Electric BMW i3 heading for the BMW graveyard sooner than planned

The electric BMW i3, BMW’s first electric car, was supposed to start in production until 2024, but BMW are pulling the plug on the i3 in July 2022.

It’s more than a decade since we got our first look at the BMW i3, a complicated and clever compact electric BMW which looked to be the start of a full range of BMW ‘BMW i’ cars, and eight years since it went on sale.

It was joined by the equally complicated hybrid i8 and with plans to roll out a complete range of electric ‘i’ cars, but those plans stalled and BMW was left with just the i3 and i8 to fight the electric fight.

But a lot has changed in the last decade in the EV world, and BMW is now busy rolling out EVs which look like ICE cars. And the i3 and i8 just don’t fit, not just because they don’t look like any other BMW, but because they’re so complicated and expensive to produce.

The BMW i8 popped off to the BMW graveyard in the sky two years ago, but, at the time, BMW said the i3 would live until at least 2024, and even had the capacity to double production if demand for the i3 continued to grow.

But now, as the EV landscape changes for BMW, they have decided it’s time to put an end to the i3, and production will end in July, having already called a halt to i3 sales in the US last year.

BMW expect the upcoming iX1 and the MINI Electric will mop up the sales lost with the i3’s loss, although neither is as innovative, or as appealing, as the i3.