EVs remain a niche choice in the US, according to survey

Consumers around the world told Deloitte what they want in their next vehicle.

See full article...

 

[Mostly Ignorant]

We own a regular ICE (Highlander) and a hybrid (Maverick). We'll upgrade the Highlander at some point in the next year to a hybrid something, but the cost-premium to get something of similar people-hauling size as the Highlander just doesn't make sense over a hybrid version in all the calculations I've run thus far.

 

[DarthSlack]

It really comes down to convenience IMO. ICE cars are just more convenient for most people. There's a gas station on every corner and filling up the tank only takes a few minutes. Most areas in the US do not have convenient locations to charge other than in your garage at home (which a lot of people don't have).

This? This is just nonsense. I drive a PHEV and the only time I visit a gas station is during long road trips. Otherwise my 33 mile range covers 95% or more of my drives and I could easily get by on 10-20 gallons a year (and no, that's not a typo) outside of long trips.

And I'm charging off of a standard household outlet. Takes me all of 5 seconds to plug in.

 

[callumshell1]

The top concern remains range and charging time. I don't think car buyers realize the range and charging times of modern EVs.
According to my totally scientific ars forum poll, only 20% of people drive more than 400miles/645km in a single day at least once per year. That means for 80% of people, you'd only ever have to stop for 1 single 30 minute charge on a road trip. On a 400 mile road trip, you're probably stopping at least once anyways.

The problem is EVs often leave a very bad first impression due to confusing and unreliable public chargers. When my uncle got an EV a few years ago multiple other members of the family ended up borrowing it to do long trips, and they all had a nightmare with charging. Subsequent trips went much more smoothly and they like the car now, but that doesn't change the fact there is a learning curve to it that can put a lot of people off.

 

[vdiv]

I read SDV and think switched digital video... Need to reflash my software defined human chip with the updated acronyms list

 

[TheShark]

Electric vehicles don't need their brakes replaced??

Regenerative braking means that the actual brakes do far less work in an EV. Brakes in a gas car need to turn almost 100% of the momentum of the vehicle into heat at every single stop. An EV can put most of that momemtum back into the battery. So yeah, the brake pads on an EV can possibly last almost forever because they don't really get used very much.

 

[TheJBW]

In the US, 39 percent said they would not pay more for a car with OTA functionality.

I would pay less for one. But then again I’m a curmudgeon who is thinking about their first car in 20+ years. I’d love an electric, but my ideal car has no subscriptions, lacks a touch screen, and will last another 20+ years.

 

[numerobis]

I don’t understand her reasons, but my daughter-in-law dislikes enough about her Kona EV to replace it with a hybrid. She charges at home, with low electric rates, and can drive to visit us without stopping to recharge. They have a gasoline burner for long trips anyway.
The main drawback of our Niro EV is the fussy climate control and touchscreen buttons.

People make personal decisions. What matters is the aggregate.

The Deloitte data indicates that 37% of Chinese buyers polled in October/November were planning on an NEV vehicle.

And then, a month later in December, China saw about 60% of Chinese buyers bought an NEV vehicle.

 

[SaturnSky]

Electric vehicles don't need their brakes replaced??

I haven't yet because of regenerative breaking.

EV car brakes only work at the very end to get the car to a full stop which is very little to no wear on them.

Even with the Hybrid RAV4, I got almost 70,000 miles before doing a brake job and that was early mostly because I was getting other service done and didn't want to come back again just for the brakes. Compare to 30,000 to 40,000 mile brake jobs on regular cars. Used to be that you could replace pads twice for every rotor change but not anymore. It's been rotors and pads together the last few times I had to do this.

 

[th3suffering]

I have a Model 3, and as much as I absolutely hate Elon with every ounce of my being, it sold me on EVs. Ill never buy another Tesla after Elon's antics, but ill never buy another ICE vehicle also. All cars going forward for me must be EV. Its such a pleasant experience having a full tank every morning and next to zero maintenance comparably.

 

[numerobis]

Regenerative braking means that the actual brakes do far less work in an EV. Brakes in a gas car need to turn almost 100% of the momentum of the vehicle into heat at every single stop. An EV can put most of that momemtum back into the battery. So yeah, the brake pads on an EV can possibly last almost forever because they don't really get used very much.

Those of us in salt-laced locales don't see much benefit. The rotors rust at about the same rate either way.

 

[iollmann]

I would only pick an EV if it was just as convenient if not moreso than an ICE car and the only way that's possible is if I can charge it at home or if pretty much every random location I might decide I want to visit has a place I can plug in and charge. Every grocery store, every bar, every rest stop, every camp site, etc. The US is not as population dense as Europe or China. There are areas of the country where public charging infrastructure is practically nonexistent.

Speaking from experience, if you can charge at home, you will not need to charge these other places. We never do. 100% at home, except for road trips or the rare 3-day power outage. Otherwise, It is enough to just plug it in when you arrive home and unplug in the morning. This is far more convenient than the gas station (and cheaper) because you are never actually waiting for it.

The only time you actually charge on the road is for travel 4+ hours away, or before traversing a mountain range. For that, the car knows where all the chargers are and which ones are free. There is no searching and wondering whether you will find gas in time. Generally you can schedule these stops to include some food or just a bathroom break, and we usually find the car is done recharging long before we are. Tesla does a pretty good job of locating superchargers next to restaurants, which is really what you want. I really don’t know why McDonald’s hasn’t put a row of chargers in every restaurant. They could become an institution for it. I assume they will figure it out eventually. For now, the supercharger subways and burrito shacks will pickup the slack.

 

[sporkinum]

I recently purchased an Ioniq 5. I was also looking at PHEVs during my search (Kia Sportage, RAV4, Prius) but they seem to basically not exist. I’m sure they do but they’re so hard to find. I couldn’t find a PHEV for sale within 250 miles of me, used or new. Hopefully that changes.

In the mean time I’m very happy with my Ioniq 5 and honestly just don’t want an ICE again. I drive infrequently enough that I can just charge in my garage on a standard outlet and never have an issue. My limited driving mileage is also why I was considering a PHEV. I just couldn’t find any.

I crashed my PHEV (2014 Ford C-Max Energi, 38k miles) last year and only had regular insurance. It's in my driveway, and when the weather warms up, I'll start working on it. It's basically just the front bumper, hood, radiator and plumbing, and right fender and headlight. In the interim, my dad gave me his old 2001 Hyundai XG300 that he has had since new.
I am also very limited in mileage. 3000 a year, and only put gas in it about 3-4 times a year.

 

[iollmann]

Those of us in salt-laced locales don't see much benefit. The rotors rust at about the same rate either way.

You will have to refuel your car less.

 

[Kerrock]

EV owner here (Audi e-tron). I love everything about it other than charging on longer trips. The extra work of planning charging stops along my route, the stress of hoping that I can find an available charger when I need one, and the added time (both charging and often waiting for a charger spot to open), makes road trips far less enjoyable than with an ICE or hybrid vehicle.

And I'm in Northern California, where we have a relatively robust charging network, but it still feels insufficient. The Tesla charging network is certainly better than any of the non-Telsa chargers, and my vehicle recently gained access to the Tesla network, but my sense is that we just need more chargers by an order of magnitude.

I guess my point is that I can appreciate why many non-EV drivers are reluctant to get an EV.

 

[numerobis]

You will have to refuel your car less.

I've fuelled the brakes in my EV exactly as often as I fuelled the brakes in my ICEVs before.

 

[Bash]

We are shopping for a new vehicle for my wife, this vehicle needs to be able to drive across texas 2-3 times a year and also tow 5,000 pounds. This vehicle needs 3 rows of seats.

We also want AWD, but in a base model, no sunroof, no leather seats, no heated seats, no fancy interior.

A pure electric is out of question, but the problem is none of the companies make a plug in hybrid that meets our needs.

The only non-luxury manufacturer that offers a plug hybrid with 3rd row seats is Mazda CX-90, but they only offer with higher trim models that starts at 50k+ and it is not available with a towing package for 5,000 pounds, only 3500 pounds.


Ideally, a base model Honda Pilot Sport with PHEV added on would what we would want. However, neither Toyota or Honda offer their mid size SUV's with plug in.

1. So many people in forums need to tow, but 99% of people I know in 'real life' never tow anything. I had to tow a car years ago, and rented from Uhaul for a couple days.

2. Why AWD? I was just in Vermont for a week during an ice storm and frequent light snow and drove a FWD CUV without snow tires. I was fine. (If I lived there hand had to commute on time every morning I'm sure I'd be running snow tires.) Given modern people's apparent need for AWD, it's amazing the car driving public survived before the 1990s.

 

[HiroTheProtagonist]

I have a Model 3, and as much as I absolutely hate Elon with every ounce of my being, it sold me on EVs. Ill never buy another Tesla after Elon's antics, but ill never buy another ICE vehicle also. All cars going forward for me must be EV. Its such a pleasant experience having a full tank every morning and next to zero maintenance comparably.

I rented a Model 3 on a trip back in 2021, and it was easily the most fun I've had with a rental car. Currently not in the market for a new car (my Prius is ten years old and running strong), but my next car will be an EV, most likely whatever refresh of the Ioniq 6 is available at the time if nothing else more compelling hits the market.

 

[the.mighty.oracle]

Is it fair to think that outside of Tesla, fewer USAians have much direct experience of EVs? In the UK, it feels like the transition is accelerating as EVs become more common and affordable, so they are less of an unknown quantity?

Nothing quells range anxiety etc like having a mate say it's not been a problem in their direct experience.

While that's true, there are enough EVs that it might not be as prevalent as you think.

The biggest thing is that gas is much MUCH less expensive here, so there is far less incentive. For me, living in an area with high electric costs, BEV is simply more expensive per mile than a prius ignoring initial cost (which, yeah, there's that too).

The next thing to consider is that we drive much further in much less developed areas. Driving the hour to my parents is at least 85% through the woods with population densities at about 25/sq mi. I live in what would be considered a very densely populated state (CT). It's just as bad when I travel for work to site inspections. I could probably find a charger, though I would need to schedule trips around it. There are a lot of places in the country where you need to be careful to schedule the trip around getting to a gas station let alone a much rarer charging station.

 

[jsully2549]

I leased an Ioniq 5 2 weeks ago. I figured a two year lease lets me see if I want to stay this route or go hybrid. So far I see no reason to go back to ICE. I’ll have a L2 charger in my garage next week but to be honest, I’ve been doing fine with the standard wall charger.

I see a ton of EVs on the road in my area. I’m sure if you drill into the data you’ll find that the percentage of uptake in EVs is skewed along the same demographics that a lot of other things are skewed.

A dealer near me had these (2025, SEL) on lease for $99/month with $999 down.

What a great way to bridge the tech gap/stick your toe in the water.

I'm also on the wall charger (L1), but rarely use it as there are some free DCFC near me.

 

[stormcrash]

I think in the US we interpret such a thing as a way for a car manufacturer to take functionality away or extract subscription revenue from our essential utilitarian item rather than a way to improve the utility of what we purchased.

Given my experience with say, multiple laptop computers and phones that were still physically functional but had to be abandoned because they were no longer supported by software updates, I am oddly loath to have this happen to a $50,000 car that I rely on for essential life activities.

That plus the whole Silicon Valley ethos of "move fast and break things" - the OTA-for-car changes I hear about seem to not always be well tested. I sure don't love any old person being able to remotely change how my car works whenever they like without me even having to drive it there and physically connect a cable.

Ironically it's the Germans pioneering exactly that with the crap BMW is pulling

 

[icwhatudidthere]

SDV is being exploited as a way to extract money from wallets. I couldn’t care less about it.

From my years with Tesla OTAs I lost radar functionality and hated the UI changes but was able to add Fully Supervised Driving and a broken implementation of Apple Music.

With Mercedes, I’ve had terrible OTA availability and constantly wonder why my car gets some updates but not others.

One sinister reason SDV is being pushed is because manufacturers want to paywall features for every single buyer of the car. You might pay for the dashcam software upgrade but if you trade in your car to the dealer (or return a lease) you can bet they’ll turn off the activation flag and make the next owner buy it again. And of course it’s not transferable for you either so even if you buy another car from the same manufacturer you get to continue paying. Imagine buying an app on your iPhone and then when you upgrade, you have to buy it again.

What really soured me was when the CEO of Mercedes, Ola called us customers a “pot of gold” when talking about digital revenue.

 

[J.R.G]

2. Why AWD? I was just in Vermont for a week during an ice storm and frequent light snow and drove a FWD CUV without snow tires. I was fine. (If I lived there hand had to commute on time every morning I'm sure I'd be running snow tires.) Given modern people's apparent need for AWD, it's amazing the car driving public survived before the 1990s.

It isn't just ice/snow that matter; there's also the steepness of the roads on which you have to drive. I lived for 20 years in one of central NY's infamous snow belts, and got along just fine without AWD, with mostly FWD. But in that snow belt, the roads were quite flat. Now I live in a different CNY snow belt, one where the roads have grades that can exceed 16% if they run East/West, but are nearly flat if they run North/South. I drive nothing but AWD because there is no way to reach my house without travelling an East/West road.

 

[TheEvilGenius]

I recently made the jump from my old 2011 Mazda 3 to a 2025 Ioniq 6. Charging at home is a complete game changer and I am in love with my car. I don't think I could go back to an ICE car. Range anxiety is a non-issue. Most of my driving is local and even the "long" trips I take are well within the 250 mile range my car is rated for. EVs are just better.

 

[HyperionAlphaMAX]

This is going to be a controversial thing, but we need a carbon tax. [....] Make the price of gas go up to $5 or 6 in the US and watch everyone scream for EVs right now.

Not sure about that, here in Canada we had the smallest of small Carbon Taxes and a significant amount of people screamed to vote out the politicians responsible for it instead.

We don't have a consumer-facing Carbon Tax anymore.

 

[stormcrash]

I went with a hybrid for my new car/truck (Maverick) because I can't charge at my condo carport.

I think between factors like the killing of the EV tax credit we're going to see a small shift back to hybrids. Meanwhile the biggest issue hurting PHEV interest is the lack of models available (bring back the Volt dangit).

On the plus EV models are moving down in price away from the luxury segment. GM has done a good job with that so far with the Equinox and soon to be back Bolt, and Ford has shifted their strategy to aim for the lower end with their next gen platform starting with the midsize EV truck, and they're going to make better use of PHEV/EREV tech for the F150 to bridge the gap between everyday driving and long haul/towing style work (in terms of convenience yes I know you can do long haul in an EV truck but people still aren't convinced so easing them in with more reassurances and giving them a taste of electric driving will help)

I think the EV market is getting primed for strong growth as the vehicles become more affordable, but we need more options for PHEV and Hybrids too to get people trending in that direction.

 

[mannyvelo]

Given that most of the rest of the world are renters, how is it that most of them seem to have a place to plug in at home?

Did they only survey people with homes in the other countries?

 

[pixelatedindex]

Can’t say I’m surprised. After a long day at work the last thing I want to do is musical chairs at the apartment with everyone fighting for the same handful of charging spots. It’s no different at work. It’s yet another thing I’ve to check the power / charge of. L2 / L3 chargers aren’t that many, and what we have is also taken.

I do love driving EVs though (Chevy Bolt was my fave, Polestar being a close second) but the logistics around it is just a pain the ass. I feel like EVs are for the privileged who have the time and energy to plan around the times when the car is charged. Or if you own a home, but if you own a home in this country it seems like you’re way better off already and peasants like me are an afterthought.

 

[Chareton]

I need to point out that at least in China this survey doesn't match new registrations.

https://cleantechnica.com/2025/12/22/record-month-for-ev-sales-in-china/

In November BEVs made up 37% and plugins (BEV+ PHEV) were 59%. Are people not buying what they want or is there a problem with the survey methodology?

 

[Got Nate?]

regen braking doesn't use the regular car brakes, so the regular car brakes are rarely used in an EV.

When I had my hybrid inspected a few weeks ago, they said that my break pads were like new - for the same regen related reasons. You still need to check the break fluids weather you use them or not.

 

[stormcrash]

SDV is being exploited as a way to extract money from wallets. I couldn’t care less about it.

From my years with Tesla OTAs I lost radar functionality and hated the UI changes but was able to add Fully Supervised Driving and a broken implementation of Apple Music.

With Mercedes, I’ve had terrible OTA availability and constantly wonder why my car gets some updates but not others.

One sinister reason SDV is being pushed is because manufacturers want to paywall features for every single buyer of the car. You might pay for the dashcam software upgrade but if you trade in your car to the dealer (or return a lease) you can bet they’ll turn off the activation flag and make the next owner buy it again. And of course it’s not transferable for you either so even if you buy another car from the same manufacturer you get to continue paying. Imagine buying an app on your iPhone and then when you upgrade, you have to buy it again.

What really soured me was when the CEO of Mercedes, Ola called us customers a “pot of gold” when talking about digital revenue.

Yep, everyone's wary of software and "connected" stuff at this point, and for good reason. If it was just the OTA update stuff people would be fine, but it's all the money grubbing and value extraction that it enables that has people saying no thanks.

My new maverick seems to have built in navigation right now, but if that expires I'm never going to renew it. Thankfully the Ford app for remote start, location, and vehicle status, along with OTA updates seem to all be free (until the day the cellular radio is no longer supported I'm guessing). I think the automakers are finding what people will and what people absolutely will not pay for

 

[Disintegration7]

I haven't yet because of regenerative breaking.

EV car brakes only work at the very end to get the car to a full stop which is very little to no wear on them.

Even with the Hybrid RAV4, I got almost 70,000 miles before doing a brake job and that was early mostly because I was getting other service done and didn't want to come back again just for the brakes. Compare to 30,000 to 40,000 mile brake jobs on regular cars. Used to be that you could replace pads twice for every rotor change but not anymore. It's been rotors and pads together the last few times I had to do this.

That's pretty awesome. I had no idea EVs used regenerative braking.

Maybe it's just me but the car companies don't do a great job of selling these things imo. The ads for the Lightning were all about charging a bunch of other stuff with it, but, while undeniably cool, i'm literally never going to do that. Sell me on actual features like extended brake life!

I have a 2015 Rogue that i like but is getting to the end of life (just passed 100k miles and the suspension is screwed after 10 years driving on PA roads). I'd love an EV but with no more tax credit, and cheap gas it's hard to justify that big initial expense when i don't drive a ton as it is (maybe 40-50 miles/day tops). Getting a charger installed is doable but no idea how much that costs and our home electricity rates have skyrocketed in the past year, despite living 20 miles from a Nuclear plant.

So, i'm concerned that in the end it will be a wash on costs and i end up with a car i hate.

I also HATE the ipad dashboards- not exclusive to EVs but still. Might just buy a newer version of what i already have (like 2019-2020 model year) and see how things shake out in 5 years.

 

[iollmann]

This is going to be a controversial thing, but we need a carbon tax.

It’s not controversial, it is obvious, but it is also deeply muddleheaded. The problem with it is 75% of car sales are used car sales. Most people can’t comply even if they wanted to because the used EVs don’t exist in enough quantity for even 10% of drivers to switch. Automakers can’t scale up fast enough to pick up the slack and can’t do it at the price points most buyers will need. They aren’t going to just reduce prices. Automakers are utterly disinterested in saving the planet. They are here for the profit.

Since we need to have the used EV installed base for people to buy, and we can’t have used EVs without them being new EVs first, a functional incentive program needs to go after primarily the new car buyer to incentive him to pick EV at point of sale. The time to stop ICEs is at the point of sale when new. An ICE already on the road is predestined to be driven until its natural lifespan is fully exhausted because it is too expensive to replace. So when the new ICE drives off the dealer lot, at that point it’s full CO2 impact is unavoidable. There will be a consumer with a strong vested interest to ensure it is so.

Norway has had huge success with (heavy) taxes on new ICEs. They are 95%+ EV in the new car market now. Alternatively, you can simply ban the sale of new ICEs. Either one works. It would also be nice to let in the cheap Chinese EVs which often cost $15-$25k, to allow this process to go faster, but we really can’t do sensible things to save ourselves.

 

[ColdWetDog]

1. So many people in forums need to tow, but 99% of people I know in 'real life' never tow anything. I had to tow a car years ago, and rented from Uhaul for a couple days.

2. Why AWD? I was just in Vermont for a week during an ice storm and frequent light snow and drove a FWD CUV without snow tires. I was fine. (If I lived there hand had to commute on time every morning I'm sure I'd be running snow tires.) Given modern people's apparent need for AWD, it's amazing the car driving public survived before the 1990s.

You're just better than everyone else, of course. My wife, who typically hates driving on snow, has finally mellowed out after a couple thousand miles on a AWD with modern traction control. I have no idea who you know, but (looks down the street) something like 25% of the houses have some sort of trailer or I know that they store one. Anecdata isn't very useful.

And lets not get started about trying to rent something specific these days. Nightmare fuel.

 

[Snuden]

Denmark’s November statistics show three in four new cars were electric​

In Denmark, electric cars recorded 11,732 new registrations in November, achieving a market share of 73.7 per cent. For new passenger car registrations by private individuals, EVs accounted for 91.2 percent of total purchases last month. The most popular electric model: the Skoda Elroq.

Skoda	Elroq	10.623
Volkswagen	ID.4	8.572
Tesla	Model Y	7.672
Skoda	Enyaq iV	5.987
Volkswagen	ID.3	5.098
Audi	Q4 e-tron	4.788
Volkswagen	ID. Buzz	4.493
Volkswagen	T-Roc	3.690
Kia	EV3	3.057
Renault	R5	3.050
Mercedes-Benz	EQA	3.040
Cupra	Formentor	3.036
BMW	iX1	2.939
Volkswagen	ID.7	2.915
Cupra	Tavascan	2.796
Mercedes-Benz	EQB	2.782
Toyota	bZ4X	2.660
Xpeng	G6	2.428
Cupra	Born	2.264
Renault	Scenic	2.255

https://www.electrive.com/2025/12/0...cs-show-three-in-four-new-cars-were-electric/

 

[stormcrash]

That's pretty awesome. I had no idea EVs used regenerative braking.

Maybe it's just me but the car companies don't do a great job of selling these things imo. The ads for the Lightning were all about charging a bunch of other stuff with it, but, while undeniably cool, i'm literally never going to do that. Sell me on actual features like extended brake life!

I have a 2015 Rogue that i like but is getting to the end of life (just passed 100k miles and the suspension is screwed after 10 years driving on PA roads). I'd love an EV but with no more tax credit, and cheap gas it's hard to justify that big initial expense when i don't drive a ton as it is (maybe 40-50 miles/day tops). Getting a charger installed is doable but no idea how much that costs and our home electricity rates have skyrocketed in the past year, despite living 20 miles from a Nuclear plant.

So, i'm concerned that in the end it will be a wash on costs and i end up with a car i hate.

I also HATE the ipad dashboards- not exclusive to EVs but still. Might just buy a newer version of what i already have (like 2019-2020 model year) and see how things shake out in 5 years.

Regen is a huge part of making EVs and hybrids efficient, all that energy that would be lost to friction and heat instead recaptured for reuse. I think it wasn't in the ads like you saw for the lightning because it's basically a mandatory feature, any EV sold without regen would be one of the worst cars on the market for range

 

[ColdWetDog]

That's pretty awesome. I had no idea EVs used regenerative braking.

Maybe it's just me but the car companies don't do a great job of selling these things imo. The ads for the Lightning were all about charging a bunch of other stuff with it, but, while undeniably cool, i'm literally never going to do that. Sell me on actual features like extended brake life!

I have a 2015 Rogue that i like but is getting to the end of life (just passed 100k miles and the suspension is screwed after 10 years driving on PA roads). I'd love an EV but with no more tax credit, and cheap gas it's hard to justify that big initial expense when i don't drive a ton as it is (maybe 40-50 miles/day tops). Getting a charger installed is doable but no idea how much that costs and our home electricity rates have skyrocketed in the past year, despite living 20 miles from a Nuclear plant.

So, i'm concerned that in the end it will be a wash on costs and i end up with a car i hate.

I also HATE the ipad dashboards- not exclusive to EVs but still. Might just buy a newer version of what i already have (like 2019-2020 model year) and see how things shake out in 5 years.

We need a society that supports climate change (and hence the need for EVs, etc.). A society that can help educate people, add and support infrastructure and give some sort of economic stability to those efforts.

In the US, we have exactly the opposite of that. And even if MAGA is relegated to the cesspits of history next election, the damage has been done. It will take decades to reverse the changes even*IF* we can pull ourselves out of it.

 

[TheShark]

Long term, I'm not sure how much consumer opinion is actually affecting the trajectory of EV vs ICE cars. On one hand is costs. Battery prices are relentlessly trending downwards and are already about at the point where it's estimated that they break even with ICE costs. A couple more years and EV's will cost less to manufacture than ICE cars. And solid-state batteries are likely to be in production which will ramp up the range. So ask consumers "Would you pay 25% more for an ICE car?" and you'd probably get a very different answer. I mean really, it's only the trade barriers to Chinese EV's that's keeping this from being true today. That's only going to work for so long.

And on the other hand, there's the future of oil and gasoline. It all looks very robust today. Everyone has this baked in assumption that they will always be able to go fill up their car with cheap gas, but is that a safe assumption going forward? The supply lines for oil are extremely long and vulnerable. An oil tanker is loaded up with $50M or more worth of crude oil and sails half way around the world. And that has been a low risk thing to do thanks in large part to the US Navy keeping shipping safe. But our administration has done a 180 and instead of being the world police, we are now literally oil gangsters. There are lots of actors on the world stage who could bring the global oil trade to a standstill if they were so inclined.

The US has always in the past acted to keep that from happening, but we have the worst possible President right now. It's probably also worth noting that China is sprinting to build out renewable energy as fast as possible. And building EVs as fast as possible. Which is to say they see that the future is electric, not oil. If they can decouple their economic growth from fossil fuels I would expect them to use that to their strategic advantage.

Anyway, I'm rambling. Suffice it to say that consumer sentiment is not going to be consulted on the big factors that will drive this over the next five to ten years.

 

[justin150]

I need to point out that at least in China this survey doesn't match new registrations.

https://cleantechnica.com/2025/12/22/record-month-for-ev-sales-in-china/

In November BEVs made up 37% and plugins (BEV+ PHEV) were 59%. Are people not buying what they want or is there a problem with the survey methodology?

Because I am a cynic, when survey dated does not match reality the first question should be who paid for the survey.

The answers given in a survey depend on how the questions are phrased

 

[juancn]

I'm on the camp that a car with an OTA is worrying. I don't want the thing to have an antenna or any communication with the outside world.

I want a stupid car, yeah, have ESP and ABS and that crap, but I don't want the car functionality to change under me. I want what I bought and that's it.