2025 Malaysia new car sales TIV hit record 820,752 units, Dec and Q4 also highest-ever month/quarter

Malaysia’s appetite for cars is just… unbelievable. In a land of not even 40 million people, we bought 820,752 new cars last year (yet another record), or 0.5% more than 2024’s 816,747. This is the second year in a row we’ve broken 800k and our fourth consecutive year of post-Covid growth.

December 2025 was a record month (90,716 new cars found homes, beating the previous record of 81,735 units in December 2024), while Q4 2025 was a record quarter (241,416 units).

The Malaysian Automotive Association (MAA) attributes the performance to robust economic growth (GDP +4.7% in first three quarters of 2025), strong domestic demand, recovering exports, favourable financing (2.75% OPR since July), socio-political stability, a 2.9% unemployment rate (an 11-year low), strong order backlogs especially in the A-segment, the EV rise (+109%) and aggressive promos.

Driven by SUV mania, passenger vehicles expanded 13% to 228,572 units in 2025 compared to 2024’s 201,565 units, while commercial vehicles contracted for the second year running (-11% versus -14% in 2024) as diesel subsidies became targeted in June 2024.

In terms of production, just 747,780 vehicles were manufactured in Malaysia in 2025 (-5% versus 2024’s 790,347 units), demonstrating the might of fully-imported (CBU) EVs, for which demand spiked ahead of the year-end expiry of incentives.

What about the national versus non-national battle? The national team jumped 1.1% to 511,468 units (62.3% market share, up from 2024’s 61.9%) while the non-nationals were down 0.6% to 309,258 units (311,058 in 2024), mainly due to a lower commercial vehicle contribution (8% compared to 9%). MAA forecasts a slower 2026 with 790k units, but it was just as pessimistic last year when it expected 780k, and look what’s happened.