Top EV Companies in the USA: Leaders and Failed Startups

By Ankita Neogi

Updated Sep 26, 2026Published Jun 1, 202316 min read

The top EV companies in the USA are Tesla, General Motors, Ford, Rivian and Lucid, with Korea’s Hyundai building EVs in Georgia. According to Cox Automotive, Tesla sold about 589,000 EVs in the U.S. in 2025, nearly half the market, and GM was a distant second with 169,887. Several once-hyped start-ups, including Fisker, Nikola, Canoo and Proterra, have gone bankrupt.

Status check (September 2026): This list was first compiled in June 2023. Since then, Proterra filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on August 7, 2023, Fisker filed for Chapter 11 on June 17, 2024, Canoo filed for Chapter 7 liquidation on January 17, 2025, Nikola filed for Chapter 11 on February 19, 2025, and Hyzon’s stockholders approved its dissolution on March 25, 2025. Li Auto and NIO are Chinese companies, not American ones. Every company entry below has been checked against company filings and news reports and corrected where it was wrong.

There are a lot of electric vehicle (EV) businesses in the US, from start-ups to well-established OEMs. With the development of new and enhanced batteries, motors, and charging infrastructure, American EV companies are setting the pace for innovation and technology. Demand has been uneven, however. According to Cox Automotive, U.S. EV sales slipped to just under 1.3 million in 2025 (7.8% of new-vehicle sales) after the $7,500 federal EV tax credit ended for purchases after September 30, 2025, and EVs made up about 5.8% of new-vehicle sales in the second quarter of 2026.

EV Companies In USA – List of Top Electric Vehicle Companies In USA

Tesla and General Motors were the two largest EV sellers in the U.S. in 2025, according to Cox Automotive, and Rivian and Lucid are the best-known EV-only start-ups still building cars. Lordstown Motors, once often named alongside them, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on June 27, 2023, stopped producing its Endurance pickup and emerged in 2024 as Nu Ride Inc. These businesses are all attempting to create the EVs of the future, and a variety of buyers will likely be interested in their offerings. There will probably be more American businesses competing for a piece of the growing EV market as it continues to develop. The ten companies below were profiled in the original June 2023 version of this article. Only three of them (Tesla, Rivian and Lucid) are American automakers still building EVs today; two (Li Auto and NIO) are Chinese, and five have gone bankrupt or dissolved. The sections after the list cover the companies that actually lead U.S. EV sales now.

Tesla

It goes without saying that Tesla is known for having revolutionized how the world uses electric automobiles. Tesla was incorporated on July 1, 2003, by engineers Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning. Elon Musk led its first funding round and joined as chairman in February 2004, becoming CEO in October 2008. Tesla is now headquartered at Gigafactory Texas in Austin. Tesla remains the U.S. market leader. According to Cox Automotive, Tesla sold about 589,000 EVs in the U.S. in 2025, nearly half of all EVs sold, and Tesla reported 1,636,129 vehicle deliveries worldwide for 2025.

The Tesla Cybertruck reached its first customers on November 30, 2023, at a delivery event at Gigafactory Texas, after several years of delays. As of September 2026, Tesla sells the Model 3, Model Y, Cybertruck and Semi; Tesla said in January 2026 that it would end Model S and Model X production in the second quarter of 2026. The second-generation Tesla Roadster, shown as a prototype in 2017 and originally promised for 2020, has still not entered production. As of late September 2026, Tesla had scheduled a reveal of the production Roadster for October 1, 2026, with production targeted for 2027 or later.

Rivian

American electric vehicle manufacturer Rivian was founded by RJ Scaringe in June 2009 (originally as Mainstream Motors; renamed Rivian in 2011) and is headquartered in Irvine, California. The R1T pickup truck, the company’s first product, was unveiled at the Los Angeles Auto Show in November 2018 and entered production in September 2021 at Rivian’s plant in Normal, Illinois, with customer deliveries starting that fall. Rivian also builds the R1S SUV (deliveries began in December 2021) and the EDV electric delivery van developed for Amazon. The R2 is not a commercial van: it is a smaller midsize SUV, and its first public customer deliveries began on June 9, 2026. Amazon, Ford and T. Rowe Price were among Rivian’s early investors. Rivian raised about $11 billion before its initial public offering on November 10, 2021, and in 2024 Volkswagen Group committed up to $5 billion to a joint venture with Rivian. Rivian had no revenue in 2020, because it did not start selling vehicles until 2021. For full-year 2025, Rivian reported revenue of $5.387 billion and 42,247 vehicle deliveries. Rivian reported 15,232 employees as of December 31, 2025, including its joint venture, according to its annual report.

Rivian markets its vehicles around outdoor and adventure travel. They hope to encourage people to travel in novel ways and to contribute to the preservation of the environment for upcoming generations.

Li Auto

Li Auto is a Chinese automaker, founded in 2015 by Li Xiang and headquartered in Beijing, whose stated mission is “Create a Mobile Home, Create Happiness.” Li Auto does not sell cars in the United States, so it is not an American EV company, although its shares trade on the Nasdaq (ticker LI) and in Hong Kong. Due to technology’s role as the main driver behind EV development, technology is at the core of the company.

Li Auto launched its flagship Li L9 SUV on June 21, 2022, and said on June 24, 2022, that it had received more than 30,000 orders within 72 hours. The Li L9 is an extended-range electric vehicle (EREV) that carries a gasoline engine used as a generator, so it is not a pure battery EV. Li Auto is listed on the Nasdaq, but not every company on this list is: Tesla, Rivian and Lucid trade on the Nasdaq, NIO trades on the New York Stock Exchange, and the companies that later went bankrupt no longer trade on a major exchange. The claim that Li Auto’s share price jumped on the L9 news could not be verified.

Lucid Motors

American electric vehicle manufacturer Lucid Motors was founded in 2007 as Atieva, a battery and powertrain developer, by Bernard Tse, Sam Weng and Sheaupyng Lin. The Lucid Air, a luxury electric sedan shown as a prototype in December 2016, entered production in September 2021, with customer deliveries starting in late October 2021. The Lucid Gravity SUV followed, with production starting in December 2024. Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund became Lucid’s majority shareholder in 2019 after a $1 billion investment; earlier Atieva investors included China’s Tsing Capital, LeEco and BAIC. Lucid became a public company on July 26, 2021, through a merger with the special-purpose acquisition company Churchill Capital Corp IV. The earlier claim of $0.160 billion in 2020 revenue is not supported: Lucid was not yet selling cars in 2020 and reported $27.1 million of revenue in 2021, its first year of deliveries. For 2025, Lucid reported revenue of $1.354 billion and 15,841 deliveries. Lucid had about 6,800 employees at the end of 2024.

Lucid Motors aims at the luxury end of the EV market. They seek to alter people’s perceptions of transportation and offer customers a distinctive ownership experience.

NIO

NIO, the brand founded by William Li, reached a market value of roughly $89 billion in early 2021, which briefly put it among the highest market capitalization values in the sector. NIO is a Chinese EV maker founded in November 2014 and headquartered in Shanghai. Its shares trade on the New York Stock Exchange, but NIO does not sell cars in the United States, so it is not an American EV company.

NIO vehicles are designed for battery swapping: at a NIO Power Swap Station, a depleted pack is exchanged for a charged one in under five minutes, and NIO had 3,989 swap stations worldwide, mostly in China, as of July 2026. NIO sells sedans and SUVs, and its limited-run EP9 electric supercar set several electric-vehicle lap records, including at the Nurburgring Nordschleife.

Fisker

Car designer Henrik Fisker and Geeta Gupta-Fisker founded Fisker Inc., a California-based electric vehicle company, in October 2016. The Fisker EMotion luxury sedan was unveiled at CES in January 2018 but never went into production; Fisker shelved it to focus on the Ocean SUV. Contract manufacturer Magna Steyr built the Ocean in Graz, Austria, from November 2022 until production stopped in March 2024, after about 11,000 had been made. Cathay Pacific Airways was not a Fisker investor, and Foxconn was a manufacturing partner for the planned Fisker PEAR rather than a major funder. Fisker raised most of its money by going public in 2020 through a merger with a special-purpose acquisition company backed by Apollo Global Management, and it held about $991 million in cash at the end of 2020. Fisker had no revenue in 2020, because it had not yet started selling cars. Fisker reported 101 full-time employees at the end of 2020.

Fisker’s stated aim was to lead the premium EV market with design-led cars. That plan ended when Fisker Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Delaware on June 17, 2024; in the bankruptcy, 3,231 unsold Oceans were sold to American Lease & Management LLC.

Proterra

Dale Hill, an entrepreneur who had earlier founded the bus company TransTeq, founded the American electric bus maker Proterra in Golden, Colorado, in 2004. Proterra’s first bus was the EcoRide BE35, shown as a prototype at the 2008 APTA Expo, and the first production buses went to Foothill Transit in California in 2010. The better-known Proterra Catalyst bus followed in 2014. Before going public in 2021 through a merger with ArcLight Clean Transition Corp., Proterra raised roughly $520 million in venture funding from investors including GM Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, BMW i Ventures, Tao Capital Partners and Daimler. Volvo Group was not an investor; it bought Proterra’s battery business in the 2023 bankruptcy sale. Proterra reported revenue of about $197 million for 2020 and $309.4 million for 2022. The earlier figure of about 700 employees at the end of 2020 could not be verified.

Proterra aimed to lead the U.S. electric transit bus market. They want to shift consumers’ perspectives on transportation while giving customers a distinctive ownership experience. Those plans ended when Proterra filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on August 7, 2023. In the November 2023 sale, Volvo Group bought the Proterra Powered battery business for $210 million, Phoenix Motorcars bought the transit bus business, and Cowen Equity bought the charging business.

Nikola

Trevor Milton founded Nikola Corporation, an American developer of battery-electric and hydrogen fuel-cell heavy trucks (not cars), in Salt Lake City in 2014. The Nikola One, a hydrogen fuel-cell Class 8 semi-truck unveiled in 2016, never went into production. Nikola’s production truck was the Nikola Tre, first delivered to customers in April 2022. Nikola’s 2019 Series D round, which targeted $1 billion, was led by CNH Industrial (then the parent of Iveco) with $250 million, followed by Bosch and Hanwha with about $230 million combined. General Electric and Stifel Nicolaus were not among the reported investors. Nikola had no truck revenue in 2020; its small reported revenue came from legacy solar installation projects, including about $36,000 for installing solar equipment for Trevor Milton in the first half of 2020. Trevor Milton was convicted of fraud in October 2022 over statements about Nikola’s technology, was sentenced in December 2023 to four years in prison, and was pardoned by President Donald Trump on March 27, 2025.

Nikola aimed to lead zero-emission trucking, but it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on February 19, 2025. Lucid acquired Nikola’s manufacturing facilities, and Hyroad Energy bought 113 of its hydrogen fuel-cell trucks.

Canoo

Canoo was founded in 2017 as Evelozcity by two former senior executives, Stefan Krause (formerly of BMW and Deutsche Bank) and Ulrich Kranz (formerly of BMW). It was based in Torrance, California, before shifting operations to Justin, Texas. No vehicle called the Canoo Lidar existed. Canoo’s first vehicle was the Canoo Lifestyle Vehicle, an electric van unveiled in September 2019; the company later showed a Multi-Purpose Delivery Vehicle and a pickup prototype but never reached high-volume production. Canoo’s early funding came mainly from Chinese investor Li Pak-tam and German entrepreneur David Stern. Hyundai Motor Group was a development partner rather than a major investor: in February 2020 it announced it would jointly develop an EV platform with Canoo. Canoo went public in December 2020 through a merger with Hennessy Capital Acquisition Corp. IV. Canoo reported revenue of $2.55 million for 2020, from engineering services, and had 805 employees at the end of 2021.

Canoo did not reach its goals: it filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Delaware on January 17, 2025, and ceased operations.

Hyzon Motors

There is no record of Hyzon Motors being founded by a former Honda executive named Hisashi Tsugami. Hyzon Motors Inc. was established in March 2020 as a spin-off of Singapore-based Horizon Fuel Cell Technologies, whose co-founders Craig Knight and George Gu became Hyzon’s CEO and chairman, and it was based near Rochester, New York. Hyzon did not sell a model called the Hyzon Horizon Fuel Cell Semi-Truck. It fitted hydrogen fuel-cell systems to other makers’ truck chassis, delivered its first HyMax 450 truck in the Netherlands in July 2021, and announced the start of production of a Class 8 200 kW fuel-cell truck in September 2024. Toyota Tsusho and Sumitomo Corporation were not among Hyzon’s reported backers. Hyzon went public in 2021 through a merger with Decarbonization Plus Acquisition Corporation, a deal expected to raise about $626 million. Hyzon was only founded in March 2020, so the earlier 2020 revenue and headcount figures could not be verified. Its CEO Craig Knight was removed in August 2022 after a short seller alleged that Hyzon had fabricated fuel-cell truck orders in China.

Hyzon aimed to lead hydrogen fuel-cell trucking, but its board approved a plan of dissolution on December 20, 2024, and on March 25, 2025, stockholders approved the company’s dissolution and the transfer of its assets to creditors.

Which Are the Top EV Companies in the USA Today?

The leading EV companies in the U.S. market are Tesla, General Motors, Ford, Hyundai Motor Group, Rivian and Lucid. Tesla, GM and Ford are the largest American-headquartered sellers by volume, while Rivian and Lucid are the only EV-only American start-ups from the 2021 wave of public listings that still build cars in volume. The table below uses the most recent full-year figures available as of September 2026.

General Motors

General Motors is the second-largest EV seller in the U.S. GM sold 169,887 EVs in 2025, up 48% from 2024, and Cox Automotive credited GM with about 13% of U.S. EV sales that year. The Chevrolet Equinox EV was GM’s best seller, with about 57,945 sold in 2025, and Chevrolet ranked as the No. 2 EV brand in the second quarter of 2026.

Ford

Ford sold 84,113 EVs in the U.S. in 2025, down 14% from 2024. The Mustang Mach-E sold 51,620 units, the F-150 Lightning 27,307 and the E-Transit van 5,186. Ford has ended production of the all-electric F-150 Lightning and has said it plans an extended-range electric (EREV) F-150 in its place.

Hyundai Motor Group

Hyundai Motor Group is a South Korean company, but it builds EVs in the U.S. at Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America in Ellabell, Georgia, a $7.59 billion plant that began producing the Ioniq 5 in October 2024 and also builds the three-row Ioniq 9. The Hyundai Ioniq 5 sold a record 47,039 units in the U.S. in 2025.

Newcomers to watch

Slate Auto, an EV start-up backed by Jeff Bezos, announced a starting price of $24,950 for its two-seat Slate Truck in June 2026. Slate says production at its factory in Warsaw, Indiana, is planned to start in late 2026, with a company-estimated range of about 205 miles from a 65 kWh battery. Until deliveries begin, Slate’s specifications and dates remain company targets.

Popular EVs From U.S. Companies: Prices and Range

The table below lists starting prices and range for widely sold or newly launched EVs from companies selling in the U.S., as of September 2026. Prices are the manufacturer’s announced starting prices before destination fees and change often, so check current prices with the maker or a dealer.

For the running costs of owning an EV, see our guide to home EV charger installation costs and the broader car owner’s guide to buying, maintaining and insuring a car.

Which American EV Companies Have Failed?

At least six U.S. EV start-ups that were publicly listed around 2020 and 2021 have failed: Lordstown Motors, Proterra, Fisker, Canoo, Nikola and Hyzon. Most went public through mergers with special-purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) on the strength of projected, not actual, sales.

How Big Is the U.S. EV Market?

Americans bought just under 1.3 million EVs in 2025, 7.8% of all new vehicles, according to Cox Automotive. That was the second-best year on record, slightly below 2024. EV share peaked at 10.5% in the third quarter of 2025 as buyers rushed to use the $7,500 federal clean vehicle credit, which the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed on July 4, 2025, ended for vehicles acquired after September 30, 2025. EV share then fell to 5.8% in the fourth quarter.

In the second quarter of 2026, Kelley Blue Book estimated 247,226 EV sales in the U.S., up 14.7% from the first quarter but down 20.5% from a year earlier, at about 5.8% of new-vehicle sales. Cox Automotive noted that hybrid sales were growing faster than EV sales in 2026.

How to Judge an EV Company Before You Buy

The failures on this list share warning signs that are worth checking before buying a vehicle from a young EV maker.

• Production versus prototypes: check whether the company is delivering vehicles to customers or only showing concepts. The Fisker EMotion and Nikola One were shown publicly but never built for sale.
• Real revenue: public companies file annual reports (Form 10-K) with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Several companies on this list had little or no revenue when they went public.
• Cash runway: start-ups that lose billions a year depend on new funding; if it stops, service, parts and software updates can stop too.
• Service network: find out where the nearest service center is and who handles warranty repairs if the maker runs into trouble.

This is general information, not financial advice. Readers new to company shares can start with our overview of how the Nasdaq stock exchange works, where Tesla, Rivian, Lucid and Li Auto are listed.

Written byAnkita Neogi

Ankita Neogi is a passionate writer with a flair for turning ideas into captivating content. Whether it’s technology, business, health, or lifestyle, she knows how to make every topic engaging and easy to understand. With a natural storytelling ability and a keen eye for detail, Ankita’s writing not only informs but also keeps readers hooked till the last word. A true tea lover, she believes that a good cup of tea sparks creativity and fuels her best work. When she’s not writing, you’ll find her sipping her favorite brew, exploring new ideas, or getting lost in a great book.

More from Ankita Neogi →

Justwebworld has published guides since 2012. How we write and update articles · Report an error

Powered by