How Ola LOST India’s EV war in 12 months?
A deep dive into the absolute discombobulation (kind of) of Ola Electric
In 2025, Ola was leading India’s EV market with a market share of 24.8%. But in 2026, the numbers have fallen disruptively to just 5.84% that’s almost 5x disruption…. INSANE and all it happened in just 12 months like it just flew past our eyes like a flash of light from happy customers, Bhavish’s insane campaigns to scooters blasting, stocks falling!
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By February 2026, Ola completely slipped out of top 5 crashing down at an insane pace from 53,000 units per month to just 3,968 units and only 3.56% market share now this is an absolutely discomforting downfall but there are hopes (I don’t know…I just said that)
So, when people start losing hope in you, and your company starts betraying (metaphor) you there is always one option to get out of this maze in a more respectful way and that is… Diversification (Yayyy!) And following this “brand fashion” — Ola just got diversified into Ola Shakti (just another home battery!) at just Rs.29,999/- Now, think of it first Ola cabs then Ola electric and now Ola Shakti and I absolutely respect the diversification from cabs to EVs but the last one starts feeling suspicious as its time is bad these days I don’t think people will believe it for home batteries! (c’mon Ola think different!) And behind all these hierarchy another Ev company started rising superfast…
Why…Ather won? Here comes Ather which at first seemed like just another EV brand and still people believed Ola but a small group of customers went for Ather and was…. not fascinated as with Ola’s work but Ather scooters focused on making customer experience and their product better but Ola on the other hand just went with adding tech into their scooters (which I love the most about Ola) but but but, scooter’s main objective is to travel but Ola took tech seriously and gave up on physics which is not a good sign for a locomotory brand (suits well..) and silently Ather overtook Ola (as customers faced issue and with unfair mouth-to-mouth advantage) in registrations, then in revenue, then in market cap and silently built trust…Not by outspending but outexecuting.. Better work, better service network, better after-sales, better trust and ultimately proving that Boring wins can be more fascinating than outperfoming loses.
Both are Bengaluru-born companies, one chased headline and one quietly built trust and now the whole city (state to be more diversified) knows which won! Ola didn’t lose to Ather. It lost to its own customers — and forgot that service is the product.
