SA's new vehicle sales boom in August, with passenger car market soaring to 10-year high

Gugs Mhlungu is joined by 702 resident motoring enthusiast Warren Tucker on Weekend Breakfast.

South Africa's new vehicle sales maintained upward momentum in August, with the highest level of domestic sales since October 2019.

The naamsa figures for August 2025 show an increase of 18,7% year on year.

51,880 units were sold - 8,188 more than the 43,692 sold in August 2024.

And the passenger vehicle market soared to a ten-year high with 36,914 units sold - the highest number since September 2015.

Export volumes also gained traction, naamsa reports, despite the fact that manufacturers and suppliers continued to adjust to renewed US tariff uncertainty and increasing global competition.

Old favourite Toyota remains South Africa's top brand, with over 13 000 vehicles sold.

Suzuki took second spot, with just under half that number.

Warren Tucker strikes a cautionary note about this apparent boom in new vehicle sales, however

While there are signs of a recovery, we also need to look at the number of people taking the traditional 60-month period financing to get a good idea of how healthy the current finance market is, he says.

"More people are buying cars - is it summer, have they come upon some newfound wealth, what's going on?! Coupled with these sales numbers we need to know how many cars were leased, how many were straight-out financed..."

Warren Tucker, 702 resident motoring enthusiast

"The other thing is that the banks have now come with 84 months to pay for a vehicle - they are definitely trying to get the instalments down to a point where people can purchase these cars... It's the people taking the 60 months that can actually afford to buy them."

Warren Tucker, 702 resident motoring enthusiast

TOP 10 SELLING VEHICLE BRANDS in SA for AUGUST 2025

1. Toyota - 13 276 units

2. Suzuki Auto - 6 534 units

3. Volkswagen Group SA - 5 521 units

4. Hyundai Automotive SA - 3 007 units

5. Ford Motor Company - 2 968 units

6. GWM SA - 2 519 units

7. Chery Auto SA - 2 228 units

8. Isuzu Motors SA - 2 194 units

9. Kia South Africa - 1 542 units

10. Renault - 1 374 units

For more detail, listen to the interview audio at the top of the article