Tesla Model Y Second Only To Ford F-150 As Best-Selling Vehicle In US

The EV doubled US registrations in January-April 2023, becoming America's No. 1 passenger car and second best selling vehicle overall.

Tesla Model Y driving

Dan Mihalascu

By: Dan Mihalascu

Jun 19, 2023 at 6:03am ET

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The Tesla Model Y continues its triumphant march through the sales charts.

After ending the first quarter of 2023 as the world's best-selling passenger car, the Model Y has continued its spectacular sales growth in the United States as well.

Data from Experian picked up by Automotive News show that Tesla's best-selling model doubled registrations to 127,541 in the first four months of 2023 over last year. Remarkably, the Model Y was the second most popular vehicle of any kind in the US after only the Ford F-150 pickup truck, which posted almost 240,000 sales during the period.

That means the Model Y is now outselling popular cars and SUVs like the Toyota Camry, Honda CR-V, Nissan Rogue, Toyota Corolla, Honda Civic, Honda Accord, and others that have dominated the sales charts in the past.

Remarkably, the Model Y accounted for more than half of Tesla's total registrations during the period, which stood at 211,842. The EV maker's second-best selling vehicle was the Model 3 with 72,259 registrations, up 28 percent over last year.

Together, the Model Y and Model 3 accounted for almost 200,000 registrations out of Tesla's 211,842 total. The Model X crossover's registrations rose 15 percent to 8,216, while the Model S sedan's fell 67 percent to 3,826.

Gallery: 2021 Tesla Model Y

2021 Tesla Model Y

Tesla was by far the No. 1 automaker in EV sales in January-April 2023, with its 211,842 registrations (up 52 percent year-over-year), which represent a 60.8 percent BEV market share. The competition is far behind, with Chevrolet second and Ford third with 24,689 registrations (7.1 percent market share) and 17,167 (4.9 percent market share), respectively.

Despite Tesla's strong numbers, battery-electric vehicles (BEV) as a whole made up just 7 percent of US light-vehicle registrations through April. New EV registrations totaled 348,258 through April compared with just over 5 million for the entire light-vehicle market.

Still, BEV sales are on a clear upward trend compared to the 4.4 percent market share recorded in January-April 2022, with EV registrations growing 72 percent compared with the year-earlier period.

Tesla's results reflect CEO Elon Musk's comments earlier this year that he was willing to sacrifice profit for volume. The strategy seems to be working in the US, where Musk's annual growth target for Tesla of 50 percent has been met so far.

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The Tesla Model Y's sales results also suggest that Musk's forecast that the Model Y will be the world's best-selling passenger car by overall volume in 2023 has a high chance of becoming reality.

The record registrations in the US have a lot to do with Tesla's price cuts that have made the Model Y much more attractive for shoppers. For example, the electric crossover started at $67,440 with shipping at the end of 2022, whereas now it has a starting MSRP of $49,380 with shipping – before any state and federal tax credits and other incentives.