Economy 4 September 2025, 5:22pm

Battery electric vehicle registrations drop 7.3% m/m in Hungary in August

Portfolio

The number of green licence plates issued in Hungary declined by 7.2% month-on-month and 11.2% year-on-year in August 2025, according to the latest data from the Ministry of the Interior. While the number of newly registered pure electric passenger cars with green plates increased by almost 63% year-on-year, it dropped by 7.3% in monthly terms. At the end of August, there were more than 135,600 vehicles with green licence plates in circulation, which is almost eight times more than in January 2020 and 13.5 times more than in January 2019.

In August 2025, a total of 2,541 vehicles were registered with green licence plates in Hungary, 7.2% fewer than in July (-7.7% m/m), and 11.2% fewer than in August 2024. The yr/yr contraction comes on the back of a 6.5% increase in July.

the Registration of 2,541 green licence plates followed 2,738 registrations in July, with a record 2,967 reported in June this year.

The number of vehicles with green licence plates reached 135,604, and that of batter-electric vehicles (BEVs) 90,452. The latter number includes 83,991 passenger cars.

The following graph shows the monthly tally of green plate registrations since January 2020 in the three main categories: Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV), Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV) and Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV).

The dramatic decline in the HEV and PHEV categories was triggered by regulatory changes (described in the box below). While we continue to receive monthly data from the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association (ACEA) on new passenger car registrations, including the uptake of electric vehicles for all engine types, the HEV and PHEV figures in green number plate reports from the Ministry of the Interior will continue to be practically zero.

Extended-range, externally chargeable hybrid electric vehicles (5N) and externally chargeable hybrid electric vehicles (plug-in hybrid vehicles, 5P) have no longer been able to receive green number plates when first registered in Hungary since 1 September 2024. In addition, previously issued green number plates for these vehicles will have to be replaced by 30 November 2026 at the latest, beyond which date they must have regular licence plates.

Environmentally friendly vehicles (5E, 5N, 5P, 5Z) uniformly benefit from the following discounts: (i) exemption from vehicle tax, (ii) exemption from company car tax, (iii) exemption from transfer tax and (iv) zero registration tax.

With those in the 5N and 5P categories no longer deemed environmentally friendly from 1 September 2024, they should be subjected to the vehicle tax, although the regulation does not define precisely what environmentally friendly means. If they were to further specify the definition in the vehicle tax law, vehicles classified as 5N and 5P will most likely be subjected to the company car tax too. These vehicles are also most likely to be subjected to the transfer tax and the registration tax (estimated to be HUF 76,000).

A total of 2,509 battery electric vehicles were newly registered with green licence plate in Hungary in August, following 2,706 in July and a new all-time high of 2,929 in June.

the latest figure marks a 7.3% decrease in monthly terms and a 62.6% jump in annual terms.

The new registration of passenger cars in the BEV category, also showed a 7.3% month-on-month fall and a 60.3% yr/yr jump to 2,319.

Almost 67% of all vehicles with green licence plates are now battery electric vehicles, up from 44.3% in January 2019. Meanwhile, due to the aforementioned regulatory changes, the share of HEVs and PHEVs has declined from around 28% to 23.3% and 9.3%, respectively.

In the first eight months of the year, 20,066 pure electric vehicles were registered with green licence plates, which marks an almost 44% year-on-year increase. Of these, 18,542 (92.4%) were passenger cars, which corresponds to a 45% yr/yr increase.

Based on pro rata progression, the Energy Ministry said about two months ago that was was a good chance that last year's high would be surpassed in 2025. Such upbeat statements have become scarce though. Officials also do not mention that the total number of green licence plates issued in the first seven months was 2.3% yr/yr and that the January-August balance shows a 3.5% drop to 20,282 from 21,026.

Last year, more pure electric cars than ever before - nearly 22,000 - received green plates in Hungary. This contributed to the fourth largest increase in 2024 in Europe.

The Energy Ministry openly projected for a long time that this trend would continue and

the number of electric-only cars should increase to 120,000 in 2026.

At the end of August, there were almost 84,000 all-electric passenger cars registered in Hungary, so the 120,000 target only seems somewhat realistic if the ministry means the end of 2026. But even that would require a monthly average of 2,251 new BEV (passenger car) registrations in the remaining 16 months. Note that March was the first time more than 2,000 new all-electric passenger cars were registered in Hungary. Should the ministry mean BEVs in general, the target becomes more realistic, with about 1,850 new registrations required per month. The objective is practically unattainable if the target date is January next year, as it would require about 7,390 new battery electric vehicles and 9,000 new passenger car registrations in each of the remaining four months.

The continued rise in EV registrations is also linked to the government's support scheme, which was opened on 5 February 2024 andwas to expire at the end of March, but was extended to 1 December 2025. It allows companies to apply for between 2.8 and 4 million HUF per car, depending on the battery capacity and vehicle category, for the purchase of green cars.

Depending on the number of employees, a company can receive between HUF 2.8 and 64 million in total to upgrade its fleet with climate-friendly vehicles.

The number of cars you can apply for depends on the number of employees:
- up to 9 employees can apply for 1 car,
- 10-49 employees for 5 cars,
- 50-249 employees for 10 cars and
- 250 employees and up for a maximum of 16 cars.

The amount of the grant depends on the net purchase price of the vehicle, the gross battery capacity and whether the application is for a car or a truck. Buying the EV(s) can take up to 20 months to complete from the start date, with a final deadline of 30 April 2026.

According to the latest figures shared by the Energy Ministry three days ago,

HUF 28.2 billion in subsidies (of the HUF 30 bn budget) were awarded.
The 4,467 winners received HUF 19.4 billion.
The winning applicants bought 5,002 BEVs.

The tender manager is expected to suspend the tender if the amount of funds committed exceeds HUF 30 billion.

In terms of payments, Tesla was the second brand after BYD to reached the 1,000 mark. In the popularity ranking of models, only Volvo made it into the top six (EX30 (339)), alongside the products of the two leading manufacturers (Tesla Model Y (622 units) and Model 3 (378), BYD ATTO 3 (416), Seal (287) and Dolphin (222)).

The geographical distribution shows that while at the beginning almost the same share of green licence plates were registered in Budapest (48.9%) than in the rest of the country (51.1%), the ratio has become much healthier by now, with 62.3% registered in the countryside and 37.7% in the capital. This translates to more than 84,400 vehicles in rural Hungary and almost 51,200 in Budapest.

Of BEVs, including passenger cars, trucks, buses, and tractors, there were 90,452 registered in Hungary at the end of August, a 44.8% annual growth and almost 12 times as many as in January 2020 and more than 20 times as many as in January 2019.

The number of HEVs totalled 31.579, practically flat yr/yr, while the number of PHEVs totalled 12,662, also unchanged from a year earlier. Although the figures shown in graph below represent a wider range of vehicles (as the note in the chart says), passenger cars comprised 93% of BEVs in August.

How popular are (were) the different kind of EVs in Hungary?

Green licence plate registrations took off in the first half of 2022 compared to the H1 2021, then the growth petered out in January-July 2023 only to soar again in the first nine months of last year. The same pattern applies to BEVs, while HEVs showed a more modest but steady growth, and the popularity of PHEVs actually subsided.

Unless one of the ministries or the Central Statistical Office (KSH) decide to publish detailed statistics, i.e. a breakdown of EVs, we will be able to learn about the HEV and PHEV registrations only from the monthly ACEA reports, but those DO NOT include imported (second-hand) vehicles, while the Hungarian green licence plate stats do.

The graphs below show the 'popularity' of the three types of electric vehicles, but the light blue and dark blue columns have essentially become obsolete, unless we use them for comparison up to 2024 when the regulatory changes - excluding HEVs and PHEVs from getting green licence plates - entered into effect on 1 September 2024.