The US auto industry under its pro-oil policy incentives is in for a disastrous long-term outlook in exchange for short-term prosperity.
At best, it’ll be a situation where the US market is segregated from the rest of the world: US auto consumers will be buying inferior vehicles from the rest of world that are more expensive to buy and own, since they will only be viable in the US market and will only be built in the US, Canada, and Mexico.
At worst, the US is setting itself for horrendous energy policy issues moving forward. Sure, the US produces a lot of gas and oil and will for a long time, but any sort of price shock will be leaving the US and its car-dependent economy destabilized while Europe and Asia power forward with an ever-decreasing dependence on oil and gas. The US’ endless energy wars will continue to serve as incredibly expensive endeavors that other countries don’t even need to engage in.
Just look at the number of nuclear power plant projects in progress in China. Comparatively few people in China depend on oil to get to work and travel long distances, and the amount that do is plummeting.
BEV - battery electric vehicle
(P)HEV - (plugin) hybrid electric vehicle
ICEV - internal combustion engine vehicle
Nearly 50% of vehicles sold in Australia in the last quarter were EVs or plug-in hybrids: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-08-02/electric-vehicle-ev-s...
does anyone have a data-backed reason as to why US market share has capped out around 10%? is it economics + lack of access to chinese EVs? range anxiety?
The industry has managed a transition. Some European brands have partnered with chinese suppliers while integrating some research in-house. Some cars have a lot of features, cute look, and good price.
I wish the article was written in a better way. It throws put many percentages in different contexts. 50-26-37-41- …
Not saying any particular number is wrong, just wishing it was a clearer way of writing.
Why would anyone buy a Tesla in 2026?
Best charging experience and best software experience.
Note: I do not want this to be true. Other companies please copy what Tesla has done with both of these. You’ve had years to do this and failed.
Charging experience? Teslas can't charge as fast as a modern Kia, Lucid, Geely, or BYD. They can't two-gun charge like a BYD. They don't have battery-swaps like NIO. They've got a single charge port in a back corner... very unclear what's best about them.
And as for software, on the infotainment side, AA/CP are great (but not available on Tesla), and people often like having _some_ physical controls, which goes against Musk's aggressive cost-cutting.
If by software you mean FSD (Supervised), I think essentially every major auto lane-keeping + adaptive cruise covers the key use case where FSD is useful: highway slogs.
For anybody who lives outside of the USA, the Chinese EVs are the obvious answer -- they've surpassed Tesla on essentially every dimension.
For people who live inside the USA the math is different, since the government is actively interfering with the free market to protect a critical donor.
(In the US) I switched from Tesla to Rivian. Their approach seems to be “Tesla, but nicer”. They have a similar non-legacy automaker feel.
That said while I appreciate their design focus their software still feels not quite as polished as Tesla’s.
“Tesla, but nicer, and $20k more”
Also, while FSD has limitations, I have found it provides enormous utility for older people, and Rivian doesn’t yet have a competing product for FSD.
The Rivian R2 is not $20k more. It’s $5k more than the deeply stripped down Model Y base model.
The R2 base model is not as premium as the higher models but the Model Y base model is really deeply stripped down including some really barebones stuff like removing liner material from the frunk and removing some of the exterior LED lights.
Cheapest Model Y is $40k and cheapest R2 is $58k. Cheapest Model 3 is $37k. A huge proportion of Teslas sold are in an entirely different market than Rivian, which hasn’t even started delivering R2s yet.
So really, the price gap is $40k or more until R2s are actually delivered.
The best charging experience would be any of 10 BYD models with flash charging.
10% to 70%: 5 minutes
> Best charging experience
This isn't accurate - they charge slower and Plug & Charge is common in many vehicles now, including with the Tesla network - whereas Teslas cannot Plug & Charge on other networks.
Not really true in Europe where charging is properly standardized.
“Best software” is subjective as well. Many car owners really don’t care for their software and just want to bypass the infotainment system for CarPlay and Android Auto.
I'm an admitted Elon hater, so maybe that clouds my judgement. But I rented a Tesla 3 a few years back to try an EV before deciding to buy one. I ultimately went with a Chevy Bolt, and find the Apple Carplay to be far better than Tesla's proprietary system. The only thing I recall that Tesla did better was pre-conditioning the battery before planned charging--something Apple Carplay (at least its current version) lacks the API to handle.
As far as charging, I think that was the case even as recently as ~2 years ago. But today, the charging game is pretty decent for CCS cars. You can even charge at Tesla stations using an adapter.
Calling it clouded is an understatement. Apart from some Chinese cars (xpeng comes to mind), Rivian, bmw new class (but on paper; practically there are too many issues), other cars don't even come close to Teslas.
I own a 2018 Model 3 and I love it. Plus it's in good shape with limited maintenance. I'm looking to trade it in. But honestly, I don't want to buy effectively the same car but slightly worse, with no turn signals (the recent M3) or an uglier version (the Model Y.) Historically, upgrading from an eight-year old car to the current version of the same model was a pretty big upgrade. Not with Tesla: I'll either keep this car until the wheels fall off, or I'll buy an R2.
As a data point - in my market Tesla is the only manufacturer that makes an EV sedan, and has made them long enough for there to be used ones at reasonable prices (not a lot of people have Taycan money). Most of EVs, especially used ones, are tall and heavy SUVs that put driving experience as the absolutely last priority.
Did I actually buy a Tesla? No. But this has entered as part of my "which EV" conundrum.
Price? They are quite cheap these days relative to comparable cars from other manufacturers.
only if you exclude cars made in Asia
Tesla does have production in Shanghai.
Self driving maybe? I’m happy to be corrected but I think most brands don’t offer the full self driving package Tesla offers.
Europe is not exempt of fascist happy to throw money in a Svatiscar.
What are their sources? How are they defining Europe?
They don't seem to link their sources (that's bad) but the general numbers seem to match The European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) report for H1 2026 [0]. They include EU + EFTA + UK.
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0: https://www.acea.auto/pc-registrations/new-car-registrations-5-7-in-h1-2026-battery-electric-20-7-market-share/I'm not entirely sure why you're getting downvoted. I wasn't able to find a source for the data but it is probably new vehicle registrations. Europe here seems to include Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland, Switzerland.
Sweden, Finland and Iceland would be part of any definition of Europe? They're all EU countries, and (irrelevant to that) are now all NATO members too.
Switzerland is not but its meager population can hardly significantly skew the sales stats
Why wouldn't it?
Typically European Union vs Europe.
they’ll get included again if they order a few humanoid robots that will be shipping by 2078
Vehicle registrations.