Federal Motor Transport Authority
More and more SUVs on the roads
Almost every tenth registered car is now an SUV. Photo: Sina Schuldt/dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
Germans are buying fewer small, compact and mid-range cars. Her heart beats for SUVs – and even larger vehicles.
The changed preferences of Germans when buying a car and the limited production due to a lack of chips and parts are becoming increasingly noticeable in the vehicle stock.
Almost every tenth registered car is now an SUV, according to data from the Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA). They are one of the few large vehicle segments in which stocks have increased over the past year. On the other hand, many classic segments are shrinking.
According to the KBA, 4.82 million SUVs were registered in Germany as of January 1st. That was 9.9 percent of the total stock and 12.2 percent more than a year ago. Only the number of mobile homes grew faster, by 13.7 percent to 767,325. The stock of off-road vehicles also grew relatively significantly – by 5 percent to 2.9 million.
The traditionally largest segments, compact, small and medium-sized, are shrinking. The compact class by 1.5 percent to 11.7 million cars, small cars by 0.7 percent to 8.8 million cars and the middle class by 2.4 percent to almost 6 million. It should be noticeable here that SUVs are competing with these three vehicle classes and have recently been the most popular segment for new registrations. In addition, in view of the lack of chips and parts, some car manufacturers preferred to use larger, more expensive and more profitable cars – the upper class was also growing. Overall, the number of vehicles increased slightly by 0.6 percent to 48.5 million cars.