Chinese brands took 10.7% of new-car sales across 18 Western European markets in Q2 2026, up from 5.7%, and Tesla went from 1.7% to 2.6% - 13.3% combined, about 0.44 million cars. Schmidt credits Tesla's gain to prices falling towards EUR 30,000.

Xiaomi says the SU7 has passed 500,000 cumulative deliveries in 28.5 months, the fastest for any Chinese EV above CNY 200,000. But Xiaomi has delivered 216,322 cars in 2026 so far, 39% of its 550,000 target, and would need close to 67,000 a month to close the gap against a record month of 50,212.

A Tesla Model 3 at a Zunder site rated up to 400 kW in Villalpando, Spain sustained barely 50 kW on a hot day, peaking at 230 kW for seconds. Charger cabinets and cables derate to protect themselves when they run out of thermal headroom, Superchargers included, and Hungary's grid-side power caps are a separate squeeze on top.

BYD's Denza N8 claims 1,003 km CLTC and 10-70% in five minutes from a 130.15 kWh Blade Battery 2.0 pack. The range record comes from pack size, not efficiency — the China-market Model Y uses 9.5 kWh/100 km on the same cycle against the N8's 13.0 — and the five-minute figure implies a 940 kW average that no European network can deliver.

Tesla announced on Weibo that its Shanghai plant has produced its six millionth battery pack, 279 days after the five millionth on 12 November 2025. That is about 3,580 packs a day, or 1.3 million a year, from the factory that exports Model 3 to Europe.

Auto Trader data puts used electric cars at 25 days to sell against 30 for the market as a whole, with three-to-five-year-old EVs the fastest-moving stock of any fuel type at 20 days. Prices are rising too: that cohort is up 10.2% year on year, and Tesla accounts for three of August's ten fastest sellers.

From 1 September a French taxi driver ordering an electric car can claim roughly €3,500, rising to about €5,500 where the car and its battery are both built in Europe. Orders must be placed by 31 December. For Tesla the money matters less than the gate: the scheme reuses France's environmental score, which the Berlin-built Model Y clears and the Shanghai-built Model 3 does not — and VTC drivers, who account for most of the Teslas working French streets, are excluded outright.

An arrêté published in France's Journal officiel on 12 August creates a purchase grant for used electric cars, running from 1 September 2026 to 31 August 2030. Most private buyers get about €337 — not the €2,000-plus figure that travelled with the announcement, which applies only to home-care professionals. The car must be fully electric, first registered in France between 2017 and 2023, bought from a professional, kept for three years, and carry a battery certificate showing at least 80% of original capacity.

SMMT figures put UK used battery-electric transactions at 110,761 in the second quarter of 2026, up 67 per cent year on year and a record 5.5 per cent of the used market. It was the fuel type's strongest quarterly growth since early 2024, and it arrived as petrol and diesel demand softened against rising fuel prices.

Tesla has listed a remanufactured Long Range pack for the Model 3 and Model Y in its public parts catalogue at $8,000, against roughly $14,500 for a new one. It is a real price and a genuinely good one — but it is a part price, not a bill, and Tesla has not published the warranty or rebuild spec behind it.

CATL says an aviation battery system built from 350 Wh/kg prismatic cells contained a deliberate thermal runaway in two adjacent cells without the failure spreading — a harder test than the single-cell trigger packs normally face.

XPeng plans to sell over a million vehicles outside China by 2030, with overseas business generating more than 70% of profits. Germany goes from about 70 dealers to 110 by year-end, Europe is at 290 outlets across 28 countries, and the 2026 goal is to double overseas sales past 90,000 units — while XPeng sells its VLA 2.0 driving software to Volkswagen.

The UK government and industry are each putting £65 million into electric and autonomous vehicle production through the Drive35 programme, naming Nissan and Bentley among recipients and £17 million for nine connected-autonomy projects. It safeguards 1,800+ jobs in a sector that built 764,715 vehicles in 2025, a 73-year low, and fell another 7.5% in the first half of 2026.

A Model 3 owner has become the first person to pass 25,000 miles of FSD (Supervised) without touching the wheel or the brake, and his car threw on-screen confetti to mark it. It is a striking number — and it is one driver's route mix, not a fleet safety statistic.

Firmware 2026.21.6 is a two-branch build: Hardware 3 cars get FSD (Supervised) v14.1 Lite, the first version bump the cut-down branch has had, and Hardware 4 cars get v14.3.7. Tesla says it distilled the HW4 v14 stack into HW3 so the older computer inherits reinforcement-learning work it could never have trained itself. North America only.

The Dutch-led collective claim for European Tesla owners left behind on Hardware 3 has grown to nearly 8,000 verified participants across 39 countries, representing €15.5 million in FSD purchases.

Firmware 2026.20.7.5 carries FSD (Supervised) v14 Lite to South Korea, the first market outside North America to get the HW3 build. The catch is the eligibility rule: US-built Model 3 and Model Y only, which excludes almost every Tesla on Korean roads.

Renault has quietly raised the R5's WLTP range to 431 km on the Autonomía Confort version and 321 km on the entry car, with no change to motors or batteries. The gain is credited to a new energy-management system.

XPeng launched the L03 compact SUV coupé at a Munich event, opening orders in more than 60 markets at once. German prices start at €35,600, with up to 520km WLTP and 236kW charging on a 400-volt architecture.

Volkswagen has opened orders for the ID. Polo with a 37kWh LFP battery, dropping the entry price to €24,995. It is rated at 334km WLTP and charges at up to 90kW.

A European Commission study puts 64 million vehicles at risk of losing eCall as operators retire 2G and 3G. Cars built from roughly 2010 to the early 2020s carry modems that cannot fall back to 4G, and for many of them there is no retrofit worth paying for.

The Boring Company has put Liner Truck 3 into service: a concrete-hauling tunnel vehicle built around Tesla Model 3 battery packs and drive units, carrying more than 22,000 lb of tunnel segments while being flown remotely from a control centre in Texas.

A memorandum signed on 30 July 2026 commits South Korea to making every new police vehicle purchase battery-electric or hydrogen by 2035. Only 12.4% of the country's 17,600-strong police fleet is zero-emission today, and the agency buys about 1,900 vehicles a year.

Infrastructure investor Meridiam has led a €23 million round in French depot-charging specialist Chargepoly, whose modular architecture shares one power connection across many charge points. The money funds international expansion for truck and bus fleet charging.

Battery-electric cars took 35% of the French market in July 2026 — 44,378 registrations, up 126.7% year on year — while petrol and diesel together managed 13.2%. Renault took three of the top nine places outright and the Tesla Model Y fell to 12th.