Tesla has the two bestselling cars in California by a ridiculous margin – and we are not just talking about electric vehicles. It even outsells longtime bestseller Toyota overall in Q2. Oh and Rivian almost catches Land Rover in Q2.
It is helping push the market shares of battery-electric vehicles to a record high in the state.
California has long been ahead of the rest of the US when it comes to electric vehicles and other clean technologies through more aggressive policies.
It has helped Tesla thrive in this big auto market, which is larger than many entire countries.
Now that Tesla has the capacity to produce and sell millions of electric vehicles per year, many believed that the automaker would saturate the California market, but the electric automaker is still growing fast in the state.
The California New Car Dealers Association (CNCDA) released its second quarter 2023 California Auto Outlook report, and it reveals record performance for Tesla.
Tesla has the two bestselling vehicles in California, and it’s not even close:
- Tesla Model 3: 41,718 units year to date (through June 2023)
- Tesla Model Y: 74,765 units year to date (through June 2023)
The next best are far behind: Toyota Camry with 27,169 units and Toyota RAV4 with 26,032 units.
Speaking of Toyota, it was dethroned by Tesla for the first time in California during the second quarter.
Tesla was the bestselling brand in California with just north of 69,000 units compared to Toyota’s 67,000 units:
The longtime bestselling Japanese brand is still ahead of Tesla year to date, but the latter is fewer than 10,000 units away from Toyota.
Tesla’s record performance is helping push battery-electric vehicle BEV market share to a record 21%:
As you can see, BEVs have completely detached themselves from the growth of PHEVs and HEVs in the last two years, as it is believed to be the future of consumer vehicles by many.
Electrek’s Take
That’s beautiful to see. If that doesn’t light a fire under Toyota’s ass, I don’t know what will.
For years, the brand has been leading in California, and the only thing that was able to dethrone it was electric vehicles.
I am curious to see if Tesla can keep this momentum in California for the second half of the year and close that 10,000 units gap by the end of the year. Considering California is ahead of the rest of the US when it comes to EV adoption, it is an indication of where the rest of the country is going.