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Sales of new cars in the UK topped 2mn for the first time since before the pandemic as BYD and other Chinese brands increased their share in Europe’s second-largest electric vehicle market.
Some 2.02mn cars were registered in Britain last year, up 3.5 per cent from 2024 and compared with 2.31mn sales in 2019, according to annual figures released by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders on Tuesday.
“It’s obviously not a full recovery,” said SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes. “If you strip out the Chinese brands, there wouldn’t have been growth in the market.”
The return to pre-Covid annual sales of 2mn cars was mainly driven by the rise in demand for electric vehicles, which accounted for 23 per cent of the UK market.
The rapid rise of Chinese brands has contributed to the sharp increase in EVs and plug-in hybrid sales — they increased their share of the UK’s EV market to 12.8 per cent last year, compared with 8.5 per cent in 2024.
Chinese carmakers such as BYD and Chery, which sells the Omoda and Jaecoo brands, have aggressively targeted the UK market in the absence of higher import tariffs imposed on Chinese-built EVs in other parts of Europe.
New car sales of Chinese brands doubled to more than 196,000 vehicles in 2025 compared to the previous year as they rolled out affordable EVs and hybrids.
Despite the popularity of Chinese-built EVs and hybrids, Hawes warned that progress in EV sales remained “fragile”.
The SMMT estimated that manufacturers spent roughly £5.5mn last year — equivalent to £11,000 per newly registered electric car — to offer discounts to boost consumer demand and achieve the UK government’s EV sales target.
The current scheme requires a certain percentage of each carmakers’ annual new car sales to be zero emission vehicles, with the percentage rising from 28 per cent last year to 33 per cent in 2026, reaching 80 per cent in 2030. Companies face fines of £15,000 for each missed vehicle.
The EV market share jumped to 32 per cent in December but this has been the only month where EV sales topped the UK government’s target of 28 per cent for 2025.
In April, the government watered down some of those targets by lowering the fines and analysts say manufacturers are unlikely to pay penalties for last year due to other flexibilities built into the scheme.
However, the SMMT has called on the government to bring forward a planned review of the country’s “zero emission vehicle mandate” so it can be completed this year, instead of early in 2027.
