The Nepal EV market is quietly crushing it with numbers nobody saw coming.
Norway? China? California? Forget them for a second.
This Himalayan nation, better known for trekking trails than electric cars, just sprinted past some of the world’s biggest players.
And the rest of the world is only just noticing.
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Inside the Nepal EV market that’s breaking records
76 percent of new passenger cars sold in Nepal last year were electric. Half the vans and minibuses went EV too.
The global EV market average is about 20 percent, which makes the Nepal EV market look like it’s running laps around everyone else.
The secret? Rivers.
Nepal runs almost entirely on hydropower, which means electricity is cheap and local.
After a fuel crisis with India back in 2015, the government hacked EV import taxes down to 40 percent, while gas cars stayed at 180 percent.
Boom – overnight, a Hyundai Kona EV was cheaper than the gas version.
Charging isn’t some huge headache either.
The government built 62 public chargers, and businesses and homeowners have added hundreds more. And power is so cheap that charging an EV costs about fifteen times less than filling a gas tank.
China’s riding shotgun on Nepal’s EV boom.
BYD and a wave of Chinese brands now dominate local streets, offering Tesla‑tier EVs for half the cost.
Dealer Yamuna Shrestha has 18 BYD stores and expects to move 4,000 cars this year.
How Nepal’s EV boom fits into the global EV market
What’s happening in the Nepal EV market is part of a bigger global story. EV sales are surging across Europe and Asia, reshaping the auto industry faster than anyone expected.
North America? Not so much – Canada even saw a 23 percent drop in EV sales this year while the rest of the global EV market keeps accelerating.
Meanwhile, China just discovered a 540‑million‑ton lithium deposit in Hunan province. That single find could power the global EV market for decades and ensures countries like Nepal will have access to affordable imports to keep their momentum.
Nepal doesn’t need superhighways or Tesla factories to make its mark.
In just five years, the Nepal EV market went from zero to 76 percent of new car sales.
While other countries debate incentives and charging apps, Nepal just quietly went electric and left the world in its dust.
Some of the images used for this article were generated using AI
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