The real ace was releasing an EV sports car, the Tesla Roadster. That's what caught people's attention. They were able to see how EV drivetrains were actually better than their ICE counterparts and that electric motors can do much more than drive golf carts – despite having powered everything from submarines to locomotives, people still thought they were weak.

Otherwise, Nissan would have been Tesla. They have produced some of the first practical EVs, way before Tesla did. Unfortunately, they made them for the Japanese consumer, not for the average american. At least not initially.

I daily drive a Nissan LEAF. Any Tesla model is vastly more practical as an only car.

I love my LEAF, but a little over a dozen times per year, I have to trade cars with my spouse to accomplish some particular day's driving.

You’re right that the Tesla Roadster led the charge — no pun intended — for EVs as uncompromising vehicles.

But I don’t think Nissan would’ve been Tesla: they didn’t think people would pay for a full-range EV (and still don’t, looks like?) and didn’t prioritize it. For many Americans that means the LEAF could not be their only vehicle.

The supercharger network also played a huge role in normalizing EVs, in particular in making the Tesla Model S the first car you could convince yourself was a great car that “happened to be an EV”. The S isn’t perfect, but it doesn’t have any huge, obvious EV-related deficits, like the LEAF’s range and charge time.

Nissan would never have been Tesla. They might have been the largest producer of EVs if history had run a different way, but that's a million miles away from being Tesla.

I am not an expert in cars and yet I know the Renault Zoe was commercialized in 2012, the year of the model S, for a reasonable autonomy and a much, much cheaper price. I believe tesla were the first to sell low volume, pricey EV cars. Their range and timing advance is only because of choosing the rich over the middle class, aka a lesser impact. Although it's true EV were and remain not cheap but it's getting quickly much better and it's definitely not tesla that will lead the dance of democratisation

I'm no Musk fan, but let's be honest, Tesla released the Roadster in 2008. An expensive luxury product, no doubt, but years ahead of the Leaf or Zoe.

And the Leaf looks like the typical electric cross between a clown car and a golf cart. The Roadster was based on a Lotus Elise. It looked great.

If you took the badges off, I think most people would have a hard time telling the LEAF (EV) and a Versa (ICE) apart. The LEAF is no 911 or Jaguar E-type, but it's not a "hey, look at me; I'm electric!" clown car either.

Maybe the current generation. I recall the original Leaf looking very clown-car-ish but I guess that's subjective.

Didn't the Zoe have a 22kwh battery? I don't doubt that it was practical for some things, but that was exactly the kind of car that many (especially in the US) used as an example of the "impracticality" of electric back then.

it had a 210km range for the first iteration and 1/3 of the model s https://www.renaultgroup.com/en/news-on-air/news/renault-zoe...

Don't forget the importance of charging either. When the 3 came out, GM was considering the Bolt a direct competitor. They had the mindset that people were only buying these as city cars.

To this day, GM sells that "direct competitor" with a ~55kw charging limit.

Tesla is what made the other manufacturers realize that people were willing to wait 15-25 minutes on DCFC while road tripping electric cars.

By the time Tesla had sold 100,000 Model S cars in the US, Nissan had already sold over 110 000 Leafs.

Tesla created the market for high-performance EVs. They did not create the overall EV market. The high-end market is only a small part of the numbers.

The Leaf that Nissan sold while the Model S was Tesla’s only sedan (ie 2012-2017) was not an ICE-equivalent vehicle. It was explicitly a city vehicle with a < 75 mile official range, an effective 40-50 mile range, and no fast charging.

If “high-performance” means “can handle the daily driving needs of > 50% of the population” then I guess you’re right, Tesla only created that market.

The daily-driving needs of 95% of the population are incompatible with a 100k$ car. The Leaf fit the needs of more people simply by virtue of having an acceptable price.

The Zoe also had a 150km+ effective range, which is more than enough for most people (maybe less so for Americans).

zoe was 210km and very cheap, it's mystery why it didn't took off

The Model S was the first EV that “happened to be” an EV. You didn’t have to compromise on range, power, comfort, or anything else to own it. That’s why it succeeded. It was a great car, and happened to be an EV.

Tesla’s chief designer himself: “We are past the idea of an environmentally friendly vehicle needing to look different. People don't want to sacrifice anything, including style, to own an efficient car.”

You definitely needed to compromise on range power and comfort. The 60kWh version was more expensive than an BMW M4, S5, or A6, all in more powerful, comfortable, etc...

You definitely had to compromise to own it, on almost everything aspect. Despite everything else, people were buying it because it was electric.

Every $100k vehicle is different, that’s not what “compromise” means. And the Model S had comparable power and comfort — not for everyone of course — to the cars you mention. Obviously people were buying it because it was electric, that added $30k in battery cost alone, you wouldn’t do that if you didn’t care about it being electric.

But my point is that could do everything an American expects a baseline car, like a Honda Civic, could do - it worked as a car in addition to being electric, which is more than can be said for the Leaf and Zoe, on range and charge time concerns alone.

The Model S had far inferior comfort, especially the 2012 version. It got better. You had to compromise on everything in exchange of getting an electric car.

> But my point is that could do everything an American expects a baseline car, like a Honda Civic, could do - it worked as a car in addition to being electric, which is more than can be said for the Leaf and Zoe, on range and charge time concerns alone.

Sure, at 100k$, which is too much for what an American expects of a baseline car. I am sure Renault and Nissan could have done it to if they had multiplied the price by 4, but then it would defeat the entire purpose of a practical everyday car. It's like saying that Ferrari makes practical every day cars because of the GTC4Lusso.

I can't tell if either I'm doing a terrible job making my point, or you're deliberately misunderstanding me.

Let me ask you this: The Model S outsold the Leaf and the Zoe, and helped launch a new car company that has now sold more BEVs than any other manufacturer. Why do you think that is?

One possibility is that they made EVs that many people wanted to buy, and people bought them. I'm proposing that this is the case, and the fact that the Model S sold well despite costing $100k is an extremely strong indicator of this.

New EVs, even those from established manufacturers, are emulating Tesla, not the Leaf or Zoe.

Without Tesla, we may have had many Leaf or Zoe-like vehicles, but given how uptake of those vehicles went, it seems unlikely that we'd be where we are today -- in California, in 2021, BEVs were ~10% of all new vehicles sold.

Personal opinions of the cost or style of Tesla's EVs aside, one can't deny that Tesla made EVs attractive in the eyes of Californian consumers, and as goes California, so goes the world (for better or worse).

"The high-end market is only a small part of the numbers" correct, but in a parallel universe where Tesla didn't exist & the typical EV looked & performed like a Leaf, would anyone actually want an electric car? Marketing and psychology are important.

Sure, as evidenced by the fact that more people bought cars that performed like the Leaf and Zoe than Model S's.

Also the Renault Zoe looked just like the Renault Clio, that is, a normal car.

bought != wanted...