Why Americans aren’t buying more EVs

Because if you live in an apartment your only option for charging is to go to a charging location. You can't just plug it in overnight.

Which I can see as a big hurdle for a lot of people.

This was my biggest issue. I live in a townhouse with a carport-ish thingy, but the same issue applies.
- Even Level 1 charging is pretty notable, means the vast majority of your daily miles still come from charging at home. This should be achievable if you have an outside plug and an outdoor extension cable.
  
  Though, I suspect from your statement even that isn't possible due to ownership issues.
I charged my EV overnight from an overhead garage door power socket in my apartment for years before I moved out. Never even needed public charging. Many people just don’t realize you can charge from a normal household outlet
- I've never had an apartment with a garage. At minimum I'd have needed a 100 ft extension cord. Probably longer, which means it'd have to be thicker. Which means more expensive.
- Near all apartments around me have exclusively open-air parking, so this isn't a viable solution for many. It's not that the available power is inadequate, it's non-existent.
I've had an EV for four years now and I've relied exclusively on public charging. I won't say it's never been without any annoyances but overall it was pretty unproblematic. It can absolutely be done if you want it. Recently they installed chargers at my workplace so now I'm fine and dandy.
I live in a suburb with a lot of one- and two-car garages, but mine is one of the few houses without cars parked in the driveway or on the street. My neighbors on one side converted their garage into a living space during COVID, and the ones on the other use it for storage of things other than cars.

So even with garages you need space in that garage to store your car, which is yet another hurdle.
- There’s no reason to need a garage. Mine is full of kids crap so I never park there, and just had the charger installed on the exterior p of my garage where it’s convenient to my car in the driveway. They’re all weatherproof and it’s not like someone is going to spend hours in your driveway charging their car to steal a couple bucks of electricity. Or, at least for Tesla, every car has a unique identifier, so you can configure a white list of allowed vehicles while blocking every phone else.
I live in an apartment and just charge it once a week for 30 min while I do my grocery shopping. Ezpz. I've been doing this for 3 years and have never had a problem.
My son's apartment had chargers.
Well, in some European countries you could load your car while at work or grocery shopping.

Depending in your commute this could just be enough.

Anyhow: the prices and (country-specific) loading network might be show stopper. Many other things are just habit and/or subjective convenience.
What percentage of people live in apartments?

Surely those people should be taking public transport anyway not buying a car when they live downtown.
- An enormous percentage, especially in the current housing market, however...
  
  Many (most?) American cities have wildly inadequate public transit and are prone to sprawl. Many Americans live in apartments, but are a multiple mile walk from their grocery store. If there's any public transit at all it's probably an infrequent and unreliable bus line that may not go anywhere near their home to begin with. They live in apartments, but are not anywhere near 'downtown'.
  
  These are problems that need to be solved, and quickly, but public transit is best grown with a city, which didn't happen. Inserting a subway after the fact is difficult, expensive, and slow.
  
  The reality of right-now (which is all a renter is likely to be able to consider financially) is that a reliable car is an essential item in most parts of the country.
- You realize not all apartments are located in big cities? Plenty of people live in small towns with no or shitty public transportation.
- The better question here is what percentage of likely EV buyers live in apartments. People that would be a potential customer if it weren't for living in an apartment.

Of course there aren't many people buying EVs when the only ones available in the US are high end luxury models.

Import a bunch of those cheap Chinese EVs and lots of people will buy them. It won't hurt the US manufacturers because they don't produce any budget models.

It will hurt US manufacturers, because their budget gasoline cars won't sell.
- And they'll spend more money fighting the inevitable pivot to EVs than they would if they just pivoted now.
There's the Nissan Leaf, Chevy Bolt/Spark, Mini Cooper EV, Hyundai Kona/Ioniq 6, Fiat 500e and more. These qualify for subsidies if purchased new plus all the gas savings make them decently affordable or you can always buy them used as most people do.

Most people are going for the midrange models like the Model Y, Model 3, Ioniq 5, etc though since it's not really ideal to buy the 'worst' version of something when making a large purchase. People want more range, space, and features. Even with ICE cars, the subcompacts sell/sold pretty poorly.
- These qualify for subsidies if purchased new
  
  They also qualify if purchased used. I'm looking at Bolts priced at $13-17k after the used EV credit. That's pretty decent, I just need to go test drive a couple and make it happen.
  
  But that only works because I'm replacing a commuter. It would be a non-starter for a family car because the maximum range is our minimum distance between stops at gas stations on road trips. We recently drove >800 miles each way on a road trip to visit family. On gas, that took us 12-13 hours. With an EV, I don't think we could make it in a day, even if recharges took 20-30 min (and that's a pretty big if, because the fast charging network isn't great).
Import a bunch of those cheap Chinese EVs and lots of people will buy them

Or start building affordable EVs here.

Back in the 70s when Toyota, Datsun, Honda etc started eating the big 3's lunch on affordable fuel efficient vehicles, they responded with smaller cars of their own.

If they're not willing to respond to market demand and competition, do they even deserve to stay in business?

Isn't that what the "free market" they claim to love enforces?

Too expensive. Not owner repairable. Too much unnecessary tech baked in.

There’s a path forward for EV’s, but I don’t think the current philosophy is it.

Dacia spring has no unnecessary tech 😍 and is cheap

But, it is small 😂🤷🏻‍♀️ big enough for my family, at least.
- Coming to the US never
- Just hope you're never involved in an accident, Dacias (both EV and ICE) have abysmal safety ratings.

Can anyone name me one that is a normal fucking car? With a little dial that tells you how fast you're going that isn't an LCD display that can't be read in direct sunlight connected to an internet connected computer that will never get OS updates? With a gear shift lever that moves forward and back or up and down to select park, reverse and drive, not a nipple in the glove box to lick for "Forward," a knob on the ceiling labeled "H" and to put it in reverse you honk the word REVERSE on the horn? Where the doors have handles that you pull on to open that look like door handles, and locks that have cylinders that accept keys?

Volkswagen E-golf seems to fit your description.
- Been Driving one for almost 6 years and I gotta tell you the car is awesome. Sadly the battery-capacity is a bit dated. Depends on the use-case tho. Another negative point is the limited charging speed. In comparison to „modern“ EVs it‘s rather slow
- Seems they're discontinued?
The 2023 Chevy Bolt I drove for a week had normal controls.
The only ones I've found close to this is bz4x or soltera. Which is why I got it. But no drive shaft really sucks and confuses the heck out of me when I have to drive my outback around.

It definitely has nothing to do with the outrageous starting price range.

Yup, American manufacturers are still treating EVs as if they're this exotic new toy for upper-middle class people or silicon valley douche bros, rather than getting onboard with the concept of them just being a utilitarian thing that needs to be marketed to normal people.

Give me the EV equivalent of the Geo Metro and I'll buy it in a heart beat. I'm not taking out a second mortgage for a car that tries to drive itself and whatever dumb gimmicks they come up with, but I will 100% buy an affordable, practical EV designed with efficiency and economy in mind.
- 2026 Bolt could change that. Hopefully the ultium system is fixed up by then. Also base model Volvo EX30s are going to come from Belgium to maintain their mid 30's price point.
  
  What we really need is the government to make a grant or low interest loan available to anyone with a parking lot and an electrical hookup to put in fast chargers. Everything from libraries to gas stations.
- It is not a defense of the manufacturers, but EVs are still damn expensive to make. And they are completely at fault for that too, because everyone except Tesla dragged their feet about making the EV transition.
- I'm with you. I ended up just buying a used gas vehicle because the others are just too expensive.

Would be nice if they made 'dumb' EVs. Like the kind where even the windows are manual old school roll up. I don't need to walk into a spaceship to drive to get groceries. But all they're selling are luxury spaceships. For all the good Tesla did to rebrand the market, I feel it also did a lot of harm by creating an incentive for luxury vehicles.

Feel like this is what Fisker should’ve tried. The Ocean had the right hardware but it seemed like they spent too much effort on their infotainment instead of getting the basics right. Then target the sub-$30k market with a car that drives well with decent range and fewer gimmicks that just works.
- That's what the PEAR would've been

No one's mentioned the privacy nightmare that new vehicles are. Why anyone would pay $45k for a vehicle that spies on you for the sole benefit of car manufacturers and insurance companies is beyond me. Do away with all the unnecessary privacy violations, or pay ME a monthly subscription for MY data.

Yep, this is the reason I won't get an EV or any modern car. Probably gonna be driving 2016 cars or older the rest of my life.
- I am uncomfortable with this as a permanent solution because new cars of today are old cars of tomorrow. Apparently at least in some vehicles, the telematics module is possible to remove with loss of some functionality - seen some videos and posts on that. I think we need an iFixit-like database comparing vehicles on that front - how easy is the unit to remove and what functions it affects. To be fair, the ones I've seen were on newer gas vehicles, so idk if EVs usually have that integrated tighter.
This is not specific to EVs, but is most cars from the last decade or two
A used car that has physical gauges and knobs that's $5000 + $1500 in preventive maintenance can actually make a decent vehicle. Plus doing the maintenance yourself can teach you a lot about working on cars.

Money. That’s the answer

Buy an EV? In this economy?
- Buy an EV ything? In this economy?

My non EV is still perfectly serviceable and I don't like all the superfluous electronic touchscreen bullshit they're putting in modern vehicles so I'm going to keep driving it until the wheels fall off.

Yup, I'm looking at used EVs to replace my commuter (50mpg, so no hurry), and they come with a bunch of smart crap, so I'm looking at ways to block any potential phoning home before I buy the car.

It's dumb. Just give me an EV with 150-200 miles range with no smart crap for $20k and I'll buy it.
- Yes. Preferably an option in the form of a small single cab pickup truck with a full size bed.
- I don’t know what telematics the Leaf had, but you’re describing what Nissan tried to do with that
Same. With my driving needs I get fuel about every 2 weeks so it's not a big burden. And I go on several long road trips each year and charging stations are not something I need to deal with.

I mean, just they're too expensive. You can buy a normal gas car for around 147 Monero while an EV will set you back 238 Monero.

My car cost 10k€, the equivalent EV is 20k€. Why don’t I buy more EVs? That’s a mystery, let’s call McKinsey to understand why.

Also let’s double the price of more affordable foreign cars to increase the amount of mystery. Sometimes I wonder if governments do this to make fun of us because it’s so stupid.
- Those "more affordable foreign cars" are only priced that low because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so much, which is only temporary and lasts just as long as it takes to put their competitors out of business.
  
  This is a race to the bottom just like states giving trillion dollar corporations billions in tax breaks as an incentive to move to their state. At the end of the day, it just harms everyone and should be avoided, which is why the US and EU are putting tariffs on Chinese EVs. They're still free to sell them at the real cost and actually compete with everyone else.
Yup.

However, there's a nice niche of used EVs. I can get a 2-5yo Bolt for $13-17k (76-100 XMR) after the $4k credit, which should still have 200+ miles range. I'm seriously considering it, but only for my commuter.

If you only have one car, range and charging network are serious considerations as well if you like to do road trips. My coworker with a brand new Model 3 has avoided certain trips within our state just because of charging network. It's a serious issue...
- 76 to 100 is not a bad price range, actually. Not at all.
- I would avoid used Bolts, especially because of all the issues those have had with going up in flames.
  
  Hopefully they've fixed those issues in the newest models...
  
  https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/14/gm-warns-some-bolt-ev-owners-dont-park-them-inside-or-charge-them-unattended-overnight.html
There's also the issue of very little (if any) used EVs on the market, and in an affordable range. Most people are looking for a reliable used car for around $1000-$2000 US, and the cheapest EV I have seen is around $7500. And there's always the question of what condition the batteries are in -- if you had to replace all the batteries in a used EV then you easily doubled the cost of it. Fortunately it seems like Tesla is the only manufacturer asinine enough to seal their batteries, other manufactures allow replacement of individual cells which will really help in the used market.
- $1000-$2000 cars are the $500 beaters from 10+ years ago. I wouldn't say most people are looking in this price range and they're usually on their last leg and the cheapest option for a car. There are cellphones that cost more than this now.
- If I were expecting to buy a car for $1-2k, I’d expect it to be on its last legs, even for ICE. Unless you’re comfortable fixing it yourself, any significant repair is already not worth it

I've never even driven an EV, they're comically far out of my price range.

All of them are expensive, and almost all of them are ugly as fuck. And the ones that I would consider even decent looking enough to drive are even more expensive than the others.
Would you buy one if they were more affordable? Personal experience I agree they are quite a lot of money to get behind the wheel of.

While we have plenty of gas stations to fill up with home charging can be another hurdle that's costly or impossible depending on the living situation.
- I sure would. I'm not one of those people who scoffs at modern cars.
  
  Environmental reasons aside, they tend to have lots of bells and whistles that cars like my 20 year old Toyota doesn't have. Parking sensors, better climate control, a multimedia system, etc.
  
  I like my car but I'd swap it for an EV without a second thought if it was possible!

Price, range, infrastructure, in roughly that order of importance when averaged over the population. The article then goes into factors affecting price. (Of course, the article originated with the Financial Times and was only reprinted by Ars, so it makes sense that they would put money first.)

For me, the last time I was in the market for a replacement vehicle, the 2 biggest factors were availability and price.

The dealers had zero stock (except maybe a rare fully optioned ridiculously priced example of the top of the line model), and I was not in a position to wait 2+ months for a factory order of a car that I couldn't even test drive.
Exactly.

I'm willing to get a commuter EV, but almost everything either has too little range (e.g. older Leafs) or too much range that drives up the cost. I'm not willing to spend $30k+ on something that can really only be a commuter.

EVs don't have the range to replace our family car since we do road trips, and anything with enough storage is already way more than a reasonable hybrid. Add to that high electricity rates at charging stations, and I'm just not interested.

So, make an affordable EV ($20k, ideally less) with 150-200 miles range, and I'll buy it. I'm looking at used Bolts, which seem to be ~$15k after the credit for used. There really should be something new in this category though...
- That’s what I’ve been saying for the last several years: give me a good commuter EV to replace my more commuter ICE. I still think two car households in single family homes are the ideal market, but i divorced my second car and spent a little more in the EV that can get me places. So far so good with road trips up to 3 hours, but we’ll see this summer with bigger road trips

I want a super cheap EV for 15k-20k to drive around the city, but I'm not ready to give up my gas jeep.

The cheapest EV I can seem to find is about 45k CAD new, looks stupid, and comes with a ton of features I don't want that will just break and need repair...

I feel like Jeep owners will be the last to go EV: the car is so unique in appearance, customizable, and functionality. And it’s not like Jeep owners are looking for efficiency.

Some of Cybertruck’s announced capabilities might have bit into that market, if they’re able to deliver them eventually

The answer to questions like these is always money.

Money for infrastructure and money to buy the thing.

Where I live, there's one charging station. And it's like 8 miles or so from my house. I've yet to see more. It's also a fairly rural area. I think we forget how much population lives outside cities.

You don’t have electricity in your house??
- IDK about houses, but this would be the case for people in apartment buildings. What should you do? Not even joke about "lowering a cord from your window" because it's not guaranteed that your street parking is near your windows!
- Of course he does. But a standard house power connection does not deliver the amount of power you need to charge a car.
  
  So you need to build a charging pole at your house if you want to charge ar home. Which is another investment.
  
  And if you are in a somewhat remote area and there are not many charging poles around you, you are also very limited in how far and how fast you can travel.
  
  So there really is no point investing in a charging pole and an EV car if the car is not capable of doing to the same things that a gas car can do.
  
  EDIT: thanks for the responses. I'm still not convinced that electric is a good option for me, but some issues seem to be fixed or not as bad as I thought.
  
  Still, within my price range it will take a while before I can pay one.
My entire city currently has 30 charging ports in total, half of which are either in private locations, malls, paid parking, or singular charging station spots in obscure places.

I’m not opposed to EVs at all, but the infrastructure is just not there. Not to mention the abysmal price of these

I've been saying since EVs hit the market that I couldn't wait for them to be cheap enough used for me to justify purchasing one. That hasn't happened yet. Most I've ever spent on a car was $7k.

For sure, we can’t expect a good used EV market until we establish a strong new EV market.

Because the most environmentally friendly car, is the one you already own.

Producing ev is heavy strain on the climate. This change won't happen overnight.

Ev needs to be better and cheaper if it wants to defeat the ice market.

We have to switch at some point. We can't just keep making ICE cars and saying the next generation will be electric.
It already is better and cheaper, but we have regressive tariffs on the country producing them.

Were waiting for the next wave of $25k EV since there is no hope that the tariffs on the only country with enough scale to build affordable EV is on a 100% tariff.

I'll tell you why I won't buy one.

I'm not going to go into debt as much as a house would've cost me 20 years ago so I can drive a 10,000 pound explosive that I spend several hours a day charging, be asked to pull over to turn on Bluetooth, have a tracking device in my car, which the government can turn off if they like, have to fumble with a touch screen to turn up the air conditioner, have to pay rent for features built into the car and then have any features I purchased be non transferrable on the secondary market. These are all fuck you's to me, so I say fuck you to them. Take your vendor lock in SAAS product and shove it up your ass. You want me to give a shit about emissions, fix all that, until then I'm driving a 20 year old beater.

You're literally describing every new car now, whether EV or ICE.
- Yup, and I won't buy a new gas car either.
- Meh, some/much of this is in every new car.
  
  But EV's take it to a new level with shit you just can't disable.
  
  I have a car with some of this shit. Just had to disconnect the cell antenna and attach a dummy to block it. Try that with an EV and it'll probably have a heart attack.
If you’re looking for a 10,000 pound vehicle, and are not one of a very small percentage that needs it, you have other problems. Yes, EVs are too heavy, but think like 20% heavier that on comparable, it’s not that bad. It’s only excessively huge inefficient trucks that are that heavy. My mid-sized SUV EV is a 4,000 pound explosive, thank you very much.

One of the benefits, if you’re able to install a home charger, is to never really have to think about refueling. Think of it like charging a phone and just get into the habit of charging over night. I need to recharge a couple hours per week, but I never have to go anywhere. When I get home, if the car is below 50%, I plug in. Then It’s always just ready to go without me ever waiting or going anywhere. So much more convenient than gas stations. Granted road trips aren’t as convenient but they’re also not as bad as people fear

Because they're an unsustainable con for saving the auto/oil cartels instead of the planet/humanity?

Instead of going into poverty buying a luxury vehicle, people should be given safe and sustainable infrastructure for LEVs, bikes, pedestrians, and of course public transit.

Cant charge it myself, doesn't last long enough, dies when it's too cold

Not to mention, 5 years in after you've invested in the power improvements to your house to allow charging, if your battery fails I guess fuck you? $20k to keep rolling lol. Think that's part of why the used market is showing huge depreciation for EVs. No one wants to spend 20k for a used vehicle with a ticking time bomb 20k repair guaranteed some time in the future.
- 5 years in
  
  Batteries last far longer than that, to the point where every warranty I've seen is 10 years minimum

If my - or any other - complex had charging stations, I'd consider it. The most I'd ever be able to get is a hybrid, if I wasn't so dirt-ass poor that an old and busted used car was the best that I could afford, because I'm disabled and live in friggin America.

I think most people in the market for an EV know that all the manufacturers are changing the charging port to the Tesla NACS standard next year. Range anxiety is still the biggest issue for EV adoption and the supercharger network is the only practical option right now. Tesla hasn’t innovated in a while and current Tesla owners are put off by Musk’s antics. I’d personally wait a year to see what the options are.

Range anxiety is still the biggest issue for EV adoption

Only because people keep making false claims like:

the supercharger network is the only practical option right now
- True enough to get the industry in North America to move off vanilla ccs.

I would love to own one, but the investment is too great right now. All I want is something repairable that will drive, have cool air, and play music over Bluetooth.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Washington has set out an industrial policy that hits Chinese manufacturers of cars, batteries and other components with punitive tariffs and restricts federal tax incentives for consumers buying their products.

The administration is attempting to reconcile its industrial and climate policies by offering tax incentives to consumers to buy EVs and by encouraging manufacturers to develop US-dominated supply chains.

According to data analyzed by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington think-tank, US-based carmakers have been importing a growing share of their batteries from China.

Ilaria Mazzocco, chair in Chinese business and economics at CSIS, says the reduced competition and rising cost of imported battery components could delay price decreases for US consumers.

Bozzella says that even with the tariff protection measures and US subsidies in place, he was unsure how long it would take for the US auto industry to produce EVs that could compete with heavily subsidized Chinese vehicles on pricing.

Van Jackson, previously an official in the Obama administration and now a senior lecturer in international relations at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand, says electric cars still need to fall in price if the market is to grow substantially.

The original article contains 2,252 words, the summary contains 197 words. Saved 91%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

At least for me the reasons are

Lack of interest
They're ridiculously Ugly
Range (I’ve driven 1500 miles in the last 3 weeks)
Driving Experience is worse (opinion, but still something I stand by)
Charging
Price

When I was looking at new cars an EV wasn’t even an option. I wanted a 2 door performance coupe and there isn’t anything even close to that in EVs, let alone on the used market. A 2014 Audi was a better choice in almost every metric beyond gas prices.

I would like to note that if you wanted to drive as far as possible, my car could probably go more than 5000mi in three weeks, though I typically only drive a few hundred a week.

And contrary to a gas car I never have to stop to fuel, I just get home and it charges over night.

Also, what's wrong with the "driving experience"? It's not loud enough or something?
- I regularly do 400+ mile trips in a day or two ( I’m a photographer ) and need to be able to quickly have range available in non major metro areas.
  
  Since I live in an apartment overnight charging isn’t an option. So I’d still have to go places to charge, which takes significantly longer than stopping for gas.
  
  Driving experince is subjective, but instant power with no real hp/torque curves makes driving really boring. There’s no response from the car, it’s just an On/Off toggle. There’s no real fun to driving it.
  
  Yes the sound is a major part. I’ve got a very nice, valved exhaust system on my new car that adds a ton to how much fun the car is. Hearing the engine, how it responds and how the power is applied is a major part of the fun of driving.
  
  If all you want is a car to get from point A to point B, an EV is completely fine, but as someone who genuinely enjoys cars and driving, EVs are boring and will 100% get you laughed out of most car shows.
Why is charging bad? Id argue it's a plus. You never have to go to a gas station and every morning you wake up with a full charge for your day.
- I don’t have a place to charge at home, nor a way to run a cord from my apartment to a car, so charging becomes a 20-30 minute ordeal instead of a 3 minute tank of gas on my way to work.

Americans probably don't want to buy those Chinese EVs that poorly made and dangerous

https://youtu.be/8HpkDUWAKFM