The German Government is preparing to bring back high subsidies for electrical vehicles (EVs).
As reported by the newspaper Bild today, federal environment minister Carsten Schneider of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) will present the programme to the public on January 19.
The subsidy amounts to €1,500 to €6,000 per car and will be available retroactively for anybody who bought a car after January 1, 2026 and meets the eligibility criteria.
The financial boost will be paid to private households – not companies – who invest in a newly made fully electric car. So-called plug-in hybrid vehicles, which combine an internal combustion engine with an electrical motor and battery, will also be subsidised but to a lesser extent.
Altogether, the federal government is setting aside €3 billion for the programme.
“This is enough money for roughly 800,000 cars over the next three to four years”, Schneider told German media, adding that he saw the programme as “a boost for electrical mobility in Germany as well as our domestic automobile industry which produces great electrical cars”.
Germany’s ruling coalition of the CDU and SDP had already agreed on the reintroduction of subsidies for electrical vehicles in their 2025 coalition negotiations, after a previous programme had been unexpectedly cancelled in December of 2023.
Experts are critical of the reintroduction of subsidies.
Libertarian pundit Rainer Zitelmann called the plans “crazy” in a post on X this morning, adding: “[Chancellor] Merz is continuing the line of Merkel and [former Greens party vice chancellor] Habeck”.
“If electrical vehicles are so superior, as we can hear daily, why do we need that subsidy?”
In November last. year, the Association of German Car Dealers (VAD) had already criticised the plans of the coalition as “a veritable flash in the pan” that would lead to supply disruptions and drive down the resale value of EVs.
Currently, around 20 per cent of all new cars sold in Germany are battery-powered electrical vehicles. In December 2025, according to data from the Federal Motor Transport Authority, around 55,000 out of 246,000 sold vehicles were electric.
All in all, as of mid-2025 there were 1.8 million EVs registered in Germany. The former SPD-led government of then-chancellor Olaf Scholz had set out a goal of 15 million electric cars by 2030.
