What Canada's EV market can teach Americans

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Drive north from Montana into British Columbia and the terrain barely changes. The Rocky Mountains run straight across the border, the winters are just as long, and the nearest big shopping center is often an hour away.

That shared geography is the point of comparison. Canada is its own country, with its own politics and its own car market, and right now that market has something to show American EV owners.

Glen Trafford runs Salmon Arm Toyota, the only Toyota store in a lake town of 20,000 in the B.C. interior. "If you took the Rocky Mountain section of Montana, you would find a direct mirror to us," Glen said. 

A rural store starts selling EVs

Salmon Arm Toyota sold one fully electric car in all of 2025. By the end of July 2026, it had sold eight. It also sold 17 plug-in hybrids in those seven months, matching its total for all of last year.

While those sound like small numbers, that’s meaningful change at a store that delivers about 260 new cars a year. Glen credits three big things:

1. The cars got better. In 2023, his customers asked how long charging took, how far they could go and whether the car could handle the cold. Longer range, access to Tesla Superchargers and faster charging answered most of those questions. "In battery electric vehicle time," Glen said of 2023, "that's a million years ago."

2. Gas got expensive. Regular gas is running about $2 a liter across much of B.C. this week, roughly $5.50 a gallon in U.S. dollars. 

3. Plug-in hybrids filled the gap. Glen's customers want to drive 600 kilometers, about 370 miles, "and not worry that they're going to get stuck with no charge." For many of them, a plug-in hybrid is the first step.

Canada also brought back a $5,000 EV rebate this year after dropping it in 2025, but Glen gives it less credit than the car improvements.

Where the two markets differ

Where a car is built matters on both sides of the border right now. In the U.S., it shows up as tariffs in the price. In Canada, many buyers are also steering away from brands they see as American.

Trade tension between the two countries makes American news once in a while. “Here it’s news every day,” Glen said.

He says the effect on what people buy is broad. “That is not a few people, that is a lot of people,” he said.

Toyota benefits from that. According to Glen, it builds more vehicles in Canada than any other automaker, and the RAV4, Toyota’s best seller, is built in Ontario. Ford and GM also build cars in Canada.

Tesla is on the other side. In Glen’s view, no brand in the business is more closely tied to the U.S. right now, and some Canadians who bought a Tesla as their first EV are reconsidering it.

Glen is quick to add that nobody in Salmon Arm wanted any of this. “Nobody wants this fight. We didn’t ask for this,” he said. “We don’t want to punish America.” He points to the American places Canadians love to visit, the people they know there and the shows they watch, and he expects buying habits to change back “as soon as it becomes reasonable again.”

For American owners, the lesson is that what buyers will pay can change for reasons that have nothing to do with the car.

What it means for your EV

Much of rural and small-town America shares those distances and winters. Drivers there ask what Glen's customers asked: how far it goes, how fast it charges and how it handles the cold.

In Salmon Arm, EV sales picked up once the cars had good answers. Used EV buyers ask the same questions. If you plan to sell, know your EV's real range today and its battery health before a buyer asks.

Recurrent Connect tracks both →

Toyota started slow.

For years, Toyota took criticism for moving slowly on EVs. It built its lead on hybrids and moved carefully into plug-in hybrids. Glen Trafford calls its first EV, the bZ4X, "mediocre."

That has changed. While Ford, GM and Stellantis scale back their EV plans, Toyota is adding models:

All four have a built-in Tesla-style charging port, so they can use Superchargers without an adapter.

Question: "How much range will my EV lose this winter?"

Expect to lose about a fifth of it at freezing, and to get it back when it warms up. Across more than 30,000 EVs in Recurrent's community last winter, the average EV kept 78% of its range at 32°F and 70% at 20°F. The best models kept 88% at freezing. A heat pump added about 10% at freezing.

The loss is temporary, and cold weather does no long-term damage to your battery.

These numbers come from last winter's data. We'll publish an updated ranking next month.

See how your model ranks →

Recurrent Connect checks your battery several times a day and tracks its health, range and charging over time. This winter, you'll see how your EV handles the cold compared with its normal, and catch battery or charging problems early.

Try it free for 30 days.

Connect my EV →

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