Cui Dongshu, Secretary-General of the China Passenger Car Association, noted in a published article that, according to statistics from the world automotive organization, global vehicle production has continued to grow, reaching 96.89 million units in 2025, up 6% from 91.77 million units in 2024, with China accounting for 35.4% of world production. In the first nine months of 2026, cumulative global vehicle sales totaled 72.52 million units, up 3% year on year; September alone recorded 8.74 million units, up only 2% year on year and 12.4% month on month, indicating weak momentum in the global auto market.
In the first nine months of 2026, cumulative global vehicle sales reached 72.52 million units. By country, China sold 23.27 million units for a 32.1% share, a marked decline from 35.4% in 2025; the United States sold 12.30 million units for a 17.0% share, a slight decrease; India performed strongly, with its share rising to 6.7%, becoming a growth highlight. Looking at share changes over the years, China's global proportion continued to climb from 2022 to 2025, reaching a cyclical peak in 2025. Major European countries saw their shares remain broadly stable with a slight downward trend, while emerging markets such as Brazil and Russia maintained stable shares. The decline in Chinese market sales in the first nine months of 2026 was the core reason for the shift in global shares, while rapid growth in emerging markets such as India partly offset the growth pressures from China and the United States, helping the global auto market maintain modest positive growth.
East rising, West falling: aside from Toyota, Hyundai-Kia, Suzuki and Tata, other international brands saw their shares drop significantly in 2026. Compared with 2019, Chinese independent brands have comprehensively raised their world shares. Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd (ASX: 00175), BYD Company Limited (HKEX: 01211), Chery Automobile (HKEX: 09973), SAIC Motor Corporation Limited (SSE: 600104) and Chongqing Changan Automobile Co., Ltd. (SZSE: 000625) have performed strongly as independent players. Electrification has also led some international automakers to gradually decline. Apart from favorable factors such as Suzuki's strong performance in the Indian market, the shares of other European and American international brands have seen comprehensive and substantial declines.
Monthly global vehicle sales trend
Since 2025, the global auto market has generally grown well, with each month performing better than the same period a year earlier. In 2026, the global auto market has been highly volatile: because China's Spring Festival fell in February 2026, stable sales before the holiday led to better global growth in January, but February saw a sharp drop in Chinese sales due to the holiday, March to July improved noticeably, August fell back significantly, and September rebounded to the second-highest level of the year. In the first nine months of 2026, cumulative global vehicle sales totaled 72.52 million units, up 3% year on year; September alone recorded 8.74 million units, up only 2% year on year and 12.4% month on month, indicating weak momentum in the global auto market. In 2025, full-year global vehicle sales reached 96.89 million units, up 6% year on year, a relatively good level in recent years. Compared with historical data, the global auto market achieved a high recovery growth rate of 11% in 2023, slowed to 3% in 2024, rebounded to 6% in 2025, and growth slowed markedly in 2026, mainly dragged down by pressure on sales in the two core markets of China and the United States at the start of the year. First-quarter 2026 sales were 22.89 million units, second-quarter 24.83 million units and third-quarter 24.71 million units, with the second quarter outperforming the third, but September rebounded well, and a strong market performance with a possible new high this year can be expected.
Global vehicle sales trend over the years
The global vehicle sales in the table above mainly cover sales from 70 countries. These 70 core countries had around 90 million units in 2019, which is also the level that can basically be tracked monthly. Due to frequent conflicts, recent global data has been slow. Another 100 countries can only be tracked annually, totaling about 3 million units in recent years; relative to the 80 million units from the 70 major countries, these smaller countries account for only about 3% and have little impact. From the perspective of world sales represented by major countries, a downward cycle began after 2018, hitting bottom in 2020; recovery began in 2021; the 3% growth in 2026 is a relatively good performance, with the 4% decline in the Chinese auto market having a major impact. This year, the overall performance of China's auto market has fallen short of expectations, and the divergence in global auto market growth is also widening.
China maintains its leading position in 2026 sales
The Chinese auto market has an extremely huge influence on the global auto market. From 2016 to 2018, China accounted for about 30% of the world's automobiles; in 2019 it fell to 29% but still held an absolute advantage; in 2020-2021 the share rebounded to 32%; in 2022 China's share rose to 33.5%; in 2023 China's share remained at 33.8%; in 2024 China reached 34.2% of the world's automobiles; in 2025 China reached 35.4% of the world's automobiles. In the first nine months of 2026, cumulative global vehicle sales totaled 72.52 million units, up 3% year on year; China's market sales were 23.27 million units, down 4% year on year, and China's share of global sales fell back to 32.1%, dragging down overall global growth. By region, in the first nine months of 2026, North America recorded 15.19 million units, Europe 13.00 million units, other Asia 15.70 million units, and the Southern Hemisphere 5.37 million units. Looking back over the years, global sales have continued to recover since the pandemic trough in 2020, with 11% growth in 2023, showing strong recovery momentum. In 2025, global sales reached 96.89 million units, up 6%, while China's market grew 9% that year, with its share reaching a high of 35.4%. In 2026, negative growth in China's auto market is the core factor behind the slowdown in global growth, while overseas regional markets maintained positive growth, offsetting some pressure from the domestic market.
Developing country markets strengthen significantly
In the first nine months of 2026, cumulative global vehicle sales reached 72.52 million units. By country, China sold 23.27 million units for a 32.1% share, a marked decline from 35.4% in 2025; the United States sold 12.30 million units for a 17.0% share, a slight decrease; India performed strongly, with its share rising to 6.7%, becoming a growth highlight. Looking at share changes over the years, China's global proportion continued to climb from 2022 to 2025, reaching a cyclical peak in 2025. Major European countries saw their shares remain broadly stable with a slight downward trend, while emerging markets such as Brazil and Russia maintained stable shares. The decline in Chinese market sales in the first nine months of 2026 was the core reason for the shift in global shares, while rapid growth in emerging markets such as India partly offset the growth pressures from China and the United States, helping the global auto market maintain modest positive growth. China's auto market has generally performed well in recent years, with its share continuing to rise. Since 2020, China's world share has continued to increase, reaching 33.8% in 2023, 34.2% in 2024, 35.4% in 2025 and 32.1% in 2026, down 3.3 percentage points from 2025.
Market trends across countries
Global vehicle sales rose 3% in the first nine months of 2026, with China's auto sales down 4%, U.S. sales down 2%, India's auto market up 22%, Thailand's auto market up 16%, Russia's market up 5% and Vietnam up 27%. Emerging markets are driving a relatively good market performance.
Trend of China's world market share
China's share of the world auto market has recently gradually stabilized in the 34%-36% range. At the start of 2026, as the rollout of the two-new subsidy policies progressed steadily, China's auto sales fell sharply in January-February, the share rebounded in March, and by September the share recovered to 35%. The cumulative share for 2026 is 32%.
Characteristics of monthly vehicle sales trends by country
From the monthly sales growth trends of countries around the world, month-to-month trends are basically balanced. However, affected by seasonal factors, annual factors and many others, trends across countries still show considerable divergence. Because China's auto market is still in a period of private car popularization, it tends to be relatively strong at the beginning and end of the year and relatively soft in the middle, while India's auto market tends to be relatively strong at the start of the year and relatively stable in the middle.
World share performance of international groups
This chart shows the world sales share trends of major automotive groups. From the current overall performance of the groups, the shares of leading international automakers have fallen noticeably, while Chinese automakers have generally performed strongly. As the international market status of India, Brazil and Russia rises, and as Asian automakers such as Geely, Chery and Suzuki perform well, East Asian automakers' production and sales trends are relatively good. European automakers have generally performed poorly. Among the world's top 10 automakers in the first nine months of this year, three Chinese automakers have relatively strong shares: BYD has rebounded to fifth place in the world, Geely is seventh and Chery is eighth.
Regional share performance of international groups
East rising, West falling: compared with 2019, Chinese independent brands have comprehensively raised their world shares this year. Geely, BYD, Chery, SAIC, Changan and Great Wall (HKEX: 02333) have performed strongly as independent players. Aside from Toyota, Hyundai-Kia, Suzuki and Tata, other mainstream international brands saw significant share declines in 2026. Asian automakers are relatively strong; in 2026, Toyota Group performed relatively well, down 0.8% from 2019, and maintained a world share of around 11% in 2026, also because Toyota performed relatively strongly overall in Europe and North America. South Korea's Hyundai Motor trended steadily, reaching 7.4% in 2026, down 0.2% from 2019; Hyundai Group performed very well in North America and other Asian markets, but continued to trend weakly in China due to weak product competitiveness. Suzuki's market performance was relatively strong, mainly due to strong performance in markets such as India and Japan. Honda Group also performed poorly this year, down 2.5% from 2019, with weak performance in the Chinese market. In 2026, European automakers were generally weak, especially Renault-Nissan, Stellantis and Volkswagen, whose shares fell by about 3 percentage points from 2019, equivalent to a loss of nearly 3 million units. These European companies face great pressure in the Chinese market and cannot retreat there, requiring a second start. Successful electrification transformation has brought comprehensive growth for China's second-tier automakers.
Comments