The UK’s electric vehicle market delivered its strongest July performance in years, with battery electric car registrations up 44.5% year-on-year as the wider new car market recorded its eighth consecutive month of growth.
According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), 156,571 new cars were registered in July — up 11.7% on the same month last year and the best July result since 2019. Of those, 43,106 were fully electric, giving battery electric vehicles a 14.9% share of the month’s registrations alone. Year to date, more than 336,000 fully electric cars have now been registered in 2026, taking BEVs to a 25.2% market share for the first seven months of the year.
SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes described July’s EV performance as “a great achievement, reflecting industry’s huge investment in zero emission mobility,” while cautioning that the progress isn’t without cost — warning that manufacturers are “haemorrhaging billions in EV discounts” to sustain demand and hit compliance targets under the Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) Mandate.
That mandate context matters: while the headline UK target requires 33% of manufacturers’ sales to be zero-emission this year, analysis from New AutoMotive suggests the effective, real-world compliance threshold is closer to 24.6% once the scheme’s various flexibilities and CO2 credits are factored in. July marked the second consecutive month in which real-world BEV sales exceeded that effective threshold, adding to a growing surplus of compliance credits across the industry.
Growth wasn’t confined to EVs alone — private buyer registrations rose 12.6%, fleet deliveries were up 9.5% and represented six in ten registrations overall, and the smaller business segment saw a 61.3% jump.
For drivers weighing up an electric vehicle for the first time, July’s figures are a reasonable signal that manufacturer discounting is making EVs more attainable right now — though as SMMT itself points out, that’s being driven partly by manufacturers absorbing losses to hit targets, which won’t necessarily continue indefinitely.
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