Carsharing in Moscow

Carsharing in Moscow is a rapidly developing type of public transport in the city. As of January 2020 Moscow has the largest fleet of carsharing vehicles in the world which counts more than 30,000 cars ahead of such megacities as Tokyo, Beijing and Shanghai. In Moscow, more than 150,000 trips are made by carsharing cars every day. The largest carsharing operator in Moscow is Delimobil which has a fleet of 17,000 cars.

Overview
In 2019 the fleet of carshare vehicles in Moscow reached 30,000, almost double from the previous year, outpacing expectations. Some industry insiders say there is a potential for as many as 100,000 carshare vehicles to eventually become available.

In addition to preferential municipal parking for carsharing vehicles, the Moscow Government exempts electric vehicles from paying transport tax.

Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin and the head of Yandex Arkady Volozh participated in an event dedicated to the launch of Yandex.Drive's electric vehicles in late September 2019.

Thirty electric Nissan Leafs branded by Yandex.Drive became available in Moscow in 2019. A number of electric vehicles of different models are also available from other carsharing operators.

Operators and fleet
The table below provides information about the largest carsharing operators in Moscow.

Long-time subscribing
Some operators provide long-term rentals. Subscription plans include car and mileage, but not include free parking in city, washing and refueling

2012
Moscow's first carsharing service was created on 21 December 2012 by Alexander Yermolenko, commissioned by Citycar, which was rebranded as Anytime. The company launched a pilot project on 21 Volkswagen Polo vehicles.

2013
Anytime added a few BMW 1 Series cars to its fleet and expanded to 72 vehicles.

2014
In February 2014, StreetCar launched its own carsharing service in St Petersburg.

Anytime acquired a further 100 vehicles, adding the BMW 1 Series, Chevrolet Cruze, VW Polo and Hyundai Solaris to its fleet.

The same year Anytime launched the St Petersburg market with a plan to unite the two capitals in a common carsharing service, with the ability to take and leave cars in either city.

On 1 August 2014, the Moscow City Pay-Parking System is expanding to the boundaries of the Third Ring Road, which serves to raise the attention on carsharing as part of the Public Transportation System.

2015
Due to the low commercial success of carsharing in St Petersburg, StreetCar closes down and Anytime stops operating its branch in St Petersburg, focusing on the Moscow market.

In 2015, Moscow's paid parking zone expanded beyond the Third Ring Road, giving a huge boost to carsharing in Russia.

Vincenzo Trani launched his own carsharing service Delimobil in September 2015.

A new BelkaCar carsharing service was announced.

Anytime launches a truck rental service for small trucks.

2016
Launch of BelkaCar, a new entrant to the carsharing market with a fleet of 100 cars.

The overall carshare fleet in Moscow has exceeded 1,500 cars.

2017
Transition to fully remote registration of users in the carsharing system, without signing paper contracts.

Anytime and BelkaCar cars appeared in Yandex Maps app. By the end of the year, Yandex will close the carshare aggregator project and develop its own service.

Delimobil comes to the St Petersburg market.

Moscow carsharing begins to expand in Russia's regions. Launch of new carsharing providers: Rentmee, Carousel, Carlion, Easyride, Carenda, Lifcar, Car4You.

2018
In May 2018, Anytime and Delimobil merged into a single entity, becoming the largest carsharing company in Russia. Vincenzo Trani and Mikro Kapital will take over full management of the companies.

Moscow-based Anytime is changing its business model to the premium segment. Anytime opens in Belarus, Kazakhstan and the Czech Republic.

Yandex launches its own carsharing service, Yandex.Drive, with a fleet of 750 cars.

2019
Delimobil is planning an IPO.

The number of rides on Moscow's carsharing system has reached 50mn.

The number of cars involved in carsharing reached 31,000.

The outstanding growth in the volume of carsharing vehicles in the Russian capital made it one of the leading car sharing market players worldwide. In 2019, Moscow beat the previous year’s leader - Tokyo.