Renault Zoe Continues To Crush Competition In France

Originally published on EV Obsession.

There were around 1,800 electric car (including SUV & van) registrations in France during the month of July 2016, according to the most recent estimates from the EV Sales blog. That represents a roughly 12% year-on-year decrease from July 2015.

Despite the apparent slowdown during July 2016, year-to-date totals in France are actually up from 2015 by a substantial margin (around 43%).

Interestingly, all-electrics (EVs) captured an 82% share of the total plug-in market, a substantial majority — with plug-in hybrid (PHEV) models not even managing to make it into the top 5 rankings for the month.

The share of the overall French automotive market held by plug-in vehicles for 2016 now sits at around 1.66%. The 2015 plug-in electric vehicle share was 1.41%.

Unsurprisingly, the Renault Zoe accounted for a large majority of electric vehicle sales in the French market during July — with 488 units of the Zoe registered during the month. A further 190 Renault Kangoo ZEs were also registered (the model took the second spot during July), growing Renault’s dominance in the country.

The world’s top-selling EV in history, the Nissan LEAF, managed to take the third spot, with 155 units registered. The BMW i3 was a large step down at fourth (84 units), while the Peugeot iOn was right below it at fifth (with 77 units registered).

Jose Pontes provides a bit more (concerning year-to-date rankings): “France is known for being a stable market, with little changes in the ranking, and July confirms that — one has to go down to the #13 spot to see a position change, with the Citröen e-Mehari surpassing its C-Zero older brother, while the #21 VW Passat GTE is now the best-selling model of its class, leaving the smaller-electric-range BMW 330e and Mercedes C350e behind. Great landing by the Audi Q7 e-Tron, with 41 units, promising to make waves in the luxury SUV class.”

As far as brand market shares, Renault obviously took the top spot — with a 43% market share — followed by Nissan (14% market share) and BMW (8% market share).