VFACTS October 2022: Tesla sales slump as shipments slow

After delivering a record number of new vehicles in August and September, Tesla sales dropped again last month – though it remained Australia’s top-selling electric-vehicle brand.

Tesla led the electric-car sales race in Australia for the third month in a row in October – but it dropped out of the Top 10, and reported as sold a fraction of the cars it did last month after fewer shipments of new vehicles arrived in the country.

VFACTS industry sales data released today reports 2098 electric vehicles as sold in October 2022 – up 355 per cent on the same month last year, or up 115 per cent with Tesla excluded, as it did not publish sales data until March this year.

Tesla retained its number-one spot with 1109 vehicles reported as delivered but the result is less than a fifth of the 5969 delivered in September, after the record number of shipments that arrived through August were cleared, and the cars on board delivered to customers.

Four shipments of Tesla vehicles have been reported as arriving in Australia since the start of October (via shipping tracker VedaPrime) – so it remains to be seen if sales surge again next month.

Tesla reported 33 Model 3 sedans and 1076 Model Y SUVs as delivered. The Model Y was the country’s best-selling electric vehicle, and topped the luxury mid-size SUV class, but was the 17th best-selling vehicle overall (down from third last month).

It brings the total number of Tesla cars delivered since the start of the year to 15,132 – well ahead of the 12,094 it delivered across all of last year, which it eclipsed last month.

Overall, Tesla was the 19th best-selling brand for the month of October – and the 16th top seller when year to date (since the start of 2022) sales are counted.

Electric vehicles accounted for 2.4 per cent of all new cars sold in October, or 2.7 per cent since the start of the year.

Sales data for new-to-Australia Chinese brand BYD were missing from this month’s VFACTS sales report – despite claiming last month its sales numbers would be released with today’s sales results.

Drive is awaiting confirmation of sales data from most electric-vehicle makers – however early highlights of October sales include the Polestar 2 (246), BMW iX (72) and Kia Niro EV (56).

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