The Chinese company BYD has been one of the world’s largest car manufacturers for a long time, and now it has finally sat on the throne. According to the latest data, in 2024 BYD sold 1,777,965 EVs, dethroning the long-time leader Tesla.

The year 2024 is over and it brought some changes with it. After the manufacturers collected their sales results, we got a new automotive king of electric cars. Chinese manufacturers have once again shown that they are unstoppable and that their development can hardly be followed by other manufacturers.

In 2023, Tesla produced 1.85 million electric vehicles, while 1.6 million EVs came out of BYD’s factories. However, strong competition, price and an aging fleet of Tesla EVs drove customers to competitors. Since the beginning of the year, the figures showed a drop in demand, which happened for the first time in the history of this American company.

On the other hand, Chinese companies have increased production and entered the global market. This resulted in BYD’s total sales last year increasing by 41 percent to 4.27 million cars. However, if you look at the numbers differently, Tesla is in advantages. The American company sold 1.79 million electric vehicles, while BYD sold about 1.65 million. So, these figures refer to the number of cars sold, not produced, so in this case Tesla has a slight advantage. This means that Tesla sold thousands of cars produced in 2023.

Back in 2023, China showed that it was not kidding and that sooner or later it would become a leader in automobile production. Their cars have become technologically better but also more affordable, which other big manufacturers cannot keep up with.

Source: Reuters