Spain Full Year 2016: Renault, Seat Leon win in market pushed by rentals

The Seat Leon is the best-seller at home for the third year in a row. 

* See the Top 60 All-brands and Top 420 All-models by clicking on the title *

Consult 44 years of Spanish Historical Data here

New car sales in Spain continue their recovery in 2016, posting a fourth consecutive year of gains at +10.8% and 1.153.645 registrations. This is the highest annual tally in eight years – since 2008 (1.161.499) – and up 65% on the low of 2012 (700.562) but still down 30% on the record high of 2005 (1.647.837). There is an alarm bell ringing this year though: the Spanish market has been pulled up mainly by rental sales up 17% to 206.178 and reaching 17.9% share vs. 17% in 2015, as well as company sales up 16.5% to 321.435 leading to a 27.9% share vs. 26.5% last year. Reversely, private sales are up just 6% to 626.032 and now represent 54.3% of the market vs. 56.6% in 2015. This is still above large European markets such as Germany and France but this trend indicates the Spanish recovery is slowly morphing into an artificially-boosted one.

The new Mégane help Renault snap up the annual brands pole position in Spain. 

Thanks to a last minute surge in December, Renault bypasses Volkswagen and Seat to finish the year in the brands’ pole position with 7.8% market share, only 1.138 sales above Opel (7.7%). Note the two market leaders advance at the same fast pace in 2016: +17%, which is only beaten in the Top 10 by Kia (+19%). Volkswagen (+1%) retrogrades to third place despite ending the year just 1.460 units below Renault, it distances Peugeot (+9%) and Seat (+0.2%). Ford (-7%) is the only manufacturer in the Top 30 with Dacia (-1%) to actually lose volume vs. 2015. Toyota (+13%), Audi (+17%), Hyundai (+15%), Fiat (+29%), Mercedes (+21%), BMW (+23%), Mazda (+19%), Volvo (+26%) and Mini (+18%) all run faster than the market this year, while among smaller brands Suzuki (+63%), Abarth (+78%), Jaguar (+110%), Infiniti (+149%) and Tesla (+418%) stand out.

The Seat Ateca is the most popular new launch of 2016.

Despite falling down in the brands ranking, local carmaker Seat retains its stranglehold on the models charts: the Leon delivers a third consecutive year on top with 2.9% share and its stablemate the Ibiza remains in 2nd place at 2.8%. The Opel Corsa soars 30% and 7 spots on 2015 to land on the third step of the podium with 2.3% share, ahead of the VW Polo (+1%) and Renault Clio (+10%). The VW Golf (-1%), Nissan Qashqai (+6%) and Dacia Sandero (-1%) all drop in the ranking, while the Peugeot 308 (+15%) and 208 (+7%) return to the Top 10. Other great performers include the Renault Captur (+23%), the Hyundai Tucson up to #14 for its first full year, the Opel Mokka up 36%, Hyundai i20 up 41% and Kia Rio up 30%. The Seat Ateca leads new launches at #72 (but ranked in the Top 20 twice), ahead of the Fiat Tipo (#76), Renault Talisman (#98) and the new generation Peugeot 3008 (#110).

Previous post: Spain December 2016: Renault shoots up 55% to 10.4% share

Previous year: Spain Full Year 2015: Second year of reign for the Seat Leon

Two years ago: Spain Full Year 2014: First ever year of reign for the Seat Leon

Full Year 2016 Top 60 All-brands and Top 420 All-models vs. Full Year 2015 figures below.