China wholesales March 2024: BYD outsells Volkswagen by a record 86,000 units

The BYD Qin Plus sells over 50,000 units in a month for the first time.

Based on data shared by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, the Chinese wholesales market is up 9.9% year-on-year in March to 2,694,000 units. This includes 2,236,000 Passenger Vehicles (+10.9%) and 458,000 Commercial Vehicles (+5.6%). The Q1 tally is up 10.6% to 6,720,000 including 5,687,000 Passenger Vehicles (+10.7%) and 1,033,000 Commercial Vehicles (+10.1%). The price war that has been affecting the Chinese market for over a year now accelerated further after the Lunar New Year holiday period, resulting in a wait-and-see attitude from potential buyers that has possibly prevented the market from growing even faster. The national government has recently launched a policy guidance targeting the auto industry aimed at boosting and widening car sales. This has materialised though specific events such as the “Hundred Cities Coordination” car festival and the “Thousands of Counties and Tens of Thousands of Towns” new energy vehicle shopping season.

Production is more timid than the wholesales market at +4% year-on-year to 2,687,000 including 2,250,000 PV (+4.7%) and 437,000 CV (+0.7%). Q1 output is up 6.4% to 6,606,000 including 5,609,000 PV (+6.6%) and 997,000 CV (+5.1%). Wholesales of New Energy Vehicles (NEVs) continue to vastly outpace the market at +35.3% to 883,000 units, with BEVs up 15.5% to 566,000 and 21% share of PC+CV, and PHEVs surging 95.1% to 317,000. Over Q1, NEVs are up 31.8% to 2,090,000 including 1,305,000 BEVs (+13.3%) and 784,000 PHEVs (+81.2%).

VW sales are down despite a strong performance by the T-Cross.

Data by the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA) shows slightly different wholesales figures but splits the PC data by segment. We therefore learn that cars wholesales edge up 4.7% to 949,000, MPVs up 6.7% to 101,000 and SUVs up 15.3% to 1,140,000. Year-to-date, cars are also up 4.7% to 2,368,000, MPVs actually drop -5.3% to 211,000 and SUVs soar 17.2% to 3,010,000. Looking at the Passenger Cars market only, Chinese-branded vehicles step up 23% year-on-year in March to 1,296,000 and 59.3% share vs. 52.1% in March 2023, 48.5% in March 2022 and 39.7% in March 2021. Exports are up 37.9% to a new record 502,000 in March including 424,000 PC (+39.3%). CV exports are up 31% to 78,000. Over Q1, exports soar 33.2% to 1,324,000 units including 1,110,000 PC (+34.3%) and 214,000 CV (+27.5%).

After falling to #2 over the first two months of the year, BYD (+34.9%) is back with a vengeance in March and outsells Volkswagen (-1.9%) by a whopping (and record) 86,000 sales. The highest previous gap between the two brands was 56,000 in November 2022. Many BYD models sport giant year-on-year gains, such as the Yuan Pro (+1105%), Destroyer 05 (+354.6%), Song Pro (+173.7%) and Han (+47.3%). On Volkswagen’s side, an overall negative result hides strong performances by the T-Cross (+106.3%), ID.3 (+100.6%), Passat (+61.3%), Teramont (+55.7%), Golf (+52.9%), Tavendor (+52.9%), ID.4 Crozz (+47.5%) and Tayron (+41.6%). In third place, Toyota (-7.8%) struggles despite the usual upticks by the twins Corolla Cross (+46.2%) and Front Lander (+60.9%) as well as the Highlander (+48.1%) and the bZ3 (+1818.2%) off a low base.

Mercedes is up to #5 brand overall.

Geely (+23.9%) is pushed up by the success of its Galaxy lineup, while Mercedes (+21.4%) surges to #5, the brand’s highest Chinese ranking since March 2020 (#5 also). Tesla (-18.6%) suffers year-on-year but climbs back up 7 spots on February to #6, its 2nd highest ever ranking below the #5 it hit a year ago in March 2023. Changan (-12.3%) and Honda (-26.4%) can’t catch the market’s growth while Audi (+6.3%) is soft. Nissan (+32.5%) excels at #10, as do Chery (+30.2%), Li Auto (+39.2%), Jetour (+117.4%), AITO (+571.8%) and Lynk & Co (+38.1%) below. Newcomer Qiyuan smashes its volume record by 56% to over 15,000 units and reaches a record 25th place. Leapmotor (+136%) and Zeekr (+95.3%) also impress further down. Finally iCar more than doubles its previous highest volume to over 3,600 sales.

Model-wise, the BYD Qin Plus (+25.3%) repeats at #1 and crosses the 50,000 monthly volume mark for the first time, eclipsing its previous best of 42,887 reached in March 2023. It is also #1 year-to-date. The Tesla Model Y (-12.8%) is #1 again and has sold over 100,000 units in three months, placing it at #2 YTD. BYD holds four of the next five spots, with the Song Plus (+16.9%) at #3, the new Seagull at #5, the Song Pro (+173.7%) at #6 and the Yuan Plus (-21.3%) at #7. The odd one out is the Nissan Sylphy (+28.1%) in great shape at #4. The VW Lavida (-13.1%) follows at #8 ahead of the Mercedes C-Class L (+46.3%) and BYD Han (+47.3%) closing out the Top 10 in fantastic fashion. #3 last month, the AITO M7 (+1288.7%) falls to #14 in March.

Previous month: China wholesales February 2024: Market down -19.9% on calendar quirk, VW stays #1, AITO M7 #3

One year ago: China wholesales March 2023: BYD places 4 models in Top 5, market up 9.7%

Full March 2024 Top 97 All brands and Top 530 All models below.