Formula E · Market
Formula E (1/3): The brands on the grid and their Swiss figures
Seven manufacturers build a powertrain for the 2026/27 Formula E season. Five of them sell passenger cars in Switzerland under their own name: Porsche, Jaguar, Nissan, Citroën and Opel. In the first eight months of 2026 their brands registered 2’398 plug-in vehicles between them, 4,3 per cent of all 55’986.
Who races in season 2026/27
The season starts in December in Jeddah and is the first with the fourth-generation race car. Which team runs which powertrain is listed with sources on our Formula E page. One distinction matters for this article: a works team runs its manufacturer’s powertrain, a customer team buys one in.
Mahindra and Lola, which races with Yamaha, have no passenger car brand in Switzerland. DS Automobiles left after the 2025/26 season. Opel is new, Porsche has entered a second works team, and Nissan now also supplies Andretti. Cupra appears in the name of the customer team CUPRA KIRO, which uses a Porsche powertrain; the brand is not entered as a manufacturer.
What their brands register in Switzerland
| Manufacturer | Plug-in vehicles | of which fully electric | Previous year, same months |
|---|---|---|---|
| Porsche | 1’288 | 808 | 1’509 |
| Citroën | 459 | 387 | 469 |
| Opel | 442 | 375 | 471 |
| Nissan | 209 | 209 | 337 |
| Jaguar | 0 | 0 | 91 |
| Together | 2’398 | 1’779 | 2’877 |
All five are below the previous year, together by 16,6 per cent. Over the same period the plug-in market grew by 20,9 per cent, from 46’314 to 55’986 vehicles. Porsche ranks 14th of 61 brands with 1’288, of which 540 are a Macan. Jaguar registered no plug-in vehicle in the eight months, after 91 the year before. Production of the I-Pace and E-Pace has ended, as reported by Magna, which built both in Graz. The next model, the four-door electric GT Type 01, will be unveiled in New York on 6 October 2026; Jaguar has not yet announced market launch or price.
The I-Pace has not disappeared from the roads. Of the 1’201 I-Pace from the 2018 to 2023 model years first registered new in Switzerland, 971 are still registered today, 80,8 per cent. Across all electric cars of the same years the figure is 93,0 per cent. Whether an I-Pace was exported, scrapped or laid up with its plates deposited is not distinguished in the ASTRA vehicle register. On 27.09.2026 the used-car platform AutoUncle listed 73 I-Pace for sale and the Jaguar Switzerland used-car exchange 21; how many vehicles appear in both we do not know. Both figures were read by hand. There is no figure for 2024 and 2025, because we only analyse a model from 40 new registrations per year.
The largest plug-in brands have left
BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Audi rank 1st, 4th and 5th in the Swiss plug-in market. Together they reach 13’245 vehicles, 23,7 per cent. All three had a works team in Formula E: Audi and BMW raced until the 2020/21 season, Mercedes-Benz until 2021/22.
In its exit announcement BMW wrote that it had «essentially exhausted the opportunities for this form of technology transfer». Mercedes-Benz cited a focus on its core activities, Audi moved its works programme to the Dakar Rally and endurance racing. What the manufacturers name as transfer from the race car is examined in part 2.
What this means for a purchase
- A racing programme says little about what is on sale in Switzerland. The five brands on the grid together sell fewer plug-in vehicles here than BMW alone.
- What a brand sells here is shown on its brand page. It lists every model with registrations, month by month.
- Technology from racing is a manufacturer’s claim. Which transfers are documented and which are only asserted is covered in part 2.
What we do not know
- Whether racing moves buyers. A registration does not say why someone chose a brand. We have no survey on this for Switzerland.
- Three points on the team list are open: the name of Porsche’s second works team, the approval of Fortescue Zero by the FIA and Formula E, and Lola’s team name. Changes appear on the Formula E page, which is updated weekly.
- Passenger cars without a plug have not been analysed by brand. For Porsche and Jaguar the share of the whole market would therefore be a different figure.
Sources: Formula E, «Formula E and the FIA announce provisional 2026-27 calendar» (23.06.2026), plus the manufacturers’ team announcements, linked on the Formula E page. Exits: BMW Group PressClub (02.12.2020), The Race on Audi (30.11.2020), Motor Sport Magazine on Mercedes-Benz (18.08.2021). Jaguar: Magna, third-quarter 2025 results, and Jaguar, announcement on the Type 01 (12.08.2026). Registrations: auto-schweiz, plug-in statistics for the first eight months of 2026 and 2025, via src/payload.js. Vehicle stock: ASTRA, Vehicle Information System (IVZ), as of 02.09.2026, via static/fahrzeugverbleib.json. Used cars: AutoUncle and Jaguar Switzerland used-car exchange, read by hand on 27.09.2026.
Transparency: plug-in vehicles are counted, i.e. fully electric cars and plug-in hybrids. A brand counts towards a manufacturer on the grid if it fields a works team for 2026/27 or supplies a powertrain; a name in a team name does not count. Every figure in this article is recalculated from the monthly values and the vehicle stock on every npm test and searched for in the text, in all four languages.
