As the world moves over from petrol and diesel cars to electric ones, there are a lot of questions about these new electrically powered models. One of the most common concerning how EVs drive is: do electric cars have gears?
The answer is that for the purposes of normal driving, electric cars do not have different gears. Most electric cars don’t have any gearbox at all so you can’t change gear. There are two pedals, no clutch or gear stick, and you select the desired drive mode from Park, Neutral, Reverse and Drive just like in any automatic car.
It’s a little more complex if you want to get more technical, as certain electric cars actually do have gears, but they aren’t needed in EVs in the way they are in internal combustion engined cars. The EV models that do have gears use them for rapid acceleration rather than efficiency. Some examples include the Porsche Taycan, Audi e-tron GT and Lotus Eletre R but the process of changing gear is completely automated in all cases.
The vast majority of electric cars use a single gear. This is because electric motors, unlike petrol and diesel engines, don’t need to build revs to produce their maximum torque, or pulling power. While a petrol engine needs to be fed more and more fuel and air to produce larger explosions in its cylinders for more power and torque, electric motors simply produce maximum power from the moment you press the accelerator pedal – more like an on-off switch.