A ‘snapshot’, some figures and lots of abbreviations
We regularly read that the electric vehicle (EV) is the future of motoring, and indeed it probably is for the decade beyond 2030. The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) reports that 23.4% of new car registrations in 2025 were Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV).
The UK government’s Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) mandate is forcing vehicle manufacturers towards an ever-increasing percentage of EV production, targeting 80% by 2030 and 100% by 2035. From 2030, the sale of new, non-hybrid, petrol and diesel cars will be banned and by 2035, all new cars and vans must be fully zero-emission.
The figure of 23.4% of new registrations being BEV sounds impressive and well on the way to the ZEV targets (although the 2025 target for new cars was 28%, so not quite there yet).
When Hybrid Electric Vehicles (HEV) and Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEV) are included in the new car registration total at 13.9% and 11.1% respectively, in 2025, over 48% of new car registrations were electric.
How have these highest ever EV percentages affected the overall proportion of EVs on the UK roads?
To answer this question, it is helpful to turn to two independent sources of data. One is the UK government data published towards the end of 2025, with estimates to the end of the year, and the other is the RAC Report on Motoring for 2025 which is based on a survey of several thousand motorists and their vehicles.
Based on DfT / DVLA regional data for the UK 2025
At the end of 2025, there were nearly 42½ million vehicles registered in the UK. Of these, approximately 34½ million were cars. The chart above is based on Department for Transport (DfT) and Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) figures. The split between internal combustion engine cars and electric propulsion is 85% internal combustion, 16% electric.
[DfT / DVLA data is not perfect – you will notice that these figures do not add to 100%. Errors in the 1000 plus lines of regional data that make up each total may occur from rounding up or down, alternative fuel, such as liquid petroleum gas (LPG) or no record of fuel type].
The RAC Report on Motoring data is based on an online interview with 2395 participants in April 2025. Like the DfT / DVLA data, there will be rounding errors in the percentages as well as sampling errors arising from the finite number of participants, the latter estimated to be around 1%. The RAC chart is shown below.
Copied from the RAC Report on Motoring 2025
Here the split between internal combustion and electric is 83% to 16%. A very similar result to that emerging from the government data yet arrived at by a completely independent process.
There is no equivalent to the ZEV mandate for the overall mix of electric and petrol / diesel cars. Clearly, a time will come when the mix is dominated by electric cars but hopefully, the classic car lobby, the classic car enthusiast and museums such as the Cotswold Motor Museum and Toy Collection will continue to cherish those historic vehicles that provide such an insight into motoring throughout the 20th century.
Finally, back at the start of this post, we noted that the ZEV legislation mandates all new cars and vans must be zero emission by 2035. As a 2025 snapshot of the progress of Light Commercial Vehicles (LCV) towards that target, the final chart, below, is reproduced from Zapmap, another useful and up-to-date information source on the rollout of EVs and their associated charging infrastructure.
[Parc simply means the total population of that vehicle type on UK roads]
So, last year, whilst around 16% of cars on UK roads had some form of electric propulsion, only around 2% of vans have moved in that direction.