China, with its affordable models, dominated global electric car exports in 2024, while driving EV adoption in emerging markets, stated the Global EV Outlook 2025 released on May 14, 2025.
In some markets, such as Indonesia, Thailand and Mexico, the cheapest battery electric car models even retailed at similar prices to the cheapest models with internal combustion engine (ICE). In all of the five emerging markets assessed by the report—Brazil, India, Indonesia, Mexico and Thailand—electric models made by Chinese original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) were, on average, cheaper than the average electric car, helping to drive uptake.
In Thailand in 2024, the average price of a Chinese EV was lower than the average price of a conventional car. In 2023 and 2024, more than four out of every five battery electric cars sold in Thailand were imported from China, bringing the average price of battery EVs nearly in line with that of conventional cars.
In Brazil, where Chinese electric car imports increased to reach 85 per cent of the country’s EV sales in 2024, up from about 60 per cent in 2023, the price gap between battery electric and ICE cars shrank from more than 100 per cent to 25 per cent.
In India, however, high import duties on EVs and the availability of locally made, affordable electric models meant the share of Chinese imports in the country’s EV sales remained below 15 per cent in 2024.
Small wonder, then, that China remained the world’s largest exporter of electric cars, with 40 per cent share of global exports, in 2024. However, tariff changes across several regions are making it more difficult for Chinese-made electric cars to remain competitive in key destination markets, stated the report.
In 2024, multiple regions introduced new tariffs on Chinese electric car imports. This included the EU, which imposed OEM-specific countervailing duties on Chinese battery electric car imports, aimed at offsetting alleged manufacturing subsidies received by OEMs in China. The US and Canada also implemented new tariffs exceeding 100 per cent in 2024, with the US announcing further increases to tariffs on Chinese imports in 2025, effectively deterring future Chinese electric car imports. Mexico and Brazil, both of which have recently experienced a surge in Chinese EV imports, have also approved tariff hikes.
The report further stated that these additional export costs are prompting Chinese OEMs to establish new overseas manufacturing capacities. The assembly plants being planned are intended to both directly supply local markets (like BYD’s plant in Brazil) and produce EVs for exports, thereby limiting exposure to tariff hikes targeting imports from China (such as from BYD’s plant in Türkiye for exports to the EU). Most of the overseas production capacity owned by Chinese OEMs today is in the EU, primarily through Volvo Cars’ assembly plants, which produced more than 160,000 electric cars last year. By 2026, when including both EV-only assembly plants and dual EV/ICE assembly plants, overseas manufacturing capacity belonging to Chinese OEMs is expected to almost double to reach over 4.3 million vehicles per year. Europe and Southeast Asia are likely to remain the primary locations of these new electric car assembly plants, with almost half of the total Chinese overseas manufacturing capacity being located in Europe by 2026.
The report, however, cautioned that the recent surge in trade policies and tariffs may affect the price and resulting sales of EVs in several markets over the coming years. The impact of tariffs might be more pronounced for EV batteries, their components and raw materials, all of which are highly traded across the world because supply is significantly more concentrated than demand. A global shift towards higher tariffs could put upward pressure on battery prices, counteracting some of the significant battery price declines that have occurred since 2015.