Quantifying Electric Vehicle Mileage in the United States

We deliver comprehensive, high-resolution estimates of annual vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in the United States for battery electric vehicles (BEVs), plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), and conventional gasoline vehicles (CVs) using odometer readings from 12.5 million used cars and 11.4 million used sport utility vehicles (SUVs) listed between 2016 and 2022. Although CVs, HEVs, and PHEVs are driven similarly, BEV cars average 4,477 fewer miles annually. Teslas are driven more than other BEVs, yet still less than CVs. Similar differences in VMT across powertrains exist for SUVs, though SUVs are driven more than cars in all powertrains. Driving range has a non-linear relationship with VMT for BEV cars: every 10 additional miles of range equates to 631 additional annual miles for low-range BEVs (<100 miles of range) but only 85 annual miles for high-range BEVs (>200 miles of range). BEV cars also show less sensitivity in annual VMT to operating cost changes compared with CVs. Results provide an important context for modelers anticipating increased electricity consumption from PEV adoption.