Over the first 11 months of 2023, 261,164 electric cars were sold in France. Over the first 11 months of 2024,… 261,524 electric cars were sold. 380 more, meaning nothing at all for an electric market that is no longer moving forward. If we have already mentioned the “capping” on numerous occasions, it seems more marked than ever in France where the potential reserve of customers could well have been exhausted. Convincing those who do not have access to a home socket, those who were reluctant from the start or those who simply do not have the means will be much more difficult than selling Teslas to early adopters. who didn’t really need convincing.
But the reasons which explain this slowdown in the electricity market are in fact complex to analyze, and there may also be a double reading which does not facilitate the analysis. Indeed, the basis of comparison with the year 2023 is somewhat biased since the previous year had been particularly good for electric sales. Should we therefore necessarily sound the alarm in 2024 if sales no longer progress compared to an unprecedented year 2023? Not sure. Let’s still wait until 2025 to decide. Still, the context is not reassuring: despite social leasing which almost single-handedly supported the electric market for several months, sales are at the same point as in 2023. What would have happened? without social leasing? A hell of a discomfiture.
Small electric ones rather than big ones?
The fact is that large electric cars seem to be less and less popular. The Tesla Model Y logically lost ground after a prosperous year in 2023, the Model 3 suffered the same fate, and the Koreans fell to very low levels: 35th place for the Kia EV6 and barely 700 Hyundai Ioniq 5 registered in France over the first 10 months of the year! In short, the big ones are less popular. And this obviously benefits the Renault 5, Peugeot e-208/e-2008 and other Citroën e-C3. “Compact” models like the BMW iX1 or the Renault Mégane E-Tech are also making progress. But they are very alone.
Only recent new products seem to be able to do well among family cars, such as the Renault Scénic E-Tech which beats the Peugeot e-3008. He almost registered one copy of the electric 3008 for every three copies of the Scénic between January and October. We will have to wait until next year and the end of tactical deliveries (concessions and demonstrations, etc.) to see things more clearly and understand why the 3008 is so far from the Scénic.
December to save honor?
Since the announcement of the publication of the bonus decree, everyone has been busy. Temporary December offers are already starting to drop. An MG4 at €21,990 in stock? The new reduced bonus coming into force by surprise from December could cause a sudden rebound in electric sales in the last month of the year, allowing us to post a slight positive balance for 2024. But this raises questions again on the economic health of the new battery vehicle market, which seems more than ever attached to and infused with tax aid to support less and less obvious growth. The government hoped that the gradual disappearance of the bonus would be compensated by a massive drop in the price of new cars, but for the moment, the account is not there. Remember that the French mainly buy used cars and their average budget allocated to a vehicle does not exceed €25,000 for new ones, and the €15,000 second-hand. At these prices, today we only find small vehicles which cannot always fulfill the role of the sole means of family transport in the household as the Mégane and other C4 Picassos were able to do for years. This price constraint is added to that of access to the terminal which is still not resolved for a quarter of French people…
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