Australia February 2025: BYD Shark 6 lands with a bang

The BYD Shark 6 sold over 2,000 units across two months.

12/03 update: Now with Top 329 All models ranking.

The Australian new vehicle market endures its 7th decline in the past 8 months in February at -7.9% to 96,710 units. This is however the 2nd highest February volume in history below only last year. The year-to-date tally after 2 months is down -5.4% to 184,335. Petrol sales drop -13% to 40,496, diesel is down -16.1% to 26,863, but the big news are next: hybrids soar 34.7% to 15,348, BEVs plunge -43.8% to 5,684 mainly due to Tesla off -71.9% and PHEVs surge 346.1% to 4,871 with the help of BYD as we’ll see further down. SUV sales continue to grow at +1.1% to 58,434 and 60.4% share vs. 55% last year, but light commercials drop -9.9% to 21,337 and 22.1% share vs. 22.6% a year ago and passenger cars tumble down -31.2% to 13,491 units and 13.9% share vs. 18.7% in February 2024. Heavy commercials are off -11% to 3,448 and 3.6% share vs. 3.7%.

All regions are in negative this month. Tasmania (1,502) is the hardest hit at -17.7%, followed by Australian Capital Territory (1,528) at -12.7% and Victoria (25,231) at -11.2%. Queensland (20,591) at -8.3% and Western Australia (10,372) at -8.4% also fall faster than the market. Doing better are New South Wales (30.338) at -5%, South Australia (6,283) at -2.6% and Northern Territory (865) at -0.7%. Private sales sink -12.1% to 48,958, business fleets are down -3.9% to 35,662, rentals off -16.3% to 4,273 and government fleets down -17.4% to 2,652. This excludes Tesla, Polestar and heavy commercials. Finally in terms of country of origin, Japan is down -2.8% to 31,560, Thailand down -21.1% to 18,271, China down -4.5% to 17,127, South Korea off -1.2% to 12,272 and Germany up 4.6% to 4,165.

Over in the brands ranking, Toyota (-2.8%) is down but less so than the market and holds 19.5% share. Mazda (+19.7%) surges ahead to 9.1% share, repeating at #2. Kia (+9.2%) is up one spot on January to #3 for the first time since April 2023. Ford (-12.9%) is relegated to 4th place as a result. Mitsubishi (-4.6%) and Hyundai (+5.1%) cam on their January ranking at #5 and #6 respectively. GWM (+8.5%) is up to a record 7th place, overtaking MG (-16.4%) to become Australia’s favourite Chinese brand. Nissan (-46.2%) collapses on particularly high year-ago volumes and Subaru (-7.7%) rounds out the Top 10. Just below, BYD (+111.8%) is up 11 spots to a record 11th place, smashing its previous best of #15 reached last August. Chery (+224%), Mini (+51.7%), Land Rover (+20.6%) and Mercedes (+19.8%) shine further down. Chinese fare Zeekr makes its first appearance in the charts at #39 with 99 sales.

The Toyota RAV4 (+54.9%) manages an 8th consecutive month in pole position but drops to 4.6% share, its lowest since last June. The Ford Ranger (-24.5%) and Toyota Hilux (-17.9%) are both in a bad way and complete the podium. In fact the Top 5 is unchanged on last month, with the Toyota Prado (+167.5%) and Mitsubishi Outlander (+8%) in tow. The Prado now benefits fully from the new generation of the model. The bombshell of the month is the arrival directly into 6th place of the BYD Shark 6 PHEV pickup truck with over 2,000 sales. Caveat to this is this includes 450 units sold in January that weren’t reported then. Even when removing these the Shark 6 ranks #12. Elsewhere, the Hyundai Kona (+84.5%) sports a second ever Top 10 finish at #10, a ranking it also reached last October.

Previous month: Australia January 2025: Toyota RAV4 secures 7th win in a row in negative market

One year ago: Australia February 2024: Another record result, Nissan at highest in 11 years

Full February 2025 Top 51 All brands and Top 329 All models below.