sales

  • 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV, road test, California coastline, Sep 2016

    Last month, 1,642 Chevrolet Bolt EV 238-mile battery-electric hatchbacks found buyers, enough to take the Bolt's six-month aggregate to 7,592 deliveries all told. It was the latest and highest in a string of rising monthly delivery totals for the 238-mile battery electric hatchback, and it marked half a year (plus a couple of weeks) that the Bolt EV has been on sale. The car went on sale on December 13 last year, with a total of 573 sales recorded for 2016, all of them in California and Oregon. DON'T MISS: U.S. plug-in electric car sales for June: Volt passes Prius Prime, Bolt EV rises again...

  • 2017 Tesla Model S
    Tesla's Q2 2017 deliveries fall slightly due to 100-kwh battery shortage (updated)

    Tesla delivered slightly more than 22,000 electric cars during the second quarter of the year, split between roughly 12,000 Model S hatchback sedans and about 10,000 Model X crossover utility vehicles. That total is more than 50 percent higher than the comparable April-June number for 2016, but...

  • 2017 Toyota Prius Prime, Catskill Mountains, NY, Nov 2016
    Plug-in electric car sales in Canada, June 2017: Prime time

    Toyota made a strong return to the Canadian plug-in electric vehicle market in June, selling 144 Prius Prime plug-in hybrids. The tally is all the more remarkable as the vehicle has so far launched only in Quebec. Why? That province is the home of Canada’s sole zero-emission vehicle mandate...

  • 2017 Toyota Prius Prime and 2017 Chevrolet Volt with Green Car Reports editor John Voelcker
    Plug-in electric car sales for June: Volt passes Prius Prime, Bolt EV rises again

    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...

  • 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

    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 sell quite well. DON'T MISS: European electric and plug-in hybrid sales for Jan 2017 Through the month of May, the Zoe has sold 10,682 units, up from 7,704 units from the same time last year. The Zoe holds a 13.1 percent market share, according to data from the European Alternative Fuels...

  • 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV, road test, California coastline, Sep 2016
    Chevy Bolt EV: nationwide sales moved up to August for electric car

    A slow Chevrolet Bolt EV rollout across the U.S. has frustrated electric-car advocates in many states toward the end of the list. While the first Bolt EVs were delivered in California last December, the last group wasn't scheduled to receive their cars until September. Now GM has moved that up by a...

  • 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...

  • 2016 Tesla Model X
    So what happened to Tesla Model X electric SUV sales, anyway?

    A few years ago, before the Tesla Model X electric SUV went into production, company CEO Elon Musk said he thought it could outsell the older Model S hatchback luxury sedan. That hasn't happened. In the first three months of this year, Tesla said it delivered 11,550 Model Xes—but 13,450 Model...

  • 2017 Toyota Prius
    California trend: hybrid sales sink, plug-in electric cars soar

    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...

  • 2017 BMW i3

    Electric-car owners and advocates have a tenuous relationship with the franchised independent car dealers who are the only legal way to buy a new vehicle in the U.S. Tesla excepted, if you want to buy a new car, you have to go to a dealership over which the carmaker has only limited control. Horror stories abound. DON'T MISS: How can automakers sell more electric cars? Sierra Club report has suggestions But as plug-in electric car sales rise, more and more dealerships are having to learn how to sell to customers who often know more about the car than their salespeople. They must also come to...

  • 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 Bolt EV electric car at EVgo fast-charging station, Newport Centre, Jersey City, NJ
    Even oil companies now acknowledge electric cars are coming

    Advocates have long suggested that electric vehicles will begin to take over daily driving duties, slowly but surely, from the internal-combustion engine. Now, even oil companies are starting to acknowledge that there may be reality in that dream of the future. France's Total SA, one of the world's...

  • Volkswagen TDI diesel vehicles owned by Phil Grate and family, Seattle, Washington
    Europe diesel sales sag slightly, continuing trend since 2012

    Despite efforts by Chevrolet to step into the void left by Volkswagen, sales of diesel passenger vehicles in the U.S. may have been permanently crippled by the VW diesel emission scandal. In Europe, however, diesel has been entrenched for decades as roughly 50 percent of the market. Even before the...

  • Tesla Store Los Angeles [photo: Misha Bruk / MBH Architects]
    Tesla loses bid to sell cars in Utah, dealer lobbyists win

    Tesla has once again been denied permission to sell its cars directly to buyers in the battleground state of Utah. Via a unanimous decision, the Utah Supreme Court handed Tesla Motors another setback this week. The state’s top court upheld a 2015 decision that denied the electric-car maker a...

  • 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...

News First Drives Electric Cars Hybrids Guides Green Life