While sales of electric cars in general have increased in Europe, sales of Teslas have plummeted, new figures from the European car manufacturers’ association, ACEA, show.
Sales of Teslas in 32 European countries fell in April by 49 percent compared with the same month last year.
European consumers bought 7,261 Teslas in April, compared with 14,228 in the same month in 2024.
The dramatic downturn for Elon Musk’s electric car brand comes despite the fact that sales of fully electric vehicles overall rose by 28 percent in Europe compared with the same period the year before. It follows widespread opposition in Europe to Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s increasingly right-wing and extreme statements and his involvement in German and British politics in support of far-right forces.
Elon Musk, who is the world’s richest man, was a major donor to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, and when Trump took office as President of the United States in January, the private citizen Musk was, through the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (Doge), granted sweeping powers by the president to fire public employees and shut down government institutions he did not like.
That alarmed many Europeans.
»2025 started as a dark chapter for Musk and Tesla, as Elon’s role in the Trump administration and Doge took on a life of its own, damaging the brand and casting a dark cloud over the narrative«, wrote analyst Daniel Ives from Wedbush in an analyst note earlier this month, according to CBS.
In March, a counter-campaign went viral that referred to Teslas as ‘swasticar’ and joked that it goes from 0 to 1939 in three seconds. Tesla owners and dealers have experienced vandalism. The references to Nazism came after Elon Musk in January was accused of giving a Nazi salute at a political meeting. He denied it.
Overtaken by BYD
Musk has announced that he will scale back his political activities and devote more energy to Tesla, which is also losing market share due to an aging product lineup and increased competition, not least from China.
In April, the Chinese manufacturer BYD overtook Tesla for the first time ever, selling just slightly more electric cars in the EU. This is shown in an analysis by Jato Dynamics. BYD’s sales surged significantly, even though the EU has imposed higher tariffs on Chinese cars than on American ones.
Donald Trump has initiated and partly postponed a trade war against the EU, which he claims treats the United States »very, very badly«, referring to consistently misleading figures for the US-European trade balance.
This has triggered calls for consumer boycotts of American goods in several parts of Europe. However, these appear primarily to be directed at Tesla. The American multinational car manufacturer Ford saw a decline of 3.2 percent in April compared with the same month the year before.
Sales of fully electric cars grew by 57 percent in Denmark and 43 percent in the major car market Germany compared with April 2024.
