ICE vehicle sales won't return to pre-pandemic levels, new study

While major markets like North America, Europe & China have already started following this trend, others are expected to follow soon.

According to a new study, sales of internal combustion engine-powered vehicles peaked in 2017 and will never return to those levels in the future.

The new analysis was conducted by Bloomberg, which reported that sales numbers of ICE-powered vehicles were highest in 2017, reaching 86 million units, after including traditional hybrid sales. During the same year, sales numbers of battery-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles combined were a little over 1 million.

Compare this to the numbers in 2022, where ICE vehicle sales were reduced to 69 million, plug-in hybrid vehicle sales grew to 2.9 million, while battery-electric vehicles registered a massive jump to 7.5 million.

While major markets like North America, Europe & China have already started following this trend, others are expected to follow soon. Especially in Southeast Asia, the growing number of EVs is most likely to overtake the sales of ICE vehicles in the coming years. India has already witnessed a jump from 15,000 EVs sold in 2021 to 50,000 EVs in 2022.

According to researchers, the global combustion vehicle fleet will remain steady till 2026 before declining and giving way to EVs.

Source: Bloomberg