Petrol-only cars lose their global market majority for the first time
Cars powered solely by petrol engines are no longer the majority choice in the global new-car market. Their share fell to 49 per cent in the first half of 2026, while both hybrids and electric cars increased sales. Even more striking is the speed of the shift: in 2021, petrol-only cars accounted for 73 per cent of the global market.
A fall of 24 percentage points in five years
Nikkei analysed data from Mobility Global, formerly S&P Global Mobility, and found that 20.25 million new petrol-only cars were sold worldwide between January and June. That was 10 per cent fewer than a year earlier, while their market share shrank from 52 per cent to 49 per cent. Models in some large vehicle classes are excluded from the statistics.
The 49 per cent figure is primarily a symbolic threshold. It does not mean that the internal combustion engine has suddenly become a minority choice. On the contrary, much of the market share lost by petrol-only cars went to hybrids, which still have a petrol engine on board.
Sales of conventional hybrids rose by 10 per cent in the first half to 7.27 million cars, giving them 18 per cent of the global market. Sales of battery-electric cars totalled 6.87 million, up 12 per cent on a year earlier. Their market share reached 17 per cent.
The statistics therefore do not tell a story of the internal combustion engine's demise. Instead, they show the rapid retreat of the conventional petrol car without electric assistance.
Electric cars are not the only winners
One of the more interesting conclusions from this market shift concerns hybrids. In the first half of 2026, hybrids continued to outsell battery-electric cars worldwide.
This also helps explain the strong position of manufacturers such as Toyota. Buyers who want to reduce fuel consumption but do not want to deal with charging find a straightforward compromise in a hybrid. Manufacturers, in turn, can reduce average fuel consumption across their fleets without an enormous battery.
Electric cars have a different advantage. With high fuel prices and an uncertain oil market, the lower energy consumption of an electric powertrain becomes increasingly important. According to the IEA, road transport uses nearly half the world's oil, so oil price shocks affect the car market very directly. The IEA forecasts that battery-electric cars and plug-in hybrids will account for 29 per cent of the global market in 2026.
Meanwhile, the overall global car market shrank by about 5 per cent in the first half of the year. The 10 per cent decline in petrol-only car sales was therefore roughly twice as fast as the market's overall contraction.
Europe is moving even faster than the global market
From a European perspective, the 49 per cent global share held by petrol-only cars already looks almost old-fashioned.
According to ACEA, petrol-only passenger cars accounted for 22.2 per cent of the European Union market in the first six months of 2026. A year earlier, the figure was 28.4 per cent. Petrol-only car registrations fell by 17.2 per cent.
Over the same period, conventional hybrids captured 37.3 per cent of the EU market, battery-electric cars 20.7 per cent and plug-in hybrids 9.8 per cent. The combined share of petrol and diesel cars was just 29.7 per cent.
By the end of August, the picture had become even clearer. The share of battery-electric cars in the EU rose to 21.7 per cent, while that of petrol-only cars fell to the same figure, 21.7 per cent. In volume terms, battery-electric cars even edged ahead: 1,641,333 battery-electric cars and 1,634,733 petrol-only cars found buyers in the EU market.
This matters much more to the automotive industry than a single psychological threshold of 50 per cent in the global market. Europe's major manufacturers must now compete in a market where electrified powertrains are not an alternative but the mainstream.
China is setting the pace of the powertrain shift
Petrol-only car sales fell particularly sharply in China, where the decline reached 26 per cent. The corresponding fall in Europe was 13 per cent.
Electric car sales are not rising steadily in every region, however. The IEA recorded a decline in global electric car sales in the first quarter of 2026, led by China and the US, but demand rebounded strongly in the second quarter. Second-quarter electric car sales exceeded the first-quarter total by 35 per cent, and around 50 countries set quarterly records.
This is an important detail that guards against the overly simplistic conclusion that the whole world is swapping petrol cars for electric cars at once. In reality, the market is fragmenting across several technologies, with regional taxes, subsidies, fuel prices and charging networks determining the pace.
The conventional petrol car is becoming a niche product faster than the internal combustion engine itself
For the automotive industry, electric cars are not the most important aspect of the 49 per cent figure. The much bigger change is the breakdown of the traditional powertrain mix.
Just five years ago, a manufacturer could build a global model range around the petrol engine and treat hybrids or electric cars as a sideline. In 2026, that strategy no longer works. Europe needs electric and hybrid cars, China is pushing the shift even faster, and even in more traditional markets, hybrids are eroding the position of the conventional petrol engine.
The internal combustion engine will not disappear tomorrow. What is beginning to disappear, however, is the car whose powertrain consists solely of a petrol engine and a gearbox. Market statistics show that this transition is happening much faster than the automotive world of five years ago would have suggested.
