The Slovak Association for Electromobility informs that as of 31 December 2023 there were 10 273 passenger and small commercial battery electric vehicles registered in the Slovak Republic. During the last year, 4,293 of them were added (87% more than in 2022) and the fleet of M1 and N1 category EVs has thus expanded by 70%. SEVA stresses that these statistics also include vehicles from brands that are not officially represented in Slovakia, as well as individual imports of used vehicles from abroad. Among the brands, Škoda continues to be the market leader, maintaining a share of more than 16% among new EVs sold through official importers.
“Discussions about whether or not the state will eventually support the purchase of electric vehicles, or at least not introduce the recommended tax and other incentives, do not do the market much good,” explains SEVA director Patrik Križanský. “Of course, everyone is waiting to see when the subsidy programme, which, by the way, is also included in the approved Action Plan for the Development of Electromobility, will finally get off the ground.” In this situation, according to SEVA’s analyses, it would help if the government were to launch the promised support as soon as possible and put the measures approved in the Action Plan into practice as quickly as possible. “These are exactly the steps our neighbours have taken to get the EV market moving. Moreover, we have the advantage of being able to use money from the Recovery and Resilience Plan to do this,” explains Križanský.
“It could be said that in this situation, electric cars are almost exclusively bought by companies for which reducing the emission footprint is important or by technology fans,” says Jaroslav Hercog, representative of the importer ŠKODA AUTO Slovensko, who is also a member of the SEVA Executive Committee and says: “This will not change as long as the topic of electromobility and alternative drives remains on the fringes of society as a whole. Accelerating the development of infrastructure, the conceptual introduction of tax breaks and the launch of medium-term subsidy programmes would certainly help to increase the share of electric vehicles in Slovakia. The results of such measures can be seen by looking at the statistics in neighbouring countries such as Hungary, Poland and, soon, the Czech Republic, where they have already been introduced.”
Despite these challenges, the Škoda Enyaq and Škoda Enyaq Coupé models will maintain their position as the leader among new registered electric vehicles sold in Slovakia in 2023 through importers involved in the Association of the Automotive Industry (ZAP SR), with 382 vehicles sold (16.3% share). The offer of models of the parent concern Volkswagen attracted 342 buyers (14.6%) and the third place is occupied by the Mercedes-Benz brand with 257 sold electric vehicles (11% share). If we take into account the number of registrations in the Central Vehicle Register, where both individual imports and driven battery EVs are included, there is the order Tesla, Volkswagen and Skoda.
The available data further shows that the “intermediate step” between electromobility and combustion drive, i.e. plug-in hybrid drive technology, is still chosen by a relatively large number of Slovak drivers. During the last year, 2 622 PHEVs were added to our roads. Even more are those that use hybrid drive without the possibility of charging the battery from the grid, 23 998 of them.