What Lessons Can We Learn From The EV Market’s Biggest Bust?

Despite some concerning economic headwinds, 2025 has been a promising year for the EV market, from the suppliers of raw materials for batteries all the way to the dealers’ forecourts.

A combination of more public charging points, a £3,750 grant on new EVs and a more diverse range of vehicles suitable for a broad consumer base has allowed predominantly electric cars (battery-electric and plug-in hybrid) to form a majority of the new car market.

Alongside this financial shift, there is also a cultural one, with the electric Renault 5 revival giving the EV market its Fiat 500 moment; the retrofuturistic styling, relative affordability and capable performance have made it a hotly anticipated talking point ahead of its release.

According to Autocar, 2400 models have been sold, 84 per cent of which to people who had not previously owned a Renault before, with the French brand becoming the second-most popular EV brand behind the struggling Tesla.

Similarly, other retrofuturistic concept cars, such as the hydrogen-powered Hyundai N Vision 74, have provided the EV market with not just a technological and practical case for their use, but have also created vehicles that have become aspirational.

What makes this notable is that one of the first major attempts at a retrofuturist EV flagship has become a mix between a case study and a cautionary tale that details how not to make a car.

Here is what the EV market has learned or can learn in the future from the infamous Tesla Cybertruck.

The Wrong Car At The Wrong Time For The Wrong Reasons

The infamous Ford Edsel was once considered to be the very worst car released at the worst time for the worst possible reasons, and one of the biggest issues with the Tesla Cybertruck from the very start was that it made little sense as a product, even as a flagship for new technology.

When the Cybertruck was first unveiled in 2019, Tesla had a relatively limited product lineup that desperately needed an affordable model to go alongside its premium Model S and Model X. Whilst the Model 3 was a step closer to this, an entry-level EV was seen as the missing link.

Instead, what was provided was a boldly-styled, luxury electric pick-up truck with stainless steel bodywork, bulletproof windows that shattered during a demonstration, the power of a Porsche sports car and the capability to survive the apocalypse.

Whilst electric pick-up trucks would become a somewhat niche market by the time the Cybertruck came out, it was not a car that customers wanted to buy outside of a dwindling number of loyalists.

Iconoclasm Is A Double-Edged Sword

The Cybertruck was always intended to stoke debate with its radical styling, and deviating from the status quo is far from a bad strategy, especially for a flagship. The Chrysler Airflow was pilloried when it launched, but its focus on aerodynamics quickly became highly influential.

However, the figuratively and literally sharp bodywork design not only made the car easy to make fun of, but it also made it difficult to maintain and even somewhat dangerous to drive.

The bodywork is sharp enough to chop vegetables, the lack of a crumple zone has directly caused several injuries, and the car has been recalled due to pieces of the bodywork coming loose and flying off.

Many cars, even successful ones, deal with recalls and early production issues, but the determination to break all of the rules of conventional carmaking frames any mistakes or typical problems as strategic mistakes.

The truck is so large and considered to be so unsafe that it legally cannot be sold in several key markets, with a Cybertruck seized by Greater Manchester Police on safety and regulatory grounds.

It also struggles to function effectively as a pick-up truck, with limited capacity, poor loading bed configuration and limited carrying and towing capacity.

Broken Promises And Underdelivering Linger

Unlike the technology industry, the car industry largely relies on promises and marketing claims being kept, or at least not egregiously broken.

Tesla made a lot of claims surrounding the Cybertruck, including its price, its battery capacity and range, rugged dependability, reliability and even the ability to function as a boat.

As it turns out, the EV costs over twice as much as its initial price, its range assumes it is not being driven quickly or whilst towing anything, it has famously broken down due to rain, car washes and snow, and even its more outlandish gimmicks proved to be untrue.

Bullets have passed through the bodywork, and even a small puddle has caused a critical battery error.

All of this reflects terribly not only on the Cybertruck itself but on Tesla more broadly, which has seen sales plummet in recent years.