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Germany’s €3bn electric vehicle support scheme will be open to all manufacturers including Chinese carmakers, as the government looks to spur fresh momentum in the market.
The new support programme, which will apply retroactively to the start of this year and extend until 2029, would strengthen German and European industry but would have no geographic restrictions, said environment minister Carsten Schneider.
“I can’t see this widely supposed major influx of Chinese car manufacturers into Germany, neither in the numbers nor on the roads, and that’s why we’re facing up to the competition and not imposing any restrictions,” he said.
The funds available would support the purchase or lease of about 800,000 new cars. The subsidies will target lower and middle earners and the sums available vary between €1,500 and €6,000, depending on the size of the household and the total taxable income.
The scheme will also be open to plug-in hybrids that are under an emissions threshold and to range-extender models, where the car’s battery can be charged by a fuel-burning generator.
A new EV subsidy programme has been a key demand from manufacturers since the German government abruptly ended the previous scheme at the end of 2023.
The sudden withdrawal of the scheme led to battery car sales in Germany falling by 27 per cent in 2024, although sales have recovered since. In 2025, about 545,000 new battery vehicles were registered in Germany, higher than the figure for 2023.
The German government’s decision contrasts with the approach taken by other European authorities. In the UK, a similar EV purchase programme included rules that practically shut out Chinese manufacturers.
Chinese carmakers have been making ground in Germany, despite anti-subsidy tariffs levied on imports by the EU, but their market share remains relatively small compared with domestic manufacturers.
BYD, for example, sold about 23,000 cars in Germany in 2025, eight times as many as in the previous year but still less than 1 per cent of the total market.
The German carmakers’ lobby group VDA welcomed the announcement of the new support programme but said it would be a “flash in the pan” if the government did not work to improve infrastructure.
A dense charging network and affordable energy remained “crucial for the sustainable growth of electromobility”, VDA president Hildegard Müller said in a statement.
