Tesla Model Y Tops EV Sales In Malaysia This Year So Far

How did the Tesla Model Y take the EV sales crown from BYD who was more dominant?

We all know that electric vehicles (EVs) are all the rage here in Malaysia at the moment, and our country had a unique sales chart in that while global sales see Chinese automaker BYD topping the charts, ours sees Tesla on top now. The reverse was true for global markets so why is this brand that is not so frequently chosen elsewhere, so popular here?

So while Tesla had been topping EV sales in most markets up until a year or two ago, when BYD dethroned them, the opposite is true in Malaysia, as the BYD Atto 3, the brand’s first offering here in Malaysia, topping the EV sales charts since its debut in 2022, but recently selling less than the Tesla Model Y EV SUV.

Moreover, Tesla is currently in a weird state of limbo given that Elon Musk is demanding either a lavish compensation package or more shares in the company or he will move all his AI and software out of these cars, but we are confident, the shareholders will either meet him in the middle ot give him what he wants so Tesla owners are likely safe anyway.

The graphs below should be a good indicator of which EVs are the hottest on our markets with the first graph below showing the number of EVs registered from January 2020 up until April of this year and the second one recording the number of EVs registered from January to April of this year alone. We got these graphs from automacha and the link to that article is here.

While it is obvious that the difference between the ageing BYD Atto 3 and the much newer but by no means new Tesla Model Y is very small, only 20 units, ultimately every single unit counts and we never know when the disparity grows even larger. Is this the start of a new Tesla-centric trend or can BYD reclaim the top spot?