The number of car club vehicles available to rent in the capital has dropped by nearly 90% since December 2025, according to new data from Collaborative Mobility (CoMoUK).

At the end of last year, Zipcar announced that it would be ceasing operations in the UK, with services coming to an end on 31 December. Since then, the number of vehicles available to book in London has decreased from 2,800 to just 300 in early 2026 – a decrease of 89%.

A recent survey conducted by the shared transport charity showed that 9% of former Zipcar users who responded have already had to buy or lease a private vehicle, with 55% actively considering it as an option.

The report argues that this is ‘highly worrying', as if ‘only a fraction' of the 230,000 people who were actively using Zipcar at the end of 2025 purchased a private vehicle, it could introduce ‘tens of thousands' of additional cars to London's roads at a time when both national and local authorities are pushing for a reduction in emissions.

The survey also showed that while 22% of previous Zipcar journeys have been replaced by taxi and private hire trips, a ‘substantial share' (19%) of trips are no longer made at all, meaning that the lack of access to car clubs has limited the mobility of one out of five previous users.

Some respondents with physical disabilities reported feeling that it felt like their ‘freedom and independence [have] been taken away' without access to Zipcar vehicles, with others highlighting concerns over safety on streets at night as part of the reason they relied on car clubs.

Speaking to The Guardian, CoMoUK chief executive Richard Dilks argued that London should be one of the most attractive cities in Europe for car-sharing, but it is being hampered by a ‘lack of centralised rules and processes'.

‘We're massively down overall,' he explained. ‘That's a catastrophic result for a sector that is doing well across Europe.'

In 2015, Transport for London published its Strategy for Car Clubs, which called for London residents to join car clubs as ‘an alternative to direct car club ownership', but a report published by the London Assembly's Transport Committee a decade later cited a ‘patchwork approach' and a lack of a ‘pan-London approach' as reasons for TfL's ‘stalling car clubs'.