Strongest March ever for new car sales as Hilux stays on top

Wednesday, 7 April 2021

Here are the ten biggest selling new vehicles in New Zealand as of the end of March 2021.

March 2021 was the strongest third month of the year ever in terms of vehicle registrations, despite various ongoing Covid-19 restrictions.

According to figures from the Motor Industry Association, March 2021 registrations of 15,498 were 86.3 per cent up on March 2020, or 7181 units. Year to date the market is up 27.6 per cent (9046 units) compared to the first quarter of 2020.

There were 424 pure electric vehicles, 150 plug-in hybrids and 855 hybrids sold over the month, while the Toyota Hilux retained the top spot over Ford’s Ranger (1019 units versus 828 units). The Mitsubishi Triton took a respectable third with 691 units sold.

The Toyota Hilux continues its run at the top of the sales charts as Marhc brings in record registrations.

Once again, Toyota was the market leader for passenger and SUV vehicles with 11 per cent market share (1106 units), followed by Kia with ten per cent (1054) and Mitsubishi also on ten per cent (1018 units).

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The top-selling passenger and SUV models for the month were the Mitsubishi Outlander (467 units) followed by the Kia Sportage (345 units) and the Mazda CX-5 (339 units).

Compact SUVs were the flavour of the month (again) with 21 per cent segment share, followed by medium SUVs at 19 per cent and then Pick Up/Chassis 4x4s with 17 per cent.

As for the commercial market, Toyota retained the market lead with 23 per cent market share (1246 units) followed by Ford with 17 per cent (925 units) and Mitsubishi third with 13 per cent market share (725 units).

The Toyota Hilux retained the top spot for the month of March as the best-selling commercial model with 19 per cent share (1019 units) followed by the Ford Ranger with 15 per cent share (828 units) and the Mitsubishi Triton in third place with 13 per cent market share (691 units).

Total commercial registrations of 5385 units were up 85.6 per cent, setting another record for March.