Many media outlets from around the world are reporting that Chinese carmaker BYD Auto has overtaken Tesla as the world's biggest electric vehicle maker by sales in the first half of this year.
Is that accurate? Well, it depends on what the definition of an electric vehicle is. BYD, which is part-owned by's Berkshire Hathaway, has sold 641,350 new energy vehicles in the first six months of 2022, a massive 314 percent jump from the same period the year before. There's a catch, though: not all these vehicles were fully electric. Of the total, 323,519 units or just over 50 percent were battery electric vehicles; the rest were plug-in hybrids. Under China's sales rules, PHEVs and BEVs are counted together as new energy vehicles .
During the same period, Tesla has sold 564,743 vehicles, all of which were obviously fully electric. This means that the US electric vehicle maker is still the world's top battery electric vehicle manufacturer by sales, despiteWhile Tesla remains the No. 1 global EV maker, it clearly cannot afford to ignore BYD's rise. The company is also an EV battery powerhouse, having recently overtaken South Korea's LG as the world's second-biggest producer of electric vehicle batteries.
Duhh, Tesla doesn’t make hybrids.
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