In 2023, Thailand’s electric car market witnessed a record-breaking sales of 76,314 vehicles. By 2024, in the first month alone, electric cars have set a new record.
Specifically, with 13,653 cars sold in January being electric, this segment accounted for 20.5% of the market share. In total, 65,067 new cars were sold in Thailand during that timeframe.
Thailand is leading the Southeast Asian market in electric car sales. Photo: BYD
In the past 2 years, Thailand has made efforts to promote the transition to electric cars while attracting investment from major brands to build manufacturing plants here. Many Chinese brands have been and are still constructing electric car plants in Thailand, with the most notable one being BYD.
As usual, the majority of electric cars sold in Thailand are from China. The top 2 best-selling models in the country are the BYD Dolphin (3,175 cars) and BYD Seal (3,008 cars). The brand’s 3rd model in Thailand, the BYD Atto 3, also reached 4th place with 1,592 cars sold.
Thanks to its early establishment of a plant in Thailand, BYD has a strong foothold in the number 1 car market in Southeast Asia. Photo: China-Global South Project
Looking at a broader perspective, out of the top 15 best-selling electric cars in Thailand, only 2 are not from China. They include the electric version of the Volvo XC40 (ranked 13th, with 105 units sold) and the BMW iX3 (ranked 14th, with 95 units sold).
Meanwhile, although Tesla entered the Thai market quite early, it seems to no longer please the customers here. While the company sold 568 Model Ys and 460 Model 3s in December, January only witnessed the sale of 37 and 15 units respectively.
