Autobayng News Team
One of the big selling points of EVs is lower ownership costs compared to their gas counterparts. Sure, they typically sell for 14% to 18% more than the average gas car. And, yeah, when parts break, they’re generally 30% more expensive to repair (depending on who you ask). Oh, then there’s the sky-high depreciation cost to factor in.
A new study shows that EV owners are also getting hosed on insurance costs, too.
Welcome back to Critical Materials, your daily roundup for all things electric and tech in the automotive space. Also on deck: the gasoline-only era of the Nissan GT-R is dead and we learn just how much electricity China’s EV charging network uses. Let’s jump in.
30%: EVs Cost 49% More To Insure Than Gas Cars
Photo by: IIHS
A new study from Insurify published this month shows that EV drivers, on average, pay 49% higher premiums than those who drive internal-combustion cars.
The data revealed that the average annual premium for EVs nationwide is $3,442, or around $286 per month. Gas cars? Try $193. That’s $1,122 extra per year, or enough for a Tesla Model 3 owner to cover their annual driving while charging exclusively at Superchargers.
If you’re wondering why a car with fewer moving parts somehow costs more to cover, it comes down to a trifecta of insurance paranoia: Repair costs, repair time and the price of a total loss.
Insurify explains:
Insurers base prices on risk, and insuring a car that’s more expensive to repair or replace adds to the company’s financial risk.
EVs cost 22% more to repair than gas-powered cars, according to Mitchell’s May EV Collision Insights report. The average price of a new EV was $57,734 in June, while the average for gas-powered vehicles was $48,799, according to KBB. In the event of a total loss, insurers could pay an average of 18% more to replace an EV.
EVs require more mechanical labor hours as well: 3.04 hours vs. 1.66 for gas-powered cars, Mitchell reported last year. Because many EVs require original manufacturer parts, mechanics can’t pull from a vast inventory of aftermarket and recycled parts, which often lowers repair costs for gas-powered cars, according to KBB.
Many newer cars, not just EVs, have technology that makes them more expensive to insure and repair. Advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) often include multiple sensors and cameras and are vulnerable to even minor collision damage.
In short? EVs are packed with pricey battery packs and expensive electronics. A fender bender that might cost you $2,500 to fix in a Toyota Corolla could quickly balloon to well over $20,000 if your EV battery pack happens to be compromised.
Then there’s labor. Not every shop is certified (or willing) to work on EVs. According to Insurify’s reporting, this has led to a shortage of trained techs who can adequately wrench on EVs safely. Not to mention the net of expensive EV-specific tools and diagnostic systems needed to service these software-centric cars.
Unsurprisingly, Tesla’s EVs take top place on the most expensive EVs to insure. The Model X is the winner (or loser?) as the most expensive EV to insure at an average of $4,765 per year. And in some states, the data shows insurance premiums for EVs cost 75% or more than the equivalent gas-powered counterpart.
Insurance Costs by EV Model vs. Their Gas Counterparts
Photo by: Insurify.com
The potentially good news is that the industry pinky-promises that this trend is temporary. It’s all reliant on adoption, according to the experts. As more people buy EVs, you get better economies of scale when it comes to battery costs, parts, and skilled labor. Eventually—hopefully—insurance prices will normalize, but it might take a while to get there.
So, yes, EVs are cleaner and quieter and quicker. But until some areas of the auto industry catch up, they’re definitely not cheaper—at least not in the parts or insurance department.
60%: The Gasoline-Only Era Of The Nissan GT-R Is Officially Dead
Photo by: Nissan
The GT-R has always been Nissan’s halo car. Its gas-guzzling, turbo-whistling sports coupe was more of a show of strength against other marques than a practical vehicle. But after nearly eighteen years (and four CEOs), the car has lost the spark that drove enthusiasts with deep pockets to the platform. It’s time for a transformation.
Nissan has now officially killed off the R35 GT-R. The very last model, a Midnight Purple Premium Edition T-Spec, rolled off the line with Nissan’s new CEO Ivan Espinosa (who Nissan wants you to know is a “real car guy“) at the helm. And with it marks the end of the gasoline-only era of the GT-R.
“To the many fans of the GT-R worldwide, I want to tell you this isn’t a goodbye to the GT-R forever, it’s our goal for the GT-R nameplate to one day make a return,” said Espinosa in a statement on the R35’s retirement. He continued:
“We understand the expectations are high, the GT-R badge is not something that can be applied to just any vehicle; it is reserved for something truly special and the R35 set the bar high. So, all I can ask is for your patience.”
While Nissan doesn’t have a precise plan, we do know a little bit of what to expect thanks to some loose lips at the 2025 New York Auto Show. Back in April, Nissan’s North American Chief Planning Officer, Ponz Pandikuthira, told The Drive that the next-gen GT-R was getting a powerplant with a battery. However, it wouldn’t be fully electrified.
Here’s what Pandikuthira told The Drive:
Pandikuthira said Nissan built some electric prototypes for the next-gen GT-R, but “basically it’s like it would complete one lap at the Nürburgring, and then you have to recharge the car. And then that charging is going to take you a while, and it’s just not authentic.”
“You just built a thing to check that box that you have a GT-R, but it’s not really a GT-R,” Pandikuthira said. “No, electric, I don’t think you’ll deliver with the technology that we have now, or even with solid state, the kind of performance that’s expected out of a GT-R.”
[…]
Pandikuthira elaborated on the upcoming next-gen battery technology, noting that “it might be alright for other electric cars that you could do that are the cruising around need to be seen at a country club, but the ultimate raw performance GT-R as an electric car, that’s really quite a ways away.”
The executive continued to note that solid-state batteries will be the “key enabler” to make the GT-R exactly what Nissan wants out of the R36. What isn’t clear is how those batteries will be used.
While a full BEV is out of the question, Nissan has apparently been kicking around the pros and cons of mild and plug-in hybrids for the platform. PHEVs add a lot of additional weight, but they potentially meet Pandikuthira’s architectural checklist for the next-gen platform: 70 miles of all-electric range, a small (30-kilowatt-hour) battery, plus, a mesh of practicality and track-focused foolery available at the driver’s right foot.
The plan was (at least back in April) to give the car a two-turbocharged V6 plus a to-be-decided hybrid component comprised of a solid-state battery pack. But as Espinosa clarified in the R35 GT-R’s sendoff:
“While we don’t have a precise plan finalized today, the GT-R will evolve and reemerge in the future.”
Pandikuthira says to expect the GT-R to hit the streets in “three to five” years. That’s coincidentally just enough time for Nissan to start pumping out its solid-state battery packs in 2028.
90%: Here’s How Much Electricity China’s EV Charging Networks Use Every Month
Photo by: Electra
China is the EV capital of the world. It produces and consumes the most plug-in vehicles on the planet, which means that it chews through a lot of juice to cover its transportation needs. Have you ever wondered just how much?
Well, now we know. On Tuesday, China’s National Energy Administration told the world that China’s robust EV charging network delivered 7.7 terawatt-hours of electricity to vehicles in July. Yes, terawatt-hours.
That’s kind of hard to picture on its own, so let’s break down exactly how much electricity that really is.
Tesla’s North American Megafactory, for example, can pump out around 40 gigawatt-hours of battery storage each year. China’s consumption is 192 times that amount in just a single month.
Or, maybe it’s easier to understand how many miles a car could drive on that amount of electricity. Tesla’s latest Model 3 achieves around 4.5 miles per kilowatt-hour of efficiency. That’s enough electricity for a single Model 3 to drive 1.7 billion miles, or every single car Tesla has ever sold to drive around 1,000 miles.
China has around 25.5 million battery-electric cars on the road. That means that it dispersed an average of around 300 kWh of electricity per vehicle via the charging network in July, not counting PHEVs. The NEA says that China currently has around 16.7 million EV chargers across the country, or roughly two chargers for every five New Energy Vehicles (which includes PHEVs) on the road.
From Car News China:
This growth is reflected in the latest data: the total number of EV charging infrastructure units (charging piles) reached 16.696 million by the end of July 2025, a tenfold increase compared to 2020.
The first seven months of 2025 alone saw an addition of 3.878 million charging units, a 93.2% year-on-year increase. Public charging facilities grew by 623,000 units (up 28.9%), while private charging facilities surged by 3.255 million units (up 113.6%). The charger-to-new energy vehicle increment ratio stands at 1:1.8, indicating that infrastructure development is keeping pace with the growth of EV sales, which reached 6.913 million units domestically during the same period.
The surge in EV adoption has also driven a significant increase in electricity consumption. According to Du Zhongming, Director of the NEA Electricity Department, quoted by Chinese media CNR, electricity consumption for EV charging and swapping services grew by over 40% in the first seven months of this year. In July 2025 alone, national charging electricity consumption reached approximately 7.71 billion kWh, an increase of 1.0 billion kWh from the previous month, marking a 53.9% year-on-year and 14.9% month-on-month growth. This electricity primarily served buses and passenger vehicles, with sanitation/logistics vehicles and taxis accounting for a smaller share.
You have to admit that these are some pretty insane statistics. 7.7 Terawatt-hours is as much electricity as the State of New York imported from Canada in all of 2024. China did that in just a month and used it only to charge its cars.
It goes to show you that no matter how much the U.S. is cheering on its charging network, its growth is nowhere near as robust as China’s. Maybe one day we’ll get to two chargers for every five cars, but today, we’ll have to settle for one charger for every 18 BEVs.
100%: Are Enthusiasts Becoming More Welcoming Of Hybrids?
Photo by: Toyota
Hybrids used to be this silent joke in the car community. Laughing at folks behind the wheel of a boring car like a Toyota Prius, or smirking to know that someone had a car powered by a battery. But plug-in cars have quickly become more normal and in some cases, even more appealing from a performance perspective.
With the Nissan GT-R headed that way, it could be a pivotal moment for the enthusiast crowd who crave instant acceleration, but still want a throaty exhaust tone and turbo whistle (even if it’s just by throwing some bolt-ons into the engine bay). Car people might actually consider a hybrid as a future classic—that’s really hard to picture.
So, what do you think? Is car culture more inclined to finally adopt hybrids as something more than just a gas-sipping econobox? What might that take? Let me know in the comments.
