BYD now Australia's number two car brand and top EV seller as electrified sales hit record levels

BYD's record run to second place

The Conversation reports that BYD sold more than 68,000 vehicles in Australia in the first eight months of 2026, making it the country's second-highest-selling brand behind Toyota, and that among electric vehicles it sold more than 39,000 cars over the same period, overtaking Tesla as Australia's highest-selling EV brand. In June, the outlet notes, just 243 sales separated BYD from Toyota. ¹

Xinhua, citing Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries data, puts a precise figure on the eight-month tally: 68,423 new BYD vehicles delivered to the end of August 2026, up 108 per cent from 32,839 at the same point in 2025. In August alone, BYD delivered 8,231 vehicles, second among all manufacturers behind Toyota, compared with 4,877 in August 2025. ⁴

CarExpert reported in June that BYD had placed second overall for a second consecutive month in May, with 8,211 sales against Toyota's 16,342. The publication noted BYD's year-to-date sales had more than doubled from 15,199 to 33,454 units while Toyota's tally had fallen from 100,753, with BYD's market share rising from 3.1 per cent in May 2025 to 8.2 per cent in May 2026. ⁵

Earlier in the year, carsales' VFACTS reporting showed BYD finishing second overall for the first time in April 2026 with 7,702 sales and 8.3 per cent market share, more than double its April 2025 result, built on volume across every segment it competes in rather than a single model. ³

Record EV share and a first for combustion

The FCAI said battery-electric vehicles accounted for 24.9 per cent of all new vehicle sales in August 2026, surpassing the previous record of 23.3 per cent set in June, according to Xinhua. It was the fourth consecutive month BEVs held at least 20 per cent of the market after the milestone was first reached in May, and August BEV sales were up 171 per cent year-on-year. ⁴

Electrek, citing VFACTS and Electric Vehicle Council data, reports that August's 27,078 BEV sales put electric cars ahead of both petrol (25,824) and diesel (23,608) for the first time in Australia, with electrified vehicles including hybrids taking 51.8 per cent of the market and the overall market growing 4.9 per cent to 108,760 vehicles. ⁶

Over the first half of 2026, the Electric Vehicle Council's latest report found EVs accounted for one in four new cars sold, with market share more than doubling from 12.1 per cent to 25.8 per cent, The Conversation reports. The council counted almost 158,000 EVs sold in the six months, more than in all of 2025, amid fuel price volatility tied to the US-Iran conflict. ²¹

CarExpert, using FCAI and Electric Vehicle Council data, counted 103,843 EV deliveries in the first half of 2026, a 119.8 per cent increase on the same period last year, when EVs held 7.6 per cent of the market. ⁷

How BYD overtook Tesla in EVs

CarExpert reports that BYD displaced Tesla as Australia's best-selling EV brand in the first half of 2026, recording 29,192 deliveries against Tesla's 23,588 despite Tesla growing 66.7 per cent, as BYD's EV sales jumped 241.2 per cent. That gave BYD 28.1 per cent of the EV market to Tesla's 22.3 per cent. ⁷

By model, CarExpert's data shows the Tesla Model Y remained the top-selling EV with 20,396 deliveries, ahead of the BYD Sealion 7 on 12,516 and the Geely EX5 on 6756. The BYD Atto 1 was the best-selling EV hatchback with 3254 deliveries. ⁷

In August, Electrek reports, the BYD Sealion 7 moved 2,213 units and finished sixth across the entire market, and seven of the eight best-selling EVs were Chinese brands, with Tesla's Model Y and Model 3 built at Giga Shanghai meaning all eight rolled off Chinese production lines. ⁶

The broader Chinese-brand shift

Xinhua, citing FCAI data, reports that Chinese manufacturers BYD, GWM, MG, Geely and Chery all ranked among the top 10 most popular brands in Australia in August, with Geely selling 4,504 vehicles for the month, an increase of more than 1000 per cent from 401 in August 2025. FCAI chief executive Tony Weber said the market is undergoing a significant structural shift, with changing brand preferences reshaping consumer choice. ⁴

carsales' VFACTS reporting found Chinese-manufactured vehicles accounted for roughly 30 per cent of all April 2026 sales, up from around 15 per cent a year earlier, with Chery and GWM placing ninth and seventh overall for the month. ³

The Conversation notes BYD's Shark 6 plug-in hybrid ute sold almost 9500 vehicles in the first half of 2026 and by June had become Australia's third-highest-selling ute behind only the Ford Ranger and Toyota HiLux, while the brand launched the Atto 1 in September with a starting price of $19,990, pushing a new EV below the $20,000 mark for the first time. ²

Toyota's response and the distribution change

CarExpert reports BYD launched in Australia in 2022 under importer EVDirect, whose founder and executive director Luke Todd told the publication in early 2025, when asked when the brand expected to become Australia's number-one automotive brand: "I'm on record as saying our target is 2027." In mid-2025, BYD took over Australian distribution from EVDirect, which remains a dealer partner. ⁵

Speaking to media including CarExpert at an event marking the arrival of almost 5000 BYD vehicles in Melbourne in June, BYD vice president Liu Xueliang was more measured: "Toyota is still an excellent company. We continue learning while working hard ourselves. Whether we can surpass Toyota in Australia ultimately depends on Australian consumers." ⁵

The same CarExpert report notes Toyota has been Australia's best-selling brand every year since 2003, delivered a record 241,296 vehicles in 2024, and issued a statement around the arrival of the BYD Zhengzhou vehicle carrier saying it had secured an additional 10,000 vehicles for Australia and remained on track to deliver 220,000 vehicles in 2026. BYD said in April it planned to ship 30,000 vehicles to Australia in response to demand, particularly for its EVs. ⁵

Behind the rise, and the scrutiny that comes with it

The Conversation attributes BYD's rise to several factors: high vertical integration, with the company making its own batteries, electric motors, power electronics and some semiconductors, and even operating its own vehicle-carrier ships; a broad plug-in hybrid range alongside fully electric models; its lithium iron phosphate Blade Battery, which is generally cheaper and requires neither nickel nor cobalt; and long-running Chinese government support including subsidies and tax incentives. ¹

The same publication notes the expansion has attracted controversy, including an ABC Four Corners investigation in which a cybersecurity expert remotely accessed functions in a BYD Shark 6, and that while ANCAP awarded the Shark 6 five stars, it applied a penalty score for posing a greater risk to oncoming vehicles due to the ute's size, weight and front-end design, the model being larger than many of Australia's largest utes including some Ford Ranger variants. ¹

The Conversation also reports the EV boom is uneven across categories: around 30 per cent of new buses sold in the first half of 2026 were electric but only 0.6 per cent of new trucks, and the Electric Vehicle Council counts more than 4200 public charging locations with around 11,600 charging points, though access remains uneven between states and EVs still make up roughly 3 per cent of Australia's total vehicle fleet. ²