Japan February 2020: Toyota Raize #1 again, Honda N-WGN up, Toyota Yaris in, 5th double-digit drop (-10.3%)

The Honda N-WGN is up 116.5% year-on-year in Japan in February.

New vehicle sales in Japan endure a 5th consecutive double-digit year-on-year decline in February at -10.3% to 430.185 units, leading to a year-to-date volume down -10.9% to 790.288. Kei cars (-9.6%) resist slightly better this month at 161.883 while regular vehicles drop -10.7% to 268.302, but the situation is reversed year-to-date with kei cars down -11.1% to 300.522 and regular cars down -10.9% to 489.766. The Top 2 brands resist better than the market in February: Toyota (-6.4%) limits its fall to reach 29.3% share while Honda (-9.6%) climbs to 14.6% of its home market. Reversely this month’s falls for Nissan (-13.8%), Suzuki (-12.6%), Daihatsu (-11%) and Mazda (-10.6%) are on or above the market rate. In fact there is only one year-on-year gainer in the Top 15: Mitsubishi Fuso (+6%) with Volkswagen (-2.5%) and Subaru (-6.1%) resisting well but BMW (-25.3%), Mitsubishi (-24.5%), Lexus (-22.7%), Hino (-19.3%) and Mercedes (-16.4%) imploding. Among carmakers securing less than 0.5% market share, Rolls Royce (+116.7%), Lamborghini (+75%), Cadillac (+52.8%),  Jeep (+48.1%), Aston Martin (+38.5%), Audi (+35.9%), Ferrari (+31.2%), Dodge (+30%), Porsche (+8.9%), Citroen (+8.5%) and Volvo (+3.6%) are among the brands in positive just as Hyundai (+266.7%) makes a rare appearance above 10 monthly units.

The Toyota Raize repeats at #1 in the regular car charts.

In the regular cars ranking, the Toyota Raize brilliantly repeats at #1 for what is only its 4th month in market, and has already accumulated 36.800 sales over that period, including over 20.000 in 2020. The Nissan Note (-23.2%) is back above the Toyota Corolla (+29.5%) on the podium, with the Nissan Serena (-20.9%) and Toyota Aqua (-25.2%) in tow. Now that the new generation is in dealerships, the Honda Fit (+23.4%) rallies back up 27 spots on January to #7, it highest ranking since last June (#4). Over 3 years after its launch, the Toyota Roomy (+8.6%) continues to progress at #8, as does its twin the Toyota Tank (+5.1%) at #13. The Toyota RAV4 (#13) leads recent launches (<12 months) above the Mazda CX-30 (#20), the all-new Toyota Yaris (#22) with Japan now aligning its naming with the rest of the world (it used to be called Vitz here), the Daihatsu Rocky (#24), Mazda2 (#32) and Mazda3 (#37). Notice also the Lexus RX300 (+206%), Subaru WRX (+134.2%), Nissan Leaf (+59.7%) and Subaru Levorg (+18.5%) posting spectacular gains in the remainder of the Top 50.

The new Toyota Yaris lands at #22.

Once again a very concentrated kei car market shows the Top 6 best-sellers in that segment in February all outselling the Toyota Raize. The Honda N-BOX (-6%) remains head and shoulders above the competition at over 19.000 units, distancing the Nissan Dayz (+6.6%), Daihatsu Tanto (-4.4%) and Suzuki Spacia (-11.9%) selling between 14.000 and 15.500 units, while the Daihatsu Move (-6.5%) is now threatened by a Honda N-WGN (+116.5%) boosted by a new generation, at 11.570 vs. 11.121 sales. The Subaru Chiffon (+22.4%), Nissan NV100 (+11%), Suzuki Hustler (+11.9%), Suzuki Every Wagon (+5%), Suzuki Alto (+1.5%) and Mazda Flair Wagon (+1.4%) also manage to post year-on-year gains further down.

Previous month: Japan January 2020: Toyota Raize #1, Subaru (+39.9%) only Top 12 brand in positive in 4th straight double-digit market fall (-11.7%)

One year ago: Japan February 2019: Kei cars trust Top 4 again, Toyota Corolla shines in market up 1.2%

Full February 2020 Top 55 All-brands, Top 50 regular cars and Top 32 All kei cars below.