Consumer interest in hybrid and PHEV cars booming too

Interest in and demand for hybrid (HEV) and plug-in hybrid (PHEV) vehicles is increasing at an even faster rate than pure-electric vehicles (EVs) – as we revealed last week – with electrified vehicles currently accounting for up to 23.2 per cent of all carsales vehicle searches.

As with EVs, the upswing in demand for HEVs and PHEVs is hardly a new revelation, but fresh data from our analysts has helped quantify just how fast the interest in electrified models is growing.

In January 2020, hybrid and plug-in hybrid vehicles accounted for a slim 4.12 per cent of this website’s monthly searches – more than double that of EVs.

Fast-forward 12 months and the figure was up to 8.77 per cent for the first month of 2021, marking a 112.9 per cent uptick.

Jump forward another 12 months to January 2022 and the share was up to 11.58 per cent – a further 32 per cent increase.

By the end of February, HEVs and PHEVs accounted for 14.38 per cent of all (monthly) searches before another strong upswing to occupy a 19.67 per cent share as of the middle of this month, with daily spikes up more than 23 per cent.

The range of electrified vehicles available in Australia has boomed in accordance with this surging consumer demand, increasingly stringent global emissions regulations and skyrocketing fuel prices , so much so that some brands like Toyota are hybridising entire model lines, such as the Toyota RAV4.

Twenty manufacturers, including exotics like Ferrari and McLaren, currently offer hybrid or PHEV model variants Down Under and that list is set to grow in the coming months.

From those 20 OEMs, 51 different hybrid or PHEV models are currently available in Australian showrooms.

Thankfully for the manufacturers, this surging consumer interest is being reflected on the sales charts according to the latest round of VFACTS data.

Across January and February of last year, 9923 hybrid and plug-in hybrid vehicles were sold across all vehicle segments, while 13,727 electrified vehicles found homes in the first two months of 2022, marking a total increase of 38.3 per cent.

Predictably, it was hybrids that accounted for the lion’s share of both years’ figures, but PHEVs saw a bigger percentage increase between the two periods; 36.8 versus 80.8 per cent – fitting given PHEVs are widely considered a stepping stone between internal combustion and fully-electric vehicles.