In a major milestone in US electric vehicle (EV) adoption, California surpassed 20% in EV sales share in Q3 2022, according to data from S&P Mobility and the Alliance of Automotive Innovation. This means that during the period July through September, one out of every five new light passenger vehicles sold in the state was either a BEV or PHEV. In addition, during the quarter 21 states plus the District of Columbia, surpassed 5% EV sales share, the most ever to surpass 5%.

EV sales share is the combined number of new sales of full battery-electric vehicles (BEVs) plug plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) divided by the number of total light passenger vehicle sales, and presented as a percentage.

For the US overall, EV sales share reached 7.1% in Q3 2022 and 6.8% year-to-date (YTD). California reached 19.2% for the YTD, but could reach 20% for the entire year.

The huge disparity in EV adoption rates across the US continues, however, with California’s EV sales share being 16.6 times higher than the 1.21% for West Virginia in Q3 2022. In addition to West Virginia, six other states still have not reached the 2% sales share threshold. These are North Dakota (1.25%, Mississippi (1.32%), Louisiana (1.38%), South Dakota (1.67%), Oklahoma (1.76%), and Wyoming (1.99%).

On the positive side, four states and the District of Columbia have EV sales shares higher than 10%. These are California (20.07%), District of Columbia (14.93%), Washington (12.62%), Oregon (12.19%, Nevada (11.15%).

Looking across the states and District of Columbia, 36 states had an EV sales shares below 7% and less than the US average of 7.07%. Twenty-one states have an EV sales share of less than 4%, but 15 are in the 4% to 6.99% range, and 10 are in the 7%-9.99% range.