Summary
- Volkswagen beat Tesla in European EV sales across the first three months of 2025, data shows.
- Registrations for VW EVs are up more than 150%, while Tesla lost huge ground.
- However, the Model Y and Model 3 remain Europe’s top two most-registered EVs.
Freaking hell Lemmy has a huge hard on for BYD.
I’ve seen some videos on them. They look pretty nice but I worry about how they hold up and the build quality, as I would any relatively unestablished brand.
I only brought them up because I saw a news report that their dealerships are popping up and their starting price is much lower than Tesla. Like €17000.
Can’t speak for other countries, but in Australia BYD is smashing it.
They represent incredible value for money and it’s not like we’ve got a local industry to protect - our conservative government made sure of that.
We’re already the world’s dumping ground for shit vehicles that don’t meet emissions standards, so having a non-Elon Musk EV alternative is something people are grabbing with both hands. We bought a BYD Seal Performance for $70k AUD a little over a year ago. For that money you get an incredibly comfortable sedan that does 500k on a charge, costs about $1 per 100km to run, and does 0-100 in 3.8 seconds.
EU vehicles are crazy overpriced by comparison, and because they try and position Mercedes / BMW / VW as luxury brands here the servicing and repair costs are through the roof. Part availability also sucks, with everything being a 6+ week lead time. We’ve owned European vehicles on several occasions and never again.
What about Japanese options?
Like what?
Korea has a few (Hyundai, Kia / same,same) but the only Japanese options are [P]HEV or the Toyota BZ4X which is… ugly… if it didn’t have a Toyota badge I don’t think they’d sell any of them. Few old Leafs still hanging in there, but if you want to go more than 100k at a time that’s them ruled out.
Because they present amazing value (at Chinese prices) and really advanced battery technology.
Chinese electric cars are great value.
If you don’t consider the impact that sending yet more manufacturing jobs to China will have in the long run and the fact that they have great value because what China is doing is called dumping and the goal is for them to have a monopoly so they can eventually increase prices without having any competitors.
Yes, China dumps EVs on other markets.
But here are some extra insights to consider about the issue:
None of this is intended to condone China or any country dumping products, but as a warning about having overly simplified reactions to an issue without understanding the bigger picture.
Maybe the US should subsidize more renewable and battery manufacturing inside its borders.
https://energy.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/renewable/trump-administration-cancels-clean-energy-grants-as-it-prioritises-fossil-fuels/119687122
Oh.
Also slave labor.
“They’re much cheaper than comparable cars!”
People never think about where the savings come from, as long as they can buy stuff.
Seeing people who call themselves left wing defending globalism will always be funny to people like me who are left wing and were protesting against it back in the day.
On the other hand, the right in America is in the process of destroying globalism and is rightly mocked for it because they themselves are suffering the worst.
The issue is the way they’re trying to put an end to it. A plan like the government giving priority to local manufacturers and forcing international bidders to build factories in the country is one thing. Imposing tariffs without any plans to compensate locally is just plain dumb.
And yet they’re not just going about it the most boneheaded way they can think of, but have been actively killing off Biden era incentives to do what they claim they want.
If they actually cared about manufacturing locally, they would support those incentives, and support the infrastructure bill
Damn I have not heard about the Chinese enslaving black Africans to work at plantations yet.
If auto subsidies are dumping, the US has been dumping for ages.
Not my part of lemmy, must just be Tankies or some shit.
Don’t want to protect elon musk’s swastikar LLC with tariffs? Must be a tankie! Want to buy a cheap electric vehicle? tankie!
Well, they do make pretty nice cars… I have a dolphin, and it is great value for the money :)