August brought the highest growth so far this year for the UK new car market, helped by a strong true fleet performance.

The UK new car market saw its highest growth so far this year in August

Latest figures from Michael Gergen at Dataforce show that total registrations reached 94,000 units –the highest volume ever for the month of August – equating to a rise of 23.1%. Similar rises in true fleets and private registrations of 23.7% and 23.3% respectively.

Dealerships and manufacturers registered 68.6% more passenger cars than in August last year – increasing speculation that the rises are down to pre-WLTP sales as with the European new car market – with only rental registrations down by 40.9%.

The rise in total registrations also brought the year-to-date loss down to 4.2%.

Within the true fleet top 10, all bar one brand saw growth. Market leader Volkswagen was up 76.0% and subsequently earned its highest-ever monthly market share in the UK’s true fleets sector. The Passat, Tiguan, Polo and especially Golf performed well. Ford (+21.4%) finished second followed by Vauxhall, BMW, Mercedes and Audi. Peugeot in seventh (+72.9%) scored its best market share since February 2016 due to the strong results of its SUV range with further support from the 308. SEAT and Kia ranked eighth and ninth.

The top 10 was completed by Suzuki – up from rank number 20 and also scoring a new record market share as well, helped by a number of top performers. The Swift ranked fourth in the Small Passenger Car segment, the Vitara was third in SUV Small and the Celerio was number one in the Mini segment.

Fuel type performance saw further changes. Diesel fell to a share of just 36.3% – an all-time low point in True Fleets – while both full EVs and Hybrid powertrains scored new record market shares of 1.0% and 10.7% respectively.

Within the full electric vehicle segment, the biggest jump was seen by the e-Golf, which increased its volume by a four-digit growth rate and took the crown for EV cars in August. Overall the emission-free passenger cars rose by +138.3%.

The most popular Hybrid model in True Fleets (both August and year-to-date) was the BMW 3 Series, which recorded more than a thousand Hybrid registrations in August! Number two in the ranking was the Golf GTE followed by Toyota C-HR, Kia Niro, Mercedes C-Class, Toyota Yaris, Mitsubishi Outlander and Toyota RAV4.