Skip to main content

Nearly 25% of UK millennials ‘favour renting cars’ – new research

Nearly a quarter of UK millennials would forgo buying a car and are likely to subscribe to a car-as-a-service scheme within the next year, according to new research. The study by cloud software subscription service Zuora states UK millennials are ‘key drivers’ for the ‘subscription economy’, with 73% looking to increase subscription use over the next two years. Zuora’s A Nation Subscribed research involved 2,000 consumers and was carried out by YouGov. It shows 77% of 16-24 year olds and 85% of 25-34
October 9, 2018 Read time: 2 mins
Nearly a quarter of UK millennials would forgo buying a car and are likely to subscribe to a car-as-a-service scheme within the next year, according to new research.


The study by cloud software subscription service Zuora states UK millennials are ‘key drivers’ for the ‘subscription economy’, with 73% looking to increase subscription use over the next two years.

Zuora’s A Nation Subscribed research involved 2,000 consumers and was carried out by YouGov. It shows 77% of 16-24 year olds and 85% of 25-34 year olds subscribe to at least one product and/or service – such as gym membership or music streaming sites.

Also, around half of both millennial age groups believe subscriptions are the future, with 31% of 16-24-year-olds expressing interest in connected and self-driving cars.    

Nearly half of respondents rank convenience as the main benefit of using subscription services, followed by cost (29%) and ease of use (27%).

John Phillips, Zuora managing director for EMEA, says millennials are adopting subscriptions at a rapid pace and are pushing companies to rethink their business model.

“It’s likely that as the UK evolves to become smarter, fully connected and more efficient, we’ll see a new generation of businesses catering to this trend,” Phillips adds.

Related Content

  • August 15, 2019
    LA launches own ‘Green New Deal’
    Los Angeles, once a temple to the automobile, has followed the Democrats in launching its own Green New Deal – and the city has made big pledges on urban mobility investment The Democratic Party has started something. The Green New Deal, one of whose most high-profile supporters is new congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, intends to persuade the public that swift action is necessary to combat climate change. Now the city of Los Angeles has followed suit, releasing what it calls ‘LA’s Green New Deal’.
  • October 26, 2017
    EdgeVis removes bandwidth barriers to mobile streamed video
    A new generation of video compression can lower transmission costs of data and make streaming from mobile and body-worn cameras a reality, as Colin Sowman discovers. Bandwidth limitations have long been the bottleneck restricting the expanded use of video streaming for ITS, monitoring and surveillance purposes. Recent years have seen this countered to some degree by the introduction of ‘edge processing’ whereby ANPR, incident detection and other image processing is moved into (or close to) the camera, so
  • July 26, 2021
    Birmingham CAZ is green for go
    For urban authorities worldwide, the health of residents is racing up the political agenda. Ben Spencer looks at how one city - Birmingham, UK - has established its own Clean Air Zone and is investing in alternative-fuel vehicles and public transport incentives
  • September 4, 2018
    ITS instrumental in reducing Texan congestion
    ITS projects in the Houston area have seen costs crunched – and even a system failure has proved valuable in analysing performance. David Crawford reports on developments in the Lone Star state Savings by Texan public agencies are major factors in the recent ITS Texas awards, recognising beneficial initiatives in bridge strike prevention and traffic intersection control. In the first, the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT)’s Houston District, covering the state’s most populous city and its surround