The following is a timeline of electric vehicles, including cars, bicycles, aircraft and watercraft.

19th century

1875 World's first electric tram line operated in Sestroretsk near Saint Petersburg, Russia, invented and tested by Fyodor Pirotsky.

1880s

Immisch & Co, established by Moritz Immisch, establishes an electric boat department - probably the world's first fleet of electric launches for hire, with a chain of electrical charging stations established along the River Thames.

1881 World's first commercially successful electric tram, the Gross-Lichterfelde tramway in Lichterfelde near Berlin in Germany built by Werner von Siemens who contacted Pirotsky. It initially drew current from the rails, with overhead wire being installed in 1883.

1882 The trolleybus dates back to 29 April 1882, when Dr. Ernst Werner Siemens demonstrated his "Elektromote" in a Berlin suburb. This experiment continued until 13 June 1882. Anthony Reckenzaun designs the first significant electric launch driven by storage batteries, and names the boat Electricity.Illustrated with wood engravings in the Electrical Review, Vol.XI, No.255, 14 October 1882, pp.296 and 297

1883 Mödling and Hinterbrühl Tram, Vienna, Austria, first electric tram powered by overhead wire.

1884 Thomas Parker built an electric car in Wolverhampton using his own specially designed high-capacity rechargeable batteries.

1888 8 September: Peral, the first successful submarine to be entirely powered by electric batteries and the first fully military-capable submarine, is launched.

20th century

1970s

1973 23 October: first crewed free flight by an electrically powered aeroplane, the MB-E1 (9 minutes)

1974 AstroFlight Sunrise makes maiden flight, first aircraft to fly on solar power.

1979 The Mauro Solar Riser becomes the first crewed aircraft to fly on solar power.

1990s

1996 December: Launch of the limited production General Motors EV1

1997 Toyota RAV4 EV becomes first plug-in electric production SUV. Leases are mostly restricted to governments and businesses in California. Toyota Prius becomes the first mass-produced hybrid vehicle.

1998 Launch of Nissan Altra EV, becoming the first highway legal electric car to use lithium-ion batteriesThe Nissan Altra EV - Nissan Launching Electrick Minivan

21st century

2000s

2003 first certificate of airworthiness for an electric powered aircraft was granted to the Lange Antares 20E.06.09.2011: SWR.de The Research Aircraft Antares DLR H2 and Antares H3

2008

Tesla Roadster becomes the first highway legal, serial production, all-electric car to use lithium-ion battery cells, and the first production all-electric car with a range of more than per charge. 2008: The Tesla Roadster becomes the first production electric vehicle to use lithium-ion battery cells as well as the first production electric vehicle to have a range of over 200 miles on a single charge.

2009 July: Launch of the Mitsubishi i-MiEV, the first modern highway legal series production electric car

2010s

2010 8 July: Solar Impulse 1 achieves the world's first crewed 26-hour solar-powered flight, as well as the longest and highest ever flown by a crewed solar-powered aircraft. December: Nissan Leaf and Chevrolet Volt deliveries began

2011 The Nissan Leaf passed the Mitsubishi i MiEV as the world's all-time best selling all-electric car Taurus Electro G2 becomes the first two-seat electric aircraft to have achieved series production.

2012 June: Solar Impulse 1 achieves first intercontinental flight by a solar aircraft, flying from Madrid, Spain to Rabat, Morocco. Launch of the Tesla Model S

2014 March: 1% of all cars in use in Norway are plug-ins first production-model all-electric school bus was delivered to the Kings Canyon Unified School District in California's San Joaquin Valley

2015 3 July: Solar Impulse 2 lands in Hawaii on 3 July, setting new records for the world's longest solar-powered flight both by time (117 hours, 52 minutes) and distance (7,212 km; 4,481 mi). The flight's duration was also a record for longest solo flight, by time, for any aircraft.Archangel, Amber.The Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) website states that the "Free distance along course" was 7,039.9 km. FAI Record ID #17595 , Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. Retrieved 29 July 2015The FAI does not record this record as official, since the FAI does not have an "any aircraft" category. See "FAI records page", Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, 29 July 2015 September: Cumulative global plug-in sales passed 1 million units.

2016 June 20-23: Solar Impulse 2 makes the first non-stop solar-powered transatlantic flight July: Solar Impulse 2 lands in Abu Dhabi, completing circumnavigation of the world November: Global all-electric car/van sales passed 1 million. December: Cumulative global plug-in sales passed 2 million units An estimated 2,032,000 highway-legal plug-in passenger cars and vans have been sold worldwide at the end of 2016. The top selling markets are China (645,708 new energy cars, including imports), Europe (638,000 EVs), and the United States (570,187 plug-in cars). The top European country markets are Norway (135,276), the Netherlands (113,636), France (108,065), and the UK (91,000). Total Chinese sales of domestically produced new energy vehicles, including buses and truck, totaled 951,447 vehicles. China was the top selling EV market in 2016, and also has the world's largest stock of plug-in cars. 5% of passenger cars on Norwegian roads are plug-ins

2017 Early: 1 millionth domestic new energy car sold in China Sales of new energy vehicles totaled 689,447 units between 2011 and August 2016. Cumulative sales of new energy passenger cars totaled 493,290 units between 2010 and August 2016. Chinese sales of domestically-built new energy vehicles in 2017 totaled 777,000 July: Launch of the Tesla Model 3 November: Cumulative global plug-in sales passed 3 million units "The number of fully electric and plug-in hybrid cars on the world’s roads passed the 3 million mark in November 2017." December: Annual global sales passed the 1 million unit mark "Global sales totaled 1,224,103 plug-in cars in 2017, with a market share of over 1%." 5% of all cars in use in Norway are all-electric. Annual global market share passed 1% for the first time

2018 First half: 1 millionth plug-in electric car sold in Europe September: 1 millionth plug-in electric car sold in the U.S. 2 millionth new energy vehicle sold in China (includes heavy-duty commercial vehicles) October: 10% of passenger cars on Norwegian roads are plug-ins November: 500,000th plug-in car sold in California December: Annual global sales passed the 2 million unit mark "Global sales totaled 2,018,247 plug-in passenger cars in 2018, with a BEV:PHEV ratio of 69:31, and a market share of 2.1%. The world's top selling plug-in car was the Tesla Model 3, and Tesla was the top selling manufacturer of plug-in passenger cars in 2018, followed by BYD." Tesla Model 3 becomes first plug-in to exceed 100,000 sales in a single year

2019 December: One out of two new passenger cars registered in Norway in 2019 was a plug-in electric car The Norwegian market share for the plug-in car segment was 55.9% in 2019

2020s

2020 Early: The Tesla Model 3 surpassed the Nissan Leaf as the world's best selling plug-in electric car in history March: The Tesla Model 3 is the first electric car to sell more than 500,000 units since inception. Tesla, Inc. becomes the first auto manufacturer to produce 1 million electric cars April: 10% of all cars on the road in Norway are all-electric June: the Velis Electro variant of the two-seat Pipistrel Virus was the first electric aircraft to secure type certification, from the EASA December: Nissan Leaf global sales reached 500,000 units. Cumulative global plug-in car sales passed the 10 million unit milestone Plug-in sales totaled 3.24 million in 2020, up from 2.26 million in 2019. Europe, with nearly 1.4 million units surpassed China as the largest EV market for the first time since 2015. The Norwegian plug-in car segment achieved a record annual market share of 74.7% of new car sales. Over 15% of all cars on Norwegian roads are plug-in electric. See graph under "Personbilbestanden i Norge fordelt på drivstoff" - , there were 12.06% all-electric cars and 5.11% are plug-in hybrid cars in use on Norwegian roads. Combined, plug-in electric passenger cars represented 17.17% of all cars in circulation in the country, up from 13.45% in 2019.

2021 September: Rivian R1T becomes the first plug-in electric production pickup truck.

2022 May: Cumulative global plug-in car sales passed the 20 million unit milestone

2023 January: EV cars surpass 10% in global market share May: Tesla Model Y becomes the world's best selling vehicle

2025 June: Kyle Clark, the founder and CEO of the Burlington, Vermont-based company BETA Technologies, piloted the Alia CX300 to the John F. Kennedy International Airport tarmack, concluding a 45-minute, 72-nautical mile-flight that took off from East Hampton, accomplishing the first-ever passenger flight of an electric-powered plane in North America.

References