Petrol-Only Cars Just Lost Their Majority on the Global Car Market, For the First Time Ever

For the first time since mass car ownership began, petrol-only vehicles made up less than half of all new cars sold worldwide. According to data reported by Japanese outlet Nikkei, petrol-only models accounted for 49% of global new-vehicle sales in the first half of 2026, a historic tipping point that’s been building for years.

The numbers behind the milestone

Roughly 20.25 million petrol-only cars were sold globally between January and June 2026, a drop of 10% compared with the same period the year before. That’s enough of a decline that, for the first time on record, petrol-only vehicles no longer make up the majority of new cars sold anywhere in the world combined. As recently as five years ago, the picture looked completely different, with petrol engines holding a commanding lead over every other powertrain type.

Where the shift is coming from

This global milestone reflects trends that have been visible regionally for a while now, just reaching critical mass worldwide. In the European Union, for example, the combined share of petrol and diesel cars fell to just 29.7% of new registrations in the first half of 2026, down sharply from 37.8% a year earlier, while battery-electric cars alone captured 20.7% of the market and hybrids took a further 37.3%.

Even traditionally conservative, hybrid-focused automakers are seeing the shift firsthand. Toyota, still the world’s best-selling carmaker, reported that electrified vehicles, overwhelmingly hybrids, made up 2.71 million of its global sales in the first half of 2026, a record high, while its battery-electric sales more than doubled year-on-year, albeit from a much smaller base.

Why this matters beyond the headline number

Crossing below 50% isn’t just a symbolic milestone, it reflects a genuine shift in buyer behaviour across very different markets simultaneously: rapid EV adoption in China, a steady hybrid shift in North America, and an accelerating move to electrification across Europe, all compounding at once. It also suggests the transition away from petrol-only vehicles is no longer being driven by any single region or policy push, it’s becoming a broad, simultaneous global trend.

What it means for the UAE

The UAE has felt its own version of this shift lately, and for very local reasons. With petrol prices here recently crossing AED 4 per litre for the first time since 2022, UAE buyers have increasingly been looking at hybrid and electric options, a trend covered in our recent EV price guide, where Chinese brands in particular have pushed entry-level EV pricing down to under AED 50,000. Combine falling global petrol-vehicle share with genuinely rising local fuel costs, and the UAE’s own car market looks less like an outlier and more like part of the same global pattern.

What’s less certain is how quickly that shows up in UAE sales data specifically, the region’s love of large, petrol-powered SUVs and trucks, especially for desert driving, means the transition here may move at its own pace. But globally, the direction of travel is now unmistakable.

Source: Autonews.ru, reporting data originally published by Nikkei (Japan), citing Global Mobility figures, 2 October 2026. Additional context: ACEA EU H1 2026 registration data; Toyota Motor Corp. H1 2026 global sales report.