Running costs

Corsa Electric vs Corsa: what each really costs a year

By Andrea PerizzatoPublished 22 September 2026

The short answer

At list price the petrol Corsa is cheaper to run, by about £2,900 a year at 8,000 miles. The electric saves £1,000 on fuel and £245 on tax, but a £32,635 car keeping 29% of its value loses £3,900 a year more than a £24,835 one keeping 54%. At the £10,000 dealer discount it is about level.

List price: what the maker says the car costs, before any discount. Every depreciation forecast is a percentage of it, which is why a car sold at £10,000 off looks like a disaster on paper and isn't in your pocket.

What does the fuel or electricity cost?

About £156 a year for the electric Corsa charged overnight and £1,152 of petrol for the 1.2 Turbo, so the electric one saves roughly £1,000 a year at 8,000 miles.

This is the line the electric car wins, and it wins it clearly. Parkers puts the Corsa Electric at 3.8 to 4.4 miles per kWh, so I've used 4.1, which is 1,950kWh for 8,000 miles. On Intelligent Octopus Go at 8p a kWh that's £156 a year; on the October 2026 price cap of 26.32p it's £514. The petrol Corsa's 1.2 Turbo 100 does 54.3mpg on the official test with the manual gearbox, which is 670 litres a year, and at 172p a litre, the UK average in the week ending 21 September 2026, that's £1,152.

So the gap is £1,000 a year with a driveway and an EV tariff, and £640 without the tariff. If you can't charge at home at all, the public network at 54p to 77p a kWh puts the electric Corsa at £1,050 to £1,500, which is petrol money, and the whole comparison changes; the no-driveway guide is the one for that.

Chart: What a year costs at 8,000 miles: Corsa 1.2 Turbo against Corsa Electric, line by line

What are the tax, insurance and servicing lines?

Tax favours the electric by £445 in year one and is level at £200 after that, servicing is about £40 a year cheaper, and insurance goes the other way because the electric sits nine groups higher.

Vehicle tax first. A new electric Corsa pays £10 in its first year and £200 a year from the second, on the GOV.UK rates for 2026/27. The petrol 1.2 Turbo emits 114 to 121g/km, which puts it in the 111 to 130 band at £455 for year one, then the same £200. Neither car goes near the expensive-car supplement, so that's a £445 saving once and nothing after. The road tax guide has the whole table.

Servicing is the small win. The electric Corsa is serviced every two years or 16,000 miles after the first visits, according to DrivingElectric, and BestChargers puts a year of EV servicing at £100 to £250 against about £205 for petrol. I've used £165, the middle of that range. Vauxhall doesn't publish its service plan prices on a page I could check.

Insurance is the line to get a quote on before you decide. Parkers puts the petrol GS in group 19 and the electric GS in group 28. MoneySuperMarket's average for a Corsa was £409 a year, from 2023 data, and I've used that for both because nobody publishes a Corsa Electric average. Nine groups usually means a dearer quote, so treat the electric's line as a floor.

What a year costs at 8,000 miles for a Corsa GS 1.2 Turbo 100 manual (£24,835) and a Corsa Electric GS 51kWh (£32,635), both bought at list price.

Line	Corsa 1.2 Turbo 100	Corsa Electric 51kWh
Fuel or electricity (54.3mpg at 172p; 4.1 miles per kWh at 8p overnight)	£1,152	£156
Vehicle tax, year one	£455	£10
Vehicle tax, standard rate from year two	£200	£200
Insurance (Corsa average, 2023; group 19 vs 28)	£409	£409 or more
Servicing	£205	£165
Value lost per year over three years (46% vs 71% of list)	£3,810	£7,720
Total, years two onwards	£5,780	£8,650
Total if the electric is bought at £22,000	£5,780	£5,130

Prices and specifications from Carwow, September 2026; efficiency and mpg from Parkers; tax from GOV.UK; insurance groups from Parkers and the premium from MoneySuperMarket's 2023 average, used for both cars; servicing from BestChargers; electric depreciation is What Car?'s forecast as reported by DrivingElectric, petrol depreciation is The Money Calculator's model estimate. The insurance and depreciation lines are estimates. Last checked 22 September 2026.

Example figures

Which one loses more value?

The electric, by a long way at list price: it keeps 29% of £32,635 after three years against about 54% for the petrol, which is £3,900 a year more lost, according to What Car?

This is where the sum turns. DrivingElectric reports What Car?'s forecast that the Corsa Electric keeps around 29% of its value after three years and 36,000 miles, which made it one of the fastest-depreciating cars on sale. On the £32,635 GS that's £23,170 gone in three years, or £7,720 a year. The petrol Corsa has no published forecast I could fetch; The Money Calculator's model estimates 46% lost in three years, so the £24,835 petrol GS loses £11,420, or £3,810 a year.

Now the part the forecast doesn't tell you. Carwow lists the Corsa Electric with average savings of £10,201 off list and cash prices from £17,778 in September 2026. A car bought at £22,000 and worth £9,500 in three years has lost £4,200 a year, not £7,700, and the whole table below moves by £3,500. The forecast is right about the car and wrong about what you paid. Depreciation is from your price, not Vauxhall's.

What would it cost me?Your car vs an EV, line by lineWork it out

So which Corsa is cheaper to run?

At list price the petrol Corsa by about £2,900 a year; at the discounted price dealers are actually selling the electric one for, the two are within a few hundred pounds of each other.

Add it up at 8,000 miles, both bought at list. The electric GS: £156 electricity, £200 tax, £409 insurance, £165 servicing and £7,720 lost value, about £8,650 a year. The petrol GS: £1,152 fuel, £200 tax, £409 insurance, £205 servicing and £3,810 lost value, about £5,780. The petrol wins by £2,900, and all of it is depreciation on a £7,800 higher price.

Buy the electric at £22,000 instead and its lost value drops to about £4,200 a year, so the total is about £5,130 against the petrol's £5,780, if the petrol is bought at list. It usually isn't either, so call it level. The whole running-cost page shows the same pattern for a typical EV: cheap electricity, dear depreciation, and the answer decided by what you paid and where you charge.

Who should pick which?

The electric Corsa suits someone with a driveway, an EV tariff and a big discount or a lease; the petrol suits someone paying list, parking on the street, or keeping the car ten years.

Driveway, EV tariff, discount or lease. The electric. You bank £1,000 a year on fuel, the depreciation is someone else's problem on a lease, and at a discounted price it's level or better on the sums.
Paying list, or near it. The petrol, unless you keep the car long enough for the fuel saving to catch up, which is eight years or more.
No driveway. The petrol, or read the public charging sums first. At 54p a kWh the electric Corsa's fuel bill is the petrol's.
Buying used. The electric becomes the bargain. A three-year-old Corsa Electric at 29% of list is a £9,000 car that costs £156 a year to run, and the used EV guide does that sum.
Either way, get the insurance quote on the exact trim before the test drive. It's the one line I couldn't pin down, and nine groups is a real gap.