SMMT's April 2026 release confirmed two milestones in one month. UK new-car registrations grew 24.0% year-on-year to 149,247 units, and battery-electric registrations climbed 59.1% to 39,084 cars, pushing pure-EV share to 26.2% of the month (SMMT, May 2026). The cumulative UK fleet crossed the two-million-EV mark in the same month.
53.2% of April was electrified, all in
Counting BEVs plus plug-in hybrids plus full hybrids, electrified powertrains accounted for 53.2% of UK April 2026 registrations, the second month this year over 50% electrified (SMMT). Diesel continued its long-decade decline and now sits in the single digits for retail registrations.
What drove the +24%: tax-change rebound
The April surge has a clear structural cause. Changes to Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) that came into force on 1 April 2025 had pulled forward demand into March 2025 and depressed registrations across most of 2025. A year later, that depressed base is the comparison point, and the natural recovery is amplified by the Expensive Car Supplement now applying to EVs, which is changing the model-mix toward sub-£40,000 cars (electrive.com, 5 May 2026).
The full-year picture: 2.093 million cars, BEV share trimmed to 26.8%
SMMT's revised 2026 forecast lifts total registrations 3.6% to 2.093 million units, the first time the UK new-car market is forecast to cross two million since 2019. But the BEV share forecast was trimmed to 26.8% from the previous 28.5%, reflecting a weaker Q1 (SMMT). The ZEV mandate target for 2026 is 28%, so the gap between forecast and mandate is now the political story to watch.
What this means for OEMs under the ZEV mandate
The ZEV mandate fines are real (£15,000 per ICE car over quota) and the flexibility mechanisms (credit trading, ICE-to-BEV pooling, transferring 2026 obligations into 2027) carry their own costs. With the BEV share forecast 1.2 points below the mandate threshold, expect a quieter Q3-Q4 push by OEMs to bring BEV-heavy models into the UK ahead of full-year compliance reporting.
Open the live UK dashboard on AutoNergy for monthly BEV share, brand-by-brand pure-EV registrations, and the running ZEV mandate compliance tracker.