By Gary S. Vasilash

This won’t garner any headlines:

78.81% of vehicle purchases in the U.S. in 2023 were for vehicles with gasoline engines, according to Experian’s “State of the Automotive Finance Market, Q4 2023.”

The number that will is:

8.55% of the vehicles purchased were electric vehicles.

But of that “purchase,” 30.7% of the EVs were leased, which is essentially renting with the option to buy, not outright obtaining (i.e., according to the Oxford English Dictionary, the verb purchase means “To acquire in exchange for payment in money or any equivalent; to buy.” And the way the Inflation Reduction Act is constructed, for many OEMs leases are the only way that consumers can get a $7,500 purchase incentive).

A number that also won’t get large type:

9.83% were hybrids.

That number alone is about 13% greater than the EV number.

But arguably the 2.02% of vehicles purchased in 2023 that were plug-in hybrids could be added to the hybrid number, which would go to 11.85%.

Odds are that hybrid number is going to continue to grow, as will the EV number, but even though it will continue to be higher than the EV number for the next several years, you can bet every rise in EV sales will continue to get outsized attention—until the novelty passes.