EV Sales Are Booming In Europe–Except For Tesla

European EV sales increased by double digits. Meanwhile, Tesla experienced the exact opposite.

Photo by: Tesla

By: Iulian Dnistran

Sep 22, 2025 at 9:29am ET

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Electric car sales continue to rise in Europe.
In the first eight months of the year, EV sales increased by an impressive 26% year-over-year.
However, not all automakers are enjoying the ride, with Tesla immediately jumping into view.

Tesla has long been the king of EVs, but its position is slowly eroding as customers are turning to the vastly more diversified portfolios of rival companies. That evolution is clear as day in Europe, where Tesla’s reliance on just two aging cars–the Model 3 and Model Y–has caused sales numbers to go down month after month, leaving room for so-called traditional automakers to sweep in.

Eight months into the year, the Tesla Model Y is Europe’s best-selling EV, according to preliminary numbers from DataForce that take into account 97% of sales in the European Union, the United Kingdom and EMEA countries. Despite this–and the fact that the Model 3 was the third-best-selling EV–Tesla is the only electric car maker in the top 10 with decreasing sales.

So far this year, the Model Y has been sold in 83,314 units, a significant decrease of 34% over last year, while the Model 3 saw 50,237 sales, down 29% year-over-year. Meanwhile, the overall EV market went up 26% from January to August, with other automakers leading the way with their higher sales numbers.

In August, Volkswagen was the best-selling EV maker in Europe, with a total of 16,105 cars finding new owners, an uptick of 45%. That’s mostly thanks to the ID.3, ID.4 and ID.7 models. Tesla was second with 14,245 units, a decrease of 23% year-over-year, followed by BMW with 12,546 EVs sold, up 7% from last year.

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For what it’s worth, Tesla’s performance improved slightly from July, when it finished seventh on the European EV sales chart. What’s more, Kia isn’t doing very well, either. After consistently getting a spot in the top 10, the Korean automaker fell out of it in August, leaving Ford to take its place on the list, thanks to increasing sales of the Volkswagen-based Explorer EV.

Overall, the European electric car market seems quite healthy. In the past, automakers have said that EVs need to have a market share of 20% to 25% to meet the EU’s emissions targets for 2025-2027. Well, that just happened in August, with the 154,582 EVs sold last month accounting for 20% of the new car market.

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