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One of our team members mentioned yesterday that BYD beat Tesla in BEV sales last quarter, and that we should have an article about it. I did publish such comparisons in the past, so it was definitely on me to get a new one out now. (To be honest, I just forgot about doing these comparisons, and it’s been a year since I’ve done one, so this is a big update that goes much further back than last quarter.)
First things first, we’re looking at full battery electric vehicle sales. Tesla led in this field for years. BYD had a surge in the 4th quarter of 2023 when it beat Tesla, but then Tesla took back the title for a while again. However, in Q4 2024, BYD took the title again, and it held the #1 spot globally for 5 quarters in a row. Then, in Q1 2026, in the face of a big drop in BYD sales (and broader China auto sales), Tesla won back the title … briefly. Now that we have Q2 2026 numbers in, we see that BYD won again despite Tesla having its 4th best sales quarter ever. BYD had 557,090 BEV sales, while Tesla had 480,126 BEV sales. You can see the long-term quarterly trend in the chart above and the graph below. Then I’ll get to another topic….
