Mitchell: EV claims continue to rise despite sales slowing
By Lurah Lowery
on February 23, 2026
Market Trends
Mitchell’s latest “Plugged-In: EV Collision Insights” report shows that while sales of new battery electric vehicles (BEVs) decreased 2% in the U.S. last year, claims for repairable vehicles continued to climb.
The share of repairable claims also increased by 6% for plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEVs) and 20% for mild hybrid electric vehicles (MHEVs) year-over-year in the U.S. In Canada, PHEV repairable claims climbed by 26%, and MHEV repairable claims grew by 29%.
“Even as BEV adoption slowed in North America last year following the end of government tax incentives, the auto insurance and collision repair industries still saw claims volume rise since more of these automobiles are on the road than ever before,” said Ryan Mandell, Mitchell’s vice president of strategy and market intelligence, in a press release. “Due to their dense electrical architectures, software-driven systems and interconnected, sensor-heavy designs, these vehicles require additional diagnostic and calibration operations when damaged that can add cost, complexity and cycle time to each repair.”
In 2025, BEVs averaged 1.70 calibrations per estimate compared to 1.63 for hybrids and 1.54 for internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles.
“As calibrations become increasingly common across all vehicle types, markets with higher concentrations of battery electric and hybrid vehicles continue to experience greater repair demands — requiring collision facilities to maintain, or expand, existing capabilities and auto insurers to account for these additional repair operations and costs when underwriting,” the report states.
Total loss market values dropped across most powertrain types, with BEVs experiencing the largest decline, of 6% in the U.S. and 13% in Canada, according to the report. Mitchell says this was the result of accelerated depreciation, increased availability of lower-cost models, and shifting consumer sentiment.
Average severity for repairable BEVs also fell by 5% in the U.S. and 2% in Canada. While average severity for repairable PHEVs remained flat in both countries, claim costs for MHEVs increased by 4% to $5,054 in the U.S. and held steady at $6,267 in Canada.
Mitchell found that OEM parts use continues to be more frequent in BEV collision repairs. On repairable vehicle estimates, the percentage of parts dollars designated for OEM parts was 86%. The percentage of repairable parts listed was 13% compared to 62% and 15%, respectively, for ICE vehicles.
Images
Featured image credit: Ruslan Sidorov/iStock
Graphs provided by Mitchell
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