BYD once again leads the way in China’s NEV (new energy vehicles – BEV, EREV, PHEV) sales charts for September as several car makers set monthly records in the hotly competitive segment. Their new monthly high of 386,414 cars sold in China includes 5,422 sales for Fangchengbao, 310 for Yangwang, and 10,299 for Denza, with the remainder going to BYD’s Ocean and Dynasty series cars.
Denza, it was confirmed to us by Liu Xueliang of BYD APAC last week, will be the next BYD brand to begin sales in Australia with the range likely adopting the Bao 5 of Fangchengbao, being named B5 as labelled on a model we tested on an off-road course.
In second place, it’s a predicted 100,000 unit for Tesla who seem on course for a record Q3 result, but we will await official numbers from them, or at least the best interpretation of what little they provide.
Taking the final podium spot is the evergreen team from Liuzhou, Wuling and Baojun, part of GM’s China operations. Both brands have been on something of a roll over the past 12 months, launching new model after new model across a variety of popular sectors, from microcars to small SUVs, and the results are telling with about 80,000 units from the pair combined. Let the good times roll.
Climbing into fourth with a standout month is Chery with the combined portfolio of Chery, Jetour, Exeed and iCar achieving 58,941 sales seeing them add more than 12,000 sales since their August record.
Li Auto are next up, their 53,709 sales yet another sales record for the brand, with a total of 341,812 sales for the year so far.
This month we’ve separated the Geely Auto brands into their individual parts and it’s the Geely Galaxy range that’s having a storming time, the new E5 helping them to a very healthy 43,998 sales alone.
They beat out Huawei’s Intelligent Mobility Alliance (HIMA), the three brands of AITO, Luxeed and Stelato combining for 39,931 sales in September. Comfortably outpaced by rivals Li Auto this month it seems, but with the Stelato just coming into play and the more affordable but significant Tesla Model Y rival, the Luxeed R7, beginning sales very soon, expect these numbers to change. 20,000 pre-orders already locked in for them so October could be good.
GAC AION kept a steady pace, their 35,780 sales marginally up on August with the new AION V model expected to begin sales soon.
Leapmotor added a healthy 10% to their August total, 33,767 sales being a new record for the Hangzhou-based maker in part thanks to increasing sales of the C10, our review of which you can see here. Sales of Leapmotor will begin very soon in Australia and Europe.
Great Wall had a good month, topping 30,000 sales to beat out August’s results by a good 20%, though we’d love to see the breakdown of those results per brand to see which are excelling and which aren’t.
Lynk & Co, normally included within the wider Geely Group figures, on their own achieved 25,803 sales, predominantly hybrids of course, including the 07 which we reviewed here. This figure beat out their electric-only stablemate Zeekr who achieved 25,333 sales for the month. It’s not clear if any 7X sales are included in this figure yet but they should be next month. We reviewed the car that’s set for international sales in 2025 here.
Deepal drop in behind Lynk & Co, their 22,709 a steady improvement from August, and with the new L07 and S05 models starting sales soon this figure could climb further before year end.
XPeng drop in just behind with a massive record month for the brand. The recently launched MONA M03 (reviewed here) claimed roughly half of their 21,352 monthly sales in September, a leap of more than 50% over August’s number.
All the growth elsewhere pushed NIO back down the charts, their 21,181 sales a slight increase on August but not enough to defend against the competition. This won’t last for long though with Onvo L60 sales about to join the fray so expect a healthy kick in this number for October.
SAIC’s ID sales also jumped in September, up to 13,486, despite no new models joining the fray.
Qiyuan (the hybrid arm of Changan) and Arcfox (an EV brand from BAIC) are next in line with 11,615 and 10,880 sales respectively. We don’t have previous figures for Qiyuan alone but Arcfox’s result saw a gentle climb though nothing spectacular.
The next four brands all just topped 10,000 sales, with Neta claiming 10,118, a drop of about 10% on their August figure and not a great sign since the launch of the Neta S Hunting estate. Yipai (eπ) just beat out stablemates Voyah, both brands recording a collection of ones and zeros, 10,010 and 10,001 respectively. Voyah’s result is quite a leap from their August lows of 6,156, indicating the updated Dreamer and new Zhiyin SUV have made useful contributions.
Xiaomi has only stated 10,000+ sales, so we’ve put these below the two just mentioned though it’s likely quite a bit higher in the mid-tens of thousands. Their CEO Lei Jun claims they should hit their 100,000 annual target in November.
Another Dongfeng brand, the cute little Nammi 01 claimed 6,556 sales all on its lonesome, marking a decent start for the car that’s already on sale in some Eastern European countries and set to expand across Europe in the coming months.
Further down, AVATR pipped IM, their 4,537 sales expected to increase when the newly released 07 SUV comes into play, an AVATR finally hitting the real volume marketplace. We recently tested the 12 saloon which you can see here. IM, who with just 4,516 sales have taken something of a gut punch in September, are down about 33% from their 6,000+ sales in July. They’ll be hoping for a big impact from the launch of their ‘all-new’ LS6 in October.
And finally, Jiyue, the joint venture between Geely and Baidu, claimed a healthy bump in sales over August with 2,605. Not really enough to run a car brand on which does beg some questions over their future existence, but the newly launched 07 might go some way to improving their outlook. You can read all about that car here.
That’s it for September. As we climb towards the traditional December end-of-year high, it’ll be interesting to see which brands start to falter and which are picking up momentum, though all should see gains. Those that aren’t will undoubtedly be in a survival battle in 2025 if there’s no urgent turnaround in fortunes.
