Front-runner brand stays ahead
More than 49 million cars now drive through Germany
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German roads will become even more crowded, and the number of registered cars will increase again in 2023. The growth in electric cars is particularly large. Around every fifth car is a VW. However, the manufacturer is growing less rapidly than the entire vehicle fleet.
According to the Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA), 60,680,636 cars, trucks and two-wheelers were registered in Germany on January 1, 2024, which is 0.9 percent more than on the previous year's reporting date. The number of cars increased by 0.7 percent to 49.1 million, the strongest growth was in trucks with an increase of 2.7 percent to 3.74 million. Vehicle trailers are not included; There was an increase of 1.7 percent to 8.44 million.
VW remains the strongest brand in the portfolio by a large margin: a total of 10.24 million vehicles are registered; that is 0.4 percent more than in the previous year. They are followed by Mercedes with 4.7 million units and Opel with almost 4 million. The Chinese brand MG achieved the strongest growth among manufacturers with at least a five-digit number of vehicles, increasing by around 97 percent to almost 37,000 units.
Trabant manufacturer Sachsenring remains stable
Among the brands no longer active in Germany, Trabant manufacturer Sachsenring in particular remains stable: the number of cars registered rose slightly by 1.7 percent to 40,826 within a year. The Dutch provider DAF Trucks is also maintaining its level at a significantly lower level; the number of registered cars even rose slightly by 9 percent to 86 units – a large part of which is probably attributable to the “Daffodil” small cars from the 1960s.
However, models from Saab, Cadillac, Pontiac, Chrysler and Daihatsu received less collector love – the inventory numbers there continue to decline.
Around 44.4 million cars are powered by an internal combustion engine running on liquid fuel, although the number of diesel (minus 2 percent) and gasoline engines (minus 1.1 percent) declined. Electric cars have increased, with the number increasing by 39 percent to 1.408 million units.
Strongest segments: compact class ahead of SUV
Almost every fifth car on German roads is an SUV. The KBA counted around 9.11 million SUVs and off-road vehicles. This corresponds to a fleet share of 18.6 percent. This puts the crossovers in second place overall, behind the compact class with 23.2 percent, but ahead of the small cars with 17.7 percent.
The share of SUVs and off-road vehicles in the fleet is likely to increase significantly in the coming years, as their share of new car registrations was recently around 40 percent.
Vans, however, are still on the decline. The stock of mini-vans fell by 3.4 percent to 1.77 million units last year, while large-capacity vans lost 2.5 percent and ended up at 1.83 million vehicles.
