The 2022 edition of ACEA’s ‘Vehicles in use’ report provides an extensive overview of the motor vehicle fleet on the road in the European Union – covering passenger cars, light commercial vehicles, medium and heavy commercial vehicles, and buses.

Per country, the Vehicles in use report shows the number of motor vehicles in use for each vehicle type and how the fleet has evolved in the last decade.

It also provides valuable insights per vehicle segment for each European country, such as the average age (as well as the year of first registration), the share of each fuel type, and the number of vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants.

This 2022 edition covers the 27 member states of the European Union, plus the EFTA countries (Iceland, Norway and Switzerland), as well as Russia, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

Fleet size

• In 2020, the EU passenger car fleet grew by 1.2% compared to 2019, with 246.3 million cars on the road in total. The highest growth was seen in Romania (+5.4%) and Slovakia (+5.1%), while the French car fleet shrank slightly (-0.3%) – see page 4.
• Nearly 29 million vans are in circulation throughout the European Union, half of which can be found in three countries: France (5.9 million vans), Italy (4.3 million) and Spain (3.9 million) – see page 5.
• There are more than 6.2 million medium and heavy commercial vehicles on EU roads, up 1.7% compared to 2019. With around 1.2 million trucks, Poland has the largest fleet by far – see page 6.
• 684,285 buses are in operation across the European Union, almost half of which can be found in three countries alone: Poland (124,526), Italy (99,883) and France (93,506) – see page 7.

Average age

• EU cars are now on average 11.8 years old. Lithuania and Romania have the oldest car fleets, with vehicles almost 17 years old. The newest passenger cars can be found in Luxembourg (6.7 years) – see page 10.
• The average age of light commercial vehicles in the EU is 11.9 years. Of the EU’s four major markets, Italy has the oldest van fleet (13.8 years), followed closely by Spain (13.3 years) – see page 11.
• Trucks are on average 13.9 years old in the European Union. With an average age of 21.4 years, Greece has the oldest truck fleet, while the newest ones can be found in Luxembourg (6.7 years) and Austria (7 years) – see page 12.
• Buses on EU roads are on average 12.8 years old. Aged more than 19 years, Greek buses are the oldest in the region. Only six countries in the European Union have a bus fleet that is less than 10 years old – see page 13.

Fuel type

• Despite the strong increase in sales seen in recent years, alternatively-powered passenger cars still make up only 5.3% of the total EU car fleet. Battery electric cars and plug-in hybrids account for just 0.5% and 0.6% of the fleet, while 1.2% of all cars on EU roads are hybrid electric – see page 14.
• Diesel-powered light commercial vehicles are still dominant in all EU countries except for Greece: 91.2% of the EU van fleet runs on diesel and just 0.4% of vans in the EU are battery electric – see page 15.
• 96.3% of all trucks in the European Union run on diesel, while petrol fuels less than 1% of the fleet. 0.24% of trucks on EU roads have a zero-emission powertrain, up from 0.04% in 2019 – see page 16.
• Diesel buses account for 93.5% of the EU fleet, with only 0.9% being battery electric and 1.4% hybrid electric. However, significant shares of electric buses can be found in the Netherlands (12.4%) and Luxembourg (6.6%) – see page 17.

Motorisation rates

• The European Union counts 560 passenger cars and 81 commercial vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants – see page 18.
• Luxembourg has the highest car density in the EU (696 per 1,000 people), followed by Italy (666). By contrast, the lowest density for both cars (353) and commercial vehicles (40) can be found in Latvia – see page 18.
• In Latvia nearly 43% of all households do not own a car, while almost 32% of French families have two passenger cars – see page 20.

The Report can be downloaded here: ACEA-report-vehicles-in-use-europe-2022