Europe's electric car sales hit record high in September

About 600,000 electric and plug-in hybrid cars were sold in Europe in September, according to data from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. That is a 39% increase over the same month last year and 10% above the previous record, set in June.

Fully electric cars drove most of the growth: sales of these models rose 50% year over year, while plug-in hybrid sales grew just 16%. The U.K., France, Spain, Portugal and Finland all posted their highest-ever monthly electric car sales. In France, sales jumped 78% to nearly 80,000, while in Germany they rose 61% to 117,000.

The global picture

Worldwide, 2.15 million electric and plug-in hybrid cars were sold in September. Global sales reached 15.5 million in the first nine months of the year, up 3% from the same period last year. In Europe, sales over that period grew 30% to 3.9 million.

Behind the North American decline

In North America, by contrast, September sales fell 44% to about 130,000. But there is an important caveat to the comparison: September 2025 was the last month before the $7,500 U.S. federal tax credit expired, and buyers rushed to make purchases that month. Even so, sales in the region are down 24% for the first nine months of the year.