Almost every new car sold in Norway last year was an EV
The government will now phase out some of its most alluring tax incentives by 2027.
There’s no swerving it: 2025 was a tough year for Tesla the business — even if it wasn’t so bad for Tesla the stock — as the electric vehicle pioneer ceded its crown to Chinese upstart BYD for the first time ever, after sales dropped for the second year in a row.
While Elon Musk’s EV giant saw deliveries drop in key regions over the year, not least in Europe, its “weakest market,” per the CEO, there was one major bright spot on the continent for the company, with Tesla selling more cars in Norway last year than any other automaker in history.
The Scandi nation being a standout for the car company will come as little surprise to anyone who’s kept an eye on the global electrification movement, given that Norway has raced ahead on EV adoption for years now and hit a staggering new record in 2025, per new national data released on Friday.
According to the latest numbers from the Norwegian Road Federation, or OFV, electric vehicles took a 97.6% share of new vehicle registrations in the last month of 2025, taking their share to a whopping 95.9% for the year all told. Plug-in and gas hybrids, meanwhile, took a collective share of around 3%, while diesel vehicles made up just 1% of the market. Most of the late-year surge is likely linked to the government’s announcement that it would pull back on some of the major tax benefits it’s used to incentivize EV uptake, before cutting them entirely by 2027.
So, is Norway now an EV utopia? Interestingly, despite electric cars dominating new car sales, the stock of cars on the road is still predominantly gas-guzzling due to the life cycle of vehicles, with figures compiled by Our World In Data estimating that only about one-third of Norway’s vehicles were electric in 2024. Naturally, that figure will continue to move higher, but it’s a good reminder of just how long a full electric transition could take.
