Are Chinese passenger car gains across Europe coming at the expense of Japanese and US models?

Chinese passenger car manufacturer's new car volume gains across Western Europe appear to be coming predominantly from Japanese brands, according to the latest Schmidt Automotive Research data.

While Chinese brands from the likes of BYD, Chery (Jaecoo, Omoda and Ebro) and SAIC's MG – accounting for almost four in five of the Sino models arriving in the region so far this year, according to the research – accounted for 5.7% of the region's new car market during the opening 9-months of 2025 compared to just 3.2% one year previously, the 2.5ppt market share gain appears to have been gained largely from US and Japanese brands while European brands saw a collective fall of just 0.2ppts.

During the opening 9 months of 2025, Japanese OEM market share losses were split between a host of brands, with Toyota relinquishing half a percentage point while Suzuki and Nissan witnessed market share losses of 0.3 and 0.2ppts respectively. Japanese exposed to same markets Chinese are targeting greatest What appears to be damaging Japanese market share losses is the fact that Japanese brands are most exposed to exactly those markets Chinese OEMs are targeting most aggressively, Spain, Italy and the UK. 

Half of Japanese brand volumes last year were delivered in precisely these markets. 

Meanwhile, Tesla contributed almost single-handedly to the losses from US manufacturers, witnessing a 0.8ppt fall in market share to just 1.9% so far this year, although its third quarter share rose once again to 2.2% from 1.7% during the previous quarter. European brands not immune to Chinese threat however Individual European brands didn't remain immune however with the likes of Stellantis' Fiat seeing a market share loss of 0.5ppts y/y while Citroën and Opel saw identical 0.3ppts losses respectively. SAIC's MG brand has now equalled Fiat's regional market share of 2.3% while Citroen (2.8%) and Opel (3.2%) remain just ahead, for now. Stellantis brands are expected to see a slight positive impact during the final quarter of the year however as the French social-leasing scheme is reintroduced. Chinese models are excluded.

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Source: Schmidt Automotive Research 

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*Western Europe 18 Markets: EU Member States prior to the 2004 enlargement plus EFTA markets Norway, Switzerland, Iceland, plus UK