug-in electric car sales. The "probably" comes because Tesla refuses to release its deliveries broken down either by month or by country, meaning there's no data to...

  • Tesla Model 3 design prototype  -  reveal event  -  March 2016

    Despite a slower-than-expected start, plug-in electric cars are gaining momentum on the North American market. Not only are sales rising, so is consumer interest: according to a survey by AAA, shoppers’ interest in electric and plug-in hybrid cars is now neck to neck with that of pickup trucks. In fact, 15 percent of the interviewed participants showed interest in the purchase of an electric car, versus 16 percent for pick-up trucks. DON’T MISS: Plug-in electric car sales for Apr: Bolt EV back over 1,000 Now, the Consumer Federation of America has projected that for 2017, sales of...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Volt in Vancouver, BC, Canada
    Plug-in electric car sales in Canada, March 2017: Chevy charges ahead

    The Chevy Volt likely continued its winning ways atop the Canadian plug-in electric vehicle sales charts in March. Its 377 sales give it a comfortable margin over the Tesla Model S's high mark of 325, set in March 2016 before the Model X became available. The Chevy Bolt's 241 units were nearly...

  • 2017 Nissan Leaf
    Putting plug-in electric car sales in perspective: they're still very low

    Volume sales of plug-in cars, both battery-electric and plug-in hybrid models, began more than six years ago. From a first-year total of about 17,000 in 2011, they rose tenfold over five years, to roughly 160,000 last year in the U.S. But it's important to understand that despite their growth rate...

  • 2017 Toyota Prius Prime and 2017 Chevrolet Volt with Green Car Reports editor John Voelcker
    Plug-in electric car sales for Mar: Leaf beats Bolt EV, plug-in hybrids beat electrics (updated)

    The Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid again took the crown among plug-in electric cars whose makers report monthly sales. A total of 2,132 Volts were sold in March, bringing its three-month sales to 5,563 units, higher than any other car with a plug over the same period. Its stablemate, the Chevy Bolt...

  • 2017 Tesla Model S
    Tesla delivered 25,000 electric cars in Q1 2017, plus or minus

    The numbers are in, and Tesla says it delivered 25,000 electric cars globally in the first quarter of this year, from January through March. That's a new quarterly record for the Silicon Valley company, which delivered 76,230 cars last year. Analysts and Tesla fans had eagerly watched for this...

  • 2017 Renault Zoe
    European electric and plug-in hybrid sales for Jan 2017

    It's a new year, and that means a reset of the tally of European electric-car sales. In January, the top-selling European-market electric car of 2016 maintained its status for one more month. The Renault Zoe accumulated 2,602 sales in the first month of the year. DON'T MISS: Nissan e-NV200 beats...

  • Electric-car rally in Geiranger, Norway [Image: Norsk elbilforening via Flickr]

    Norway has achieved yet another milestone in electric-car sales. The Scandinavian country may be the friendliest for electric cars in the world, thanks to a combination of aggressive incentives, well-developed charging infrastructure, and a citizenry committed to lowering carbon emissions. Thanks to this unique array of circumstances, electric cars routinely make up a larger percentage of new-car sales in Norway than they do in other countries. DON'T MISS: What can we learn from electric-car owners in Norway (more than 100K of them)? (Aug 2016) As data from this year begins to trickle in, it...

  • 2017 Ford Focus
    Bargains surge on small, fuel-efficient sedans, hatchbacks

    Automakers are expected to offer greater incentives on sedans and hatchbacks as sales of these models continue to slow. Overall new-car sales fell 1.1 percent in February compared to the same month a year ago, according to Autodata Corp. But sales of passenger cars were hit particularly hard as...

  • 2017 Tesla Model S
    Another day, another positive electric-car adoption rate forecast

    If only success could be guaranteed by positive predictions. While the fossil-fuel industry is notably skeptical of the long-term prospects of electric cars, a growing number of studies and forecasts predict the adoption rate will grow rapidly in the coming decades. Electric cars still face...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV
    Plug-in electric car sales in Canada, Feb 2017: Bolt sprints to a speedy start

    The Chevy Bolt EV electric car got off to a fast start in its first full month of Canadian sales, selling 86 vehicles in February. Excluding its first week of availability in late January, the Bolt enjoyed the fourth-best debut month of any plug-in electric vehicle in the Canadian market. It...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Volt
    Plug-in electric car sales for Feb: Volt outsells Prius Prime, Bolt EV, Leaf (final update)

    Once again, it's the first day of the month following a weekday sales close, when the auto industry turns its eyes to the sales charts emerging from all automakers (except Tesla). For plug-in electric cars, the question this month remains the same as last month: how many Chevrolet Bolt EVs did GM...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV pre-production vehicles at Orion Township Assembly Plant, March 2016
    Speedy growth of electric cars will challenge automakers

    Estimates of electric-car market share over the coming decades vary wildly, but certain trends seem to be working in their favor. Battery prices should continue to fall, and tougher global emissions standards may put increasing pressure on automakers to build larger numbers of electric cars. But...

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