Dutch passenger cars are on average clearly older than those in surrounding countries. In recent years we have only grown older and that also applies to the entire EU.
In the Netherlands, the average passenger car in 2019 was 11 years old. This is evident from figures that the European trade association ACEA now shares. With that, we are clearly leaving our neighboring countries behind. In Belgium, passenger cars are on average 9.1 years old, in Germany 9.6 years old and in Luxembourg only 6.5 years old. The ages go up further south, for example, France at 10.2 years old is a bit closer and countries such as Italy (11.4 years old) and Spain (12.7 years old) go over it.
The average age of passenger cars in the EU is still somewhat higher than the Dutch average, at 11.5 years. This is mainly due to Southern and Eastern Europe. On average, the Netherlands has a fairly young fleet when it comes to trucks. With an average age of 9.6 years, we are well below the European average (13 years) and we mainly drive significantly younger trucks than Belgians (15.8 years). Vans do last a relatively long time here compared to our neighboring countries (9.8 years), compared to 8.6 years in Belgium and 8.1 years in Germany.
We are getting older in the EU, as it turns out when we add the figures from more than four years ago. Then we reported that the average passenger car in the EU was almost 10 years old. Ten years earlier, the average age of passenger cars in the EU was still 8.4 years. In the Netherlands, the average age of passenger cars was 9.6 years ago.