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Electric and plug-in hybrid specialist BYD could surpass Ford in its annual sales this year as the Chinese brand continues to gain momentum.
Electric Cars
BYD is on track to overtake Ford for global sales in 2024.
In October, BYD sold 534,003 vehicles globally – including trucks and buses – after it narrowly toppled Ford in the third quarter of 2024 by 40,000 units with 1.13 million sales, Bloomberg reports.
Ford has delivered 3.3 million vehicles globally in the first nine months of 2024 – with 1.1 million deliveries between July and September – while BYD shipped 3.25 million vehicles to the end of September.
In 2023, BYD sold three million vehicles while Ford delivered four million – however the Chinese brand has already surpassed its full-year 2023 sales with the final three months of 2024 still to be counted.
BYD is the number-one carmaker in China – the world’s biggest new-car market – ahead of Volkswagen, Toyota, Honda and Changan, and it sells the most electric vehicles with a 26 per cent market share in 2023.
Some carmakers, including Ford, have found it challenging to gain traction in the lucrative Chinese market.
BYD does not sell vehicles in the United States and Canada – the leading market for Ford – although it has investigated building a factory in Mexico as a way to enter the region without incurring import tariffs.
BYD launched in Australia in 2022 under third-party distributor EVDirect, initially with the electric Atto 3 small SUV and later the Dolphin hatch and Seal sedan in 2023.
It launched its first plug-in hybrid vehicle in mid-2024, the Sealion 6 midsize SUV, while orders for the Shark 6 plug-in hybrid ute opened in late October.
In Australia, BYD sold 16,913 vehicles between January and October 2024 – led by the Atto 3 EV and Sealion 6 PHEV – compared to 83,145 Ford sales dominated by the Ranger and Everest.
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Jordan is a motoring journalist based in Melbourne with a lifelong passion for cars. He has been surrounded by classic Fords and Holdens, brand-new cars, and everything in between from birth, with his parents’ owning an automotive workshop in regional Victoria. Jordan started writing about cars in 2021, and joined the Drive team in 2024.
