Oxford, UK – West European car registrations for the whole of 2019 were 14.29m units. This is a 0.7% rise on 14.19 m units in 2018, according to data from LMC Automotive.
Consumers in the region purchased 99,000 more vehicles in 2019 than in 2018, according to the consultants
The largest market in the region remains Germany. A total of 3.6 m vehicles were registered there in 2019, this is 171,000 more than in 2018. Which is a 5% increase.
The UK was second. This market contracted by 2.4% in 2019 with 56,000 fewer cars sold at 23.1m, according to LMC Automotive.
France ranked third with 22m sold in the year. This was up 1.9% on the 2018 figure and equates to an extra 40,000 cars sold in that country in 2019 compared with 2018.
Italy retained its fourth spot, with 5165 more vehicles sold in 2019 than in 2018. This took total registrations up to 1.9m. The Spanish market contacted by 4.8% in 2019. In total, 63,000 fewer cars were sold there than in 2018. A total of 1.2m vehicles hit the market there.
The standout for market growth in 2019 was Greece. There a total of 115,000 cars were registered in 2019, up 11% on the number in 2018.
Markets in the UK, Austria, Norway, Spain, Finland and Ireland all shrank. The Irish market experienced the greatest contraction in percentage terms, falling by 6.8% to 117,000 units in the year.
