Car shopping experts say consumers are rushing to buy electric vehicles as the clock winds down to just seven days before the federal EV tax credit expires on Sept. 30.
But some warn that once the incentives are gone, EV sales will all but halt.
As part of the mega-tax bill signed into law in July, the expiration date of the federal clean vehicle tax credit was pushed up to Sept. 30 from its original expiration date of 2032. That means the deadline for snagging a tax credit of up to $7,500 on a qualifying new EV, and up to $4,000 on a used EV, is closing in.
New data from car-shopping website Cars.com released on Sept. 18 showed that nearly half of consumers considering buying an EV are now accelerating their purchases. Cars.com said demand on its site is up 33% for new EVs compared with this time a year ago. And demand for used EVs is up by 22% compared with the year-ago period.
Cars.com said nearly three-fourths of consumers surveyed said the federal credit is a “major or contributing factor” in their decision to purchase an EV. Cars.com said it conducted the survey Aug. 25-26 and said it got 950 respondents.
Cars.com said its research showed that 70% of EV and plug-in hybrid shoppers are aware of the federal tax credit, and just over half, or 53%, know when it ends.
The federal EV tax credit helped make EVs more affordable. While its expiration at the end of the month might slow demand in the near term, it doesn’t mean the end of affordable EVs, said Aaron Bragman, Detroit bureau chief at Cars.com.
“Shoppers are moving quickly to lock in savings, and Cars.com’s Top EV Picks, including the Hyundai Ioniq 6 and Ioniq 5, Kia EV9 and Chevrolet Equinox EV, show there are strong options for every type of buyer,” Bragman said in a statement. “And even after Sept. 30, deals won’t disappear — many state and local incentives remain, and automakers like Nissan, Chevrolet and Hyundai have already announced new lower-priced models. ”
Karl Brauer, executive analyst with iSeeCars.com, said once the federal tax credit ends, EV sales are “going to crater. It’s going to be quite the whipsaw effect. You’ve got the rush to the dealership to take advantage of these incentives now … but what’s going to happen in the next three to six months? There’ll be almost no buyers.”
Brauer said EVs comprise about 8% of the total U.S. new vehicle market share, he expects that to drop to 1% to 3% by year’s end and settle in at 4% of total market share by early next year.
“The consumer is going to think, ‘I don’t get $7,500 off the car and it already is priced more than a gasoline vehicle … and it loses range in cold weather so, why am I buying this car?’ ” Brauer said.
Edmunds.com’s Director of Insights Ivan Drury said his data also showed that as the EV tax credit deadline nears, shoppers are beginning to at least research EVs at a higher rate than all of last year. He said there is still rich inventory for buyers to choose from if they do decide to go electric.
“Availability shouldn’t be too much of an issue, EVs still make up 4.2% or roughly one out of every 25 pieces of inventory on dealer lots,” Drury said, citing that data as of Sept. 21. “This is down from the same time last year at 5.6%, but needless to say, past the 30th, there will certainly be inventory, the only question is what kind of deals will there be?”
Electric vehicle shopping: Best EVs to buy before the federal tax incentive expires on Sept. 30
Many automakers have said the key to accelerating mass adoption of EVs is to offer more EVs for a cheaper price point, especially if the automakers are to compete with the Chinese globally for EV market share. The Chinese automakers are known for making high-quality and affordable EVs.
According to Cox Automotive, the average transaction price of a new EV in August was $57,245, a slight decrease of 0.1% year-over-year. The average transaction price is what car buyers paid after incentives and trade-in amounts were deducted from the manufacturer’s suggested retail price. Cox Automotive said EVs carry an average price premium of $9,000 above the average transaction price of a gasoline-powered vehicle.
Ford Motor Co., which saw sales of its EVs soar in August driven largely by the nation’s car buyers hurrying to get ahead of the expiration of the federal EV tax credit, announced in August the creation of a new electric vehicle production system and a new EV platform that will allow the automaker to more efficiently bring several lower-cost EVs to market in the future. The first of those will be a midsize, four-door electric pickup that seats five, to launch in 2027. That vehicle is expected to be priced at about $30,000.
At Cox Automotive, spokesman Mark Schirmer said, “While we don’t have a shareable measure on September yet, the activity in August was strong and total new EV sales blew past the previous monthly all-time sales record by 7.5%.”
Schirmer said the previous EV sales record was in December 2024 when the industry sold about 135,000 new EVs. In August, the industry sold 146,000.
Schirmer said a majority of franchised automobile dealers, according to Cox Automotive’s quarterly sentiment index, believe that the tax credits offered by the government are having “a positive effect on EV sales at their dealership.” 
But, similar to Brauer’s prediction, dealers expect EV sales to halt after the incentives dry up.
When asked about expectation for EV sales three months from now, the majority of dealers expected sales to be declining, Schirmer said. He said third-quarter 2023 was the last time franchised dealers expected “growing EV sales” in the next three months, “but the third-quarter 2025 score was the lowest we’ve ever seen.”
Last month, Cars.com said new EV inventory grew by 1.4% compared with August 2024, with Chevrolet and Honda scaling back supply due to five EV launches last year as most other brands expanded. They did not provide a figure for how many new EVs remain in inventory.
On the used side, inventory is moving faster this year — spending just 46 days on the lot in August, down from 66 days the same time a year ago, Cars.com said. Tesla, which makes up about one-third of used EV listings, saw average prices fall 16.2% year-over-year, pulling the overall used-EV average down 3.8%. A spokesman for Cars.com said the average transaction price for a used Tesla in August was $28,862. The average transaction price for used cars last month was $35,815, Cars.com data showed.
With 77 new EV models now available, Cars.com’s editors identified the best EVs for 2026 looking at value, use, performance and technology and selected the following models for their range, affordability, family-friendliness and technological innovation as follows:
Jamie L. LaReau is the senior autos writer who covers Ford Motor Co. for the Detroit Free Press. Contact Jamie at jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @jlareauan. To sign up for our autos newsletter. Become a subscriber.

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