Global sales of electric and plug -in hybrid vehicles in January increased by 18% annually, as growth in Europe and the United States has surpassed China for the first time since last February, Rho Motion’s research company announced on Wednesday.

The European Car Market started in 2025 on a strong basis as CO2 emissions came into force on the European Union, while holidays during Chinese New Year led to a decline of 43% from month to month in country sales, the data manager said of Rho Motion, Charles Leicester.

Because it is important

Governments around the world are adopting different policies to encourage EV adoption, while commercial tensions and slowdown car purchases foreshadows factories and thousands of job losses.

China has expanded its subsidies to car trade by 2025 as part of an expanded consumer trading program in January to prevent EV sales from slowing down while rejuvenating economic growth.

Europe started new consultations on the same month on CO2 emissions targets with automotive executives, trade unions and interest groups.

With numbers

Fully electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid (PHEV) worldwide sales increased by 17.7% annually to 1.3 million in January, in the third consecutive month of growth, Rho Motion data showed.

Sales in China increased by 11.8% annually to 0.7 million vehicles per month.

Europe reported sales of 0.25 million, up 21% from the same month of 2024.

Among the main markets in Epirus, France declined by 52% due to the import of weight tax on PHEVs, while Germany increased more than 40% in part due to low sizes in January 2024, when EV subsidies stopped abruptly, the Rho motion.

In the United States and Canada, EV sales increased by 22.1% to 0.13 million in January.

In the rest of the world, sales of January increased by 50%.

On a monthly basis, global sales declined by 35%, declining 43% in China compared to December.