Chinese OEMs equal market share of Japanese manufacturers for the first time
- Matthias Schmidt
- 36 minutes ago
- 1 min read
Chinese manufacturers continued to expand their presence across Western Europe in Q2 2026, with their combined share of new passenger car registrations reaching 10.7%, matching the collective market share of Japanese OEMs for the first time. Chinese brands recorded a 28.8% sequential increase in volume from Q1, translating into a 2.0ppt market share gain, although part of this acceleration can be attributed to temporary effects.
Chinese brands registered a record 351,873 new passenger cars in Q2 2026, narrowly surpassing Japanese brands by 2,000 units.
This represents another significant milestone given their relatively short period of genuine market exposure, dating from 2016 when SAIC began rolling out MG models under its ownership.
By comparison, Japanese brands have been established across the region since the early 1970s, with Toyota, Nissan, Honda and Mazda each exceeding 100,000 annual registrations by the end of that decade and collectively surpassing one million units soon after.
Chinese OEMs are now on course to reach one million annual registrations this year. They recorded 625,100 units in the first six months, already close to the 738,797 units delivered during the whole of 2025.
Chinese brands are gaining particularly strongly in markets where Japanese/Korean manufacturers have traditionally held significant positions, notably the UK, Spain and Greece.
This is just a small extract from one of our full studies which are available below. To discover more about out studies just contact us
Scope: Western Europe's 18 Markets: EU Member States prior to the 2004 enlargement, plus EFTA markets Norway, Switzerland, Iceland, plus UK – accounting for 90% of the enlarged European region.
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