Hyundai Elexio Elite in Dragon Red. Source: Hyundai Australia
South Korea car giant Hyundai says it has experienced a massive surge in interest in electric vehicles, which now account for 20 per cent of its order volume, up from 3 per cent before the fuel supply crisis emerged after the breakout of the latest Middle East war.
The company says it has seen a more than four-fold increase in EV orders in March – up to 1,037 from 228 in February – with the Kona EV and the newly released Elexio leading the way.
“EVs now account for 20% of our volume – previously we were at less than 3%,” said Hyundai Motor Company Australia director of sales, David Rodda. “We are planning for a 70% increase in EV orders for the second quarter over Q1.”
Rodda says Hyundai Australia has secured a 158% supply increase of EVs for quarter two to meet this unprecedented level of demand, and these vehicles will start to arrive from May. It is confident the increased supply can continue for the rest of the year.
Hyundai says it has a supply of 1,226 Kona EVs for the second quarter, up from 305 in the March quarter, and also has 1,180 of the new Elexio EVs, up from 750 in the first quarter. Wait times are several months.
It is also increasing its supply of the small Inster (to 255 from 84), and the Ioniq 5 (to 150 from 96). It says the order level in March and April is triple the level of January and February for the Kona, Inster and Ioniq 5, and more than 10-fold for the Elexio.
Hyundai also provided this week by week data of its order numbers, showing the surge in interest in the 3rd and 4th week of March.
Hyundai says it expects to boost order with the release of the Ioniq 3 hatch early next year and the Staria commercial van later this year. It is also seeing a strong interest in hybrid orders, which rose to 3,966 in March from 3,049 in February, and accounted for a record 57 per cent of total orders in March.
See The Driven’s detailed EV sales data here: Australian electric vehicle sales by month in 2026; by model and by brand
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Giles Parkinson is founder and editor of The Driven, and also edits and founded the Renew Economy and One Step Off The Grid web sites. He has been a journalist for nearly 40 years, is a former business and deputy editor of the Australian Financial Review, and owns a Tesla Model 3.
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Great numbers!
That's impressive considering how expensive Hyundai EVs are
They seem to have lost momentum with sales in the first half of April. Hopefully that was just a result of stock running out.
sister company Kia sold more than double Hyundai EVs so far in 2026. their order numbers would also be super interesting.
Finally Hyundai recognise they need to be proactive in selling EVs. Sad about Hybrids though.
If a prospect walks into a Hyundai dealer and they're not too sure about EV, they'll be offered a good deal on a hybrid and assured it doesn't use much fuel and is 'good for the environment'.
Yes.Sad.
Two things.
First, well played Donald Trump in engineering a fossil fuel crisis and putting a rocket under EV sales.
Second, thank god for NVES, because without it, do you think the carmakers would be able to pressure HQ to send more deliveries to Australia? Nope - the available production would be sent to countries with fuel efficiency standards and we’d be told to go away.
Exactly, even with the additional numbers of EVs and Hybrids brought in by NVES, they were sold out.
If it wasn't for the NVES there would have been even less EVs available to buy.
As a long-time owner of EVs, I am really pleased to see the rest of the community finally starting to catch on about how great EVs are.
But, I wish you wouldn’t give Hyundai any airtime. Unfortunately for me my first EV was a 2022 Hyundai Ioniq 5, and it had the ICCU failure twice dying on the side of the road on winter nights with no warning. To make matters worse, Hyundai took 2 months each time to replace the failed part, were slow to provide loan cars and were entirely unsympathetic. They also just replaced the failed part with the same dodgy part that will probably fail again. The recalls and software updates don’t stop this from happening. These issues have been happening for 5 years now, and Hyundai still haven’t figured out how to fix it.
Hyundai have refunded quite a number of Ioniq 5s in Australia already, including mine after 7 months of chasing them to honour the ACL. The Ioniq 5 is not the only Hyundai EV affected, the Ioniq 9 and Inster also have known ICCU issues. It is entirely unconscionable for Hyundai to continue to sell these vehicles and they certainly shouldn’t be receiving airtime helping them sell them.