Volkswagen tops Tesla for new electric vehicles in Germany in 2023

Volkswagen overtook Tesla in electric vehicle sales in the German market in 2023, according to registration data from the country's Motor Transport Authority (KBA) released on Tuesday.

Around 70,600 all-electric Volkswagen vehicles were newly registered in Germany in 2023, according to the KBA, an increase of 11.7% compared with the previous year.

Registrations of new Tesla vehicles, meanwhile, dropped by 9% compared to 2022 and lagged in second place behind VW with 63,700.

However, Tesla's Model Y remained the single most popular electric vehicle in Germany with around 45,800 newly registered cars in 2023.

In total, around 524,200 cars with a purely electric drive were registered in Germany in 2023. Compared to the previous year, this is an increase of 11.4%. All-electric vehicles made up 18.4% of all 2.84 million newly registered vehicles in Germany in 2023, up from 17.7% in 2022.

Several other Volkswagen-owned brands also sold significant numbers of new all-electric vehicles in Germany in 2023, including Audi (30,600), Škoda (23,500), SEAT (17,500) and Porsche (5,700).

The Volkswagen Group as a whole held a 28% market share for newly registered electric vehicles in Germany.

Tesla is followed by the Stellantis Group - which includes the brands Citroën, Fiat, Peugeot and Opel - with almost 71,300 newly registered electric cars in 2023.

Overall, the three major German car companies - VW, Mercedes-Benz and BMW - were able to make strong gains in the electric market in Germany.

In 2023, the number of new registrations of electric cars by those three German companies rose by 32%, almost three times as much as the market as a whole, according to an analysis by the consulting firm EY.

The market share of the three groups in the electric car sector climbed from 38% in 2022 to 46% in 2023.

Although the brands owned by Chinese manufacturers were at a significantly lower level, their share of the German market has grown sharply in recent years and now sits at 9%. That is twice as high as a year earlier and eight times as high as in 2021.