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The Toyota RAV4 is on track to post record sales in Australia this year, but it is not looking to be enough to deny the Ford Ranger a second consecutive number-one finish.
The Ford Ranger looks set to top the Australian new-car sales charts for the second consecutive year – after defeating the Toyota HiLux in 2023 – despite a fresh challenge from the Toyota RAV4.
It would be the first Ford to top the country's most popular new model in consecutive years since the Falcon led the sales race in 1992 and 1993.
Record deliveries on multiple occasions in 2024 have placed the Toyota RAV4 closer than ever to the top step of the podium, as the stock shortages of the pandemic have eased – and production improved.
It finished January with a lead of 2500 sales in the year-to-date race, before strong Ford Ranger sales grew the gap to more than 8000 sales at the end of June.
The Toyota RAV4 has narrowed the difference since then, overtaking the Toyota HiLux – the top seller from 2016 to 2022 – in year-to-date sales in August.
But the latest data from the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) shows the RAV4 has entered the final month of the year 4501 deliveries behind the Ford Ranger, a margin it looks unlikely to overcome.
Year to date, Toyota RAV4 sales are up 95.4 per cent, while the Ford Ranger is up 4.5 per cent.
Even Toyota is bullish on the RAV4's chances of stealing the crown.
"I think it's going to be tight. It's going to be close," Toyota Australia sales and marketing boss Sean Hanley told Drive at last month's launch of the new Prado 4WD.
"It has to do a lot of monthly sales to be number one between now and Christmas. Look, I don't know. It'd be a dream come true if it did, but the truth of the matter is it's probably it's gonna be close."
While it may not top the charts this year, Hanley predicts an SUV will lead the new-car sales race within the next three years – and sales of top-selling utes will be cannibalised by new entrants into the market.
"I do believe over the next one to three years in the Australian market, an SUV could be the number-one selling car.
"The reason I say that is twofold. One is the expansion and demand for these SUVs. The product lineup is expanding rapidly everywhere, not just by Toyota – from everywhere.
"Secondly, I think the ute market is going to be so saturated that it's unrealistic to think that with all of those new entries – including existing entries that are strong – that we can sit up the top and comfortably be doing the same rate that we're doing today unless you spend a lot of money.
"And I'm not sure the spend would give you a good return anyhow, so therefore it's probable that as new entrants come into the ute market, [model] sales could actually drop a bit."
The Toyota executive said order intake – how many new orders are being placed, rather than cars delivered, as represented in the official sales data –for the RAV4 is "very healthy", as is supply.
While the Toyota RAV4 may not become Australia's top-selling new car, it is well on track to become the country's most popular SUV.
There is daylight to the second-placed Mitsubishi Outlander, which has recorded 25,622 sales so far this year – up 14.5 per cent on the same period last year.
Alex Misoyannis has been writing about cars since 2017, when he started his own website, Redline. He contributed for Drive in 2018, before joining CarAdvice in 2019, becoming a regular contributing journalist within the news team in 2020. Cars have played a central role throughout Alex’s life, from flicking through car magazines at a young age, to growing up around performance vehicles in a car-loving family.
