Nissan on Tuesday introduced that it had surpassed a million international EV gross sales—a milestone that took 12 years to attain.

The automaker was a pioneer of recent electrical automobiles, launching the first-generation Leaf in December 2010. Because the longest-running Nissan EV and the longest-running EV within the North American market, the Leaf accounts for 650,000 of the million EV gross sales Nissan has collected. Whereas it has offered the e-NV200 electrical van, the automaker solely lately started introducing different electrical passenger automobiles within the type of the Ariya crossover SUV and the Japanese-market Sakura.

First 2011 Nissan Leaf delivered to purchaser, San Francisco, Dec 2010, picture by Eugene Lee

Of these million gross sales, simply 210,000 have gone to North America. Essentially the most (320,000) went to Europe. China and Japan account for 230,000 EV gross sales every, whereas the remaining 10,000 went to different areas.

Whereas Nissan deserves credit score for being among the many first automakers to launch a contemporary EV, its progress in rising gross sales has been gradual. Tesla reported about 889,000 deliveries within the first half of 2023 alone. At this charge, it’s doubtless already previous 1,000,000 deliveries for the 12 months right now, in late July. Tesla handed a million annual EV gross sales in 2022, and even outsold Toyota within the vital California market on this previous quarter.

2023 Nissan Ariya e-4orce

Nissan, in distinction, has been gradual so as to add electrical fashions—the Ariya and Sakura solely arrived in 2022—and gross sales of the Leaf have been sluggish. It took Nissan till 2019 to go 400,000 cumulative international Leaf gross sales. It surpassed 500,000 international Leaf gross sales in 2020—10 years after manufacturing began.

Nissan does look like getting extra formidable with its EV plans. It now targets 19 new electrical fashions by 2030, and goals to launch EVs powered by solid-state batteries by 2028. The automaker expects EVs to make up 40% of its U.S. gross sales by 2030, and plans to construct two EVs in Mississippi beginning in 2025—one Nissan-branded automobile and the primary U.S.-market EV for the Infiniti luxurious model.