Tesla outsells all other brands combined as America's EV market resets

Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images Tesla accounted for more than half of US electric-vehicle sales in the third quarter.

Its quarterly sales increase exceeded the entire market's gain, Cox estimates show.

High gas prices are helping EVs compete, though sales remain below last year's levels.

Tesla is taking a bigger slice of America's electric-vehicle market as high gas prices give drivers another reason to consider ditching the pump.

The company sold an estimated 144,094 vehicles in the US in the third quarter, up from 124,800 in the previous three months, according to Cox Automotive's latest sales report .

That increase was bigger than the gain for the rest of the US EV market.

Put another way: Tesla drove the recovery.

Everyone else, taken together, went backward.

The figures offer a new twist on the EV comeback I wrote about in July.

Back then, sales had finally improved after the slump that followed the end of federal incentives in the US.

Several manufacturers were benefiting, but only those with the fortitude to stick with EVs after federal government support waned.

While recovery continued in the third quarter, it became more dependent on Tesla.

Americans bought 262,649 new EVs during the period, about 6% more than in the second quarter.