Car sales in China rose 14.7% year-on-year to 2.59 million units in July 2025, according to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM). It follows a 13.8% rise in June.
On a monthly basis, the results were not so positive with total car sales falling 10.7% in July and reversing the 8.1% growth seen in June.
Sales of new energy vehicles (NEVs)—this includes battery electric (BEV), hybrid and fuel cell electric vehicles(FCEV) —saw a dramatic rise, growing 27.4% year-on-year to 1.26 million units in July. This marked a fifth consecutive month of growth in this sector. NEVs made up 48.7% of all new car sales in China.
Looking closer at the NEVs market, BEVs managed a 41.7% increase year-on-year, with sales totalling 811,000. Plug-in hybrids (PHEV), whilst a small (2.8%) increase year-on-year, saw 4% contraction in July compared to June. This marks a potential change in consumer habits as preferences shift away from PHEVs—a year ago, we saw the opposite situation, with sluggish growth for BEVs and strong gains for PHEVs.
BYD continues to be China’s leading brand, however, in July they saw a 10% drop in NEV sales—reporting 344,296 units sold—compared to June.
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Vehicle sales in 2025
In the first seven months of 2025, total vehicle sales in China rose 12%, with NEVs dominating the sector—making up 45% of sales and sales volumes rising 38.5% to 8.22 million units.
This is a promising start to the year, following a disappointing 2024 where vehicle sales totalled 31.44 million units, a moderate 4.5% increase and considerable slowdown in comparison to the year before which recorded 12% growth.
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