Do electric vehicles really catch fire more than gas cars? Global data answers

A single video of an electric vehicle burning can rack up millions of views in a matter of hours. Headlines sometimes frame battery fires as proof that EVs are inherently dangerous, often implying that electric cars ignite more easily than gasoline vehicles.

This perception has become so widespread that it now shapes consumer hesitation, policy debates, and even emergency-response narratives. But once the sentiment calms down, the data tells a very different story. After more than a decade of large-scale EV deployment, there is enough real-world evidence to answer the question directly. Electric vehicles do catch fire, but they do not catch fire more often than gasoline cars.

In fact, across multiple countries and datasets, they burn significantly less frequently. What the latest data actually says In the United States, vehicle fire statistics overwhelmingly point to internal combustion engine vehicles as the dominant source of risk.

Data compiled by U.S. transportation safety agencies and cited by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) shows that ICE vehicle fires occur at a rate of roughly one every 2 to 3minutes nationwide.

That translates to hundreds of thousands of fires annually, the vast majority involving gasoline or diesel vehicles. Analyses drawing on U.S. sales data and fire incident reports show approximately 25 fires per 100,000 electric vehicles sold, compared with about 1,500 fires per 100,000 gasoline-powered vehicles.

European data reinforces the same conclusion. Sweden s Civil Contingencies Agency reported that in 2022, just 23 fires occurred among roughly 611,000 electric vehicles, a fire incidence of 0.004 percent.

During the same period, 3,400 fires occurred among approximately 4.4 million gasoline and diesel vehicles, corresponding to 0.08 percent. In other words, combustion vehicles were about 20 times more likely to catch fire than EVs in one of the world s most electrified car markets. Australia s EV FireSafe, which maintains a verified global database of EV fire incidents, reports an estimated EV fire risk of 0.001-0.002 percent, compared with approximately 0.1 percent for petrol and diesel vehicles.

That places combustion vehicles at a 50- to 100-fold higher fire risk, depending on assumptions about fleet age and reporting completeness. More recent figures from Poland s State Fire Service, cited by the Polish New Mobility Association in 2025, further complicate the narrative. Between 2020 and 2025, Poland recorded 51,142 vehicle fires, of which 50,833 involved ICE vehicles, 222 involved hybrids, and just 87 involved electric vehicles.

Even after adjusting for EV market share, the data show no evidence that EVs are more fire-prone than conventional cars. Across the U.S., the EU, and Australia, the data trend is consistent. EV fires are rarer, not more common. Why the perception refuses to die If the numbers are so clear, why does the myth persist?

The answer lies in visibility and misunderstanding, not in probability. Gasoline vehicle fires are routine. They happen so often that they rarely become national news unless lives are lost. EV fires, by contrast, remain unusual enough to feel exceptional.

When one occurs, it is filmed, shared, dissected, and replayed across platforms. A single incident can generate more attention than thousands of ordinary ICE vehicle fires combined. There is also a technical reason EV fires attract outsized attention. Lithium-ion battery fires behave differently.

They can burn longer, resist standard suppression methods, and in some cases reignite after appearing extinguished. This creates prolonged scenes involving firefighters, road closures, and dramatic visuals, reinforcing the idea that something uniquely dangerous is happening, even though the event itself is statistically rare.

Iconic but misleading imagery also plays a role. Viral photos of burning EVs are frequently reused without context, sometimes even misattributed to battery failures when crashes, external fires, or non-EV factors were involved.

Over time, these images harden into cultural evidence, even when they are not representative. What actually causes EV fires Most EV fires originate from damage to lithium-ion battery systems rather than spontaneous ignition. Severe collisions that compromise battery enclosures, internal manufacturing defects, water intrusion after flooding, or failures in charging infrastructure can trigger internal short circuits.

In rare cases, this leads to thermal runaway, in which heat spreads rapidly from one cell to its neighbors. Gasoline vehicle fires, by contrast, are overwhelmingly linked to fuel leaks, ruptured tanks, overheated engines, or electrical faults igniting flammable vapors.

The presence of liquid fuel under pressure means ICE vehicles inherently carry a continuous ignition risk, especially in older cars or high-impact crashes. The crucial distinction is that EV fires are technically complex but infrequent, while ICE fires are simpler but vastly more common. What regulators and safety experts agree on Safety agencies are careful in their language, but their assessments are telling. The NFPA and U.S.

fire departments consistently note that EV fires pose unique challenges for first responders, particularly in cooling battery packs and preventing re-ignition. At the same time, they emphasize that EVs account for only a small fraction of vehicle fires overall. A 2023 investigation by Battelle for the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration concluded that the propensity and severity of fires involving lithium-ion battery systems are comparable to, or slightly lower than, those associated with gasoline and diesel fuels.

This conclusion has been echoed by European transport safety bodies and independent researchers studying post-crash fire behavior. The reality behind the myth Electric vehicles are not fireproof, and no credible expert claims they are. But the idea that they catch fire more often than gasoline cars is not supported by modern data. Across multiple regions, EVs burn less frequently, sometimes by an order of magnitude or more.

The myth persists because EV fires are visually striking, unfamiliar, and disproportionately covered, not because they are common. The numbers are no longer ambiguous. EV fires are real, but they are rarer than gasoline vehicle fires, and the gap is wider than most headlines suggest.