Tesla Model Y’s Huge Growth in US Sales Visualized — Charts
The Tesla Model Y has become not just Tesla’s star player, but also the USA’s and the world’s standout BEV, carrying the flag forward for the electric vehicle transition. It has become not just the top selling electric vehicle but the top selling vehicle. Working on recent US EV sales reports, it was fun to look at the growth and growing diversity of the market, but one chart also highlighted how big of a deal the Tesla Model Y is and stimulated this extra piece. That said, there’s also a twist to all of this. For starters, here’s the chart:
I’m used to seeing sales charts where the Tesla Model Y is far out ahead of every other model. But something else struck me here. Even the Model Y’s growth from 2022 to 2023 dwarfs sales of any model other than the Model 3. Its increase in sales in one year was more than any other brand could hope for when it comes to its electric models (or any types of models in most cases).
After looking at that chart, I decided to go and create another one extending back to 2019.
As you can see, year after year, the Model Y’s sales grow by leaps and bounds. I could cut that chart off and just feature a handful of top models, but the long tail of EV models in the United States just further highlights the point of how important the Model Y is to the market and how far it stands apart from other EVs. I love the growing number of electric models on the US market, and there are definitely great models with huge growth potential, but the Model Y is so many leagues above the other models that it’s hard to even say it lives in the same automotive universe. Of course, the Tesla Model 3 is up there, but even the Model 3 is a shadow of the Model Y now. It was right there with the Model Y until 2023, but the Model Y’s growth blew it away rapidly.
But let’s return to overall US EV sales now. There is a little twist here.
We can see strong growth year over year from BEV sales, Tesla sales, and non-Tesla BEV sales. Naturally, as we know, Tesla sales lead the way, and those are largely Model Y sales now. The charts at the top demonstrate that point perhaps more than anything else has. However, what may be uplifting from these final charts is that the non-Tesla BEV sales actually have risen to a significant volume. The 2023 total approached half a million units, just a bit less than Tesla’s 2022 total! And even with the Model Y’s massive growth, non-Tesla BEVs together grew faster in the past year — and from 2021 to 2022, they grew by nearly the same amount as Tesla did from 2021 to 2022.
So, the Tesla Model Y’s standout leadership is to be admired and appreciated, or you could say Tesla’s leadership overall is to be admired and appreciated. But there is also tremendous growth in BEV sales beyond Tesla — faster growth, in fact — and there is further growth potential that is probably unfathomable to some extent. Because of the Model Y’s star power and sales records, and because of how spread out other BEV sales are, the rest of the model growth can go unnoticed. It would be nice to have a few more models in the same universe as the Tesla Model Y, but just as importantly, the growing platter of BEV options is growing the market to a similar extent — actually, an even bigger extent.
For a little extra fun, here are interactive versions of some of those charts above:
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