Chinese electric carmaker BYD finally got its annual beat of Tesla in the electric car market, which is neither that surprising nor even that interesting. Both Tesla and BYD had worse years than they projected, and both face some serious hurdles in the new year.
Not like they’re alone. While Rivian met its expectations for the quarter, those expectations were lower than Q3 by a large margin. Rolls-Royce, once a brand that was promoting EVs, is shifting focus back to milking as much as possible from its customers with fancy features and V12s.
You know who is killing it right now? Kia. Specifically, Kia is killing it with minivans. The Morning Dump is a pro-van organization, so it’s nice to see that happening.
BYD Thumps Tesla
It was clear as late as Q4 of 2024 that, unless something dramatically changed, Tesla was going to finally give up its EV sales crown to Chinese automaker BYD this year. While Tesla sells cars pretty much everywhere, including in China, that advantage was only going to last so long. BYD has long made more cars and more “electrified” vehicles thanks to its large stable of PHEVs, but hasn’t quite been able to put together a full calendar year of higher pure BEV sales.
The total numbers are in, and Tesla sales dropped about 8.6% to 1.64 million global sales, compared to 2.26 million for BYD. In Q4, Tesla put out its own weird public estimate of quarterly sales. Some thought this was because it wanted to set a lower number that it could beat, but it couldn’t even top its own diminished target. There is an argument out there that comparing Tesla and BYD sort of misses the point, and I accept that there are big differences, but it’s still notable.
A big drop came in Europe, where, other than in Norway, people don’t seem to be that jazzed about buying Teslas. Here’s Bloomberg with an explanation:
Demand for Teslas slumped across most of Europe throughout last year, in part due to blowback over Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk throwing his support behind right-wing politicians and parties in countries including Germany and the UK. While the CEO has predicted sales will improve once Tesla is able to offer the driver-assistance system Tesla markets as Full Self-Driving, or FSD, the company has yet to obtain regulatory approval from authorities in the region.
Most notable is that, unlike the United States, EV sales in the EU were up about 28% for the year, whereas Tesla sales dropped by roughly the same amount. Not great.
Would you rather be BYD? Ehhh… not really. The company has the same massive overcapacity issues that other Chinese automakers have, was clearly juicing its sales with zero-mileage used car schemes, and is only surviving the country’s brutal price war because it’s the biggest. The company just dropped a ton of cars in Mexico to get ahead of tariffs there, but that was supposed to be a big export market, and now it’s less clear how competitive it’ll be.
If BYD has an advantage, it’s in Europe, because most Europeans seem to be willing to buy a cheaper car from a Chinese brand than a more expensive one from Tesla/Musk. Except Norway. Norway DGAF.
Rivian Did Fine, It Was Fine
Rivian also saw a decline in Q4 sales, but it was about what the company had expected, so that’s something, I suppose.
Per the WSJ:
The company said it produced 10,974 vehicles at its manufacturing facility in Normal, Illinois and delivered 9,745 vehicles during the fourth quarter of 2025. That is down from 12,727 vehicles produced and 14,183 delivered in the fourth quarter of 2024.
For the entirety of 2025, the company produced 42,284 cars and delivered 42,247. In 2024, the company totaled 49,476 vehicles produced and 51,579 delivered.
The R2 and R3 really can’t come fast enough.
Rolls-Royce Has An EV If You Want It, But If You Have The Money, You Want The V12
The irony of the ultra-wealthy not buying EVs is that the ultra-wealthy, generally, have so many cars that range anxiety couldn’t possibly be an issue for most of them.
While the EV Rolls-Royce Spectre has done well enough, what the people really want is apparently V12s, at least according to this Bloomberg article:
In an interview at Rolls-Royce’s Goodwood base, Chief Executive Officer Chris Brownridge said the brand would cater to what buyers want – all while ramping up customizations, including putting more resources into a global network of private offices for one-on-one client meetings.
“We will launch more electric-powered Rolls-Royces, but they’re Rolls-Royces first,” said Brownridge. “We see very strong demand for V12 — where the client demand continues for that engine, we will continue to produce Rolls-Royces as well.”
It’s cool that RR builds an EV coupe, as there are too few of those.
In addition to more V12s, the company is also doubling down on customization, which allows RR to grab bigger and bigger margins.
The Success Of The Carnival Shows Some People Have Taste
It’s fairly obvious that I like the Kia Carnival, which isn’t the best minivan in every way, but has enough going for it to make it extremely appealing. It’s probably going to be the Kia vehicle that grew the most in sales in 2025, having already grown nearly 50% through November.
While Kia dealers are worried about having too much inventory in certain areas next year, that doesn’t include the Carnival, according to this Automotive News interview with Jeffrey Hinchliff, the head of Kia’s dealer advisory council:
The Kia Sorento was the only model “that really probably got over its skis this year” in 2025 with oversupply in both his Omaha market and nationally — but it was simply a victim of the Telluride’s success, Hinchcliff said.
“It’s not that Kia is losing the business; it’s just those customers are buying Tellurides,” he said.
[…]
Conversely, both his store and dealers nationally in 2025 at times found themselves with too few Kia Carnival minivans, he said.
“Carnival’s story is really just beginning,” he said. “It’s still growing fast.”
Kia must immediately increase the strategic supply of Kia Carnival vans.
Honestly, Kia out here wiping up with a minivan (it’ll probably sell more Carnivals than all its EVs in the United States this year) is just proof that there’s a large contingent of buyers that, given the choice, will buy the right car.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
All this EV talk has me thinking about AC/DC, so it’s time for some “Dirty deeds done dirt cheap.”
The Big Question
Which brand that doesn’t currently offer a minivan should bring one to the market?
Top photo: BYD/Tesla
Slate. Slate should build a minivan. An inexpensive small BEV minivan with optional rear seating.
Audi. Audi should build a mid luxury and irresponsibly fast minivan and pay to have it in family action adventure films driven by the secretly bad ass dad. Count money.
Honda. Honda should build a hybrid microvan. They have the engineering chops to find the sweet spot between kei and US safety, and make it sporty and efficient. Good fit for the brand.
Honda should make a Type R Odyssey. An article was written about the one that was built for SEMA and people would love it. I know a very happy Carnival owner whose had zero issues, mostly because it doesn’t have an explodey turbo four.
As far as manufacturers that don’t make one and should? Mazda. Phil down below already made the same case I would have, and I’d pick the inline six and AWD from the CX90. That verison of minivan would probably be the only thing to get me to reconsider my Mazda 3.
Minivan? Porsche. Absent that, which is a certainty, then MB. As much as I’d love a four ringed minivan, it’s MB that has the people hauler chops. From the 80’s AMG wagon to their current tall, skinny cargo vans, a luxury MB minivan with an optional performance package would kill.
Acura. I want an Acura, AWD, PHEV, Odyssey.
Build it, and I will buy it.
I’m flexible on the AWD. And I’m not even asking for a stick (although that would be nice…)
SUBARU! SUBARU BRING ME A GODDAMN VAN YOU COWARDS!
I’ve said this about a million times. The Ascent is a borderline useless also-ran. Make it a damn van, bless it with Subaru marketing and AWD, along with rubberizing the shit out of it, and you’ve got a hit.
I see no fault with any of this logic. Even a rebranded AWD Sienna could work.
Speaking of Kia: Fun Fact: Their website says the “The all-new 2026 K4 Hatchback” is “expected late 2025”
I thought wagons were going to be the new black? I mean SUV?
Everything goes in cycles. Minivans were over and most people didn’t want to touch them because they grew up in them or had them for years and wanted to move on. Now the younger people that grew up in SUVs don’t want them and seem to want minivans. Ford hasn’t had a real mini van in a while maybe something based on the Maverick / bronco sport platform could be a winner especially a hybrid AWD. Or figure out how to make the transit connect passenger van sell. The name is probably one of the many issues. The Chinese know vans and the younger people love are starting to love Chinese stuff like people before loved Korean and Japanese stuff. Could be quite a storm coming. When they see the xpeng waymos could unleash more interest as it’s quite different looking.
BYD will survive and find new markets. They have gotten too big for the Chinese government to let fail. Emerging markets will turn to them if there is value and there isn’t a complete distaste for the Chinese and or their goods. In most markets if it’s cheap enough people will look look the other way. Especially if a car is treated at an a to b tool. The Chinese have taken a big share transit buses around the world with out many noticing. You already see a fair bit of Chinese cars in Mexico and I bet it will be like the Japanese in the 80s just suddenly everywhere. Just like the Japanese and Korean people will start to look at them not as cheap cars but a decent economical car.
“Which brand that doesn’t currently offer a minivan should bring one to the market?”
Dodge, as a cheaper/de-contented version of the new Chrysler Pacifica that should also be already out by now, but isn’t because Stellantis
“Which brand that doesn’t currently offer a minivan should bring one to the market?”
Mazda is who I’d like to see, though I’m not sure which format would interest me more: a smaller FWD Mazda5 rebirth with the transverse 2.5T and 6spd, or an Odyssey-sized van using the longitudinal inline 6 and AWD system from the CX90.
But that’s a different question from who should bring one to market. Are we sure the CUV craze is letting up at all? Sales figures of the existing minivans are a bit mixed still and nowhere near what they were 15-20 years ago.
BYD may be a huge company subsidized and incentivized by an aggressively exansionist totalitarian government, but Tesla has Elon Musk. Overall, I’d rather drive a BYD.
Never head the expression ‘get ahead of your skis’ before. I’ve only been skiing a few times decades ago, but it was enough to understand what’s meant. Very nice! 🙂
The only thing about the Kia Carnival that I’m not wild about is that C-pillar sail panel thingy, which always looks odd to me. Hardly a deal breaker of course. I’ve seen a few of their lavender EV9 vans around town courtesy of Waymo, and I like those a lot too.
I like having at least one vehicle big enough to sleep in if necessary since the LA wildfire evacuations almost exactly one year ago. An old XC90 holds lots of dog food, hard drives, important documents, etc… with room left over for a guy and his dog to lie down in the back, but a minivan would hold more.
I bet Mazda could make a pretty nice full-size minivan or big van, but it’s a small company and I doubt they’d want to spend the development dollars on it. I drove the 5 microvan (with a manual IIRC!) and I liked it… it felt like a 3 but slower/heavier and you sat a bit higher in it. Not a sports car of course, but there was still some driving enjoyment to be had. The sliding doors were nice too.
You’re lucky on never hearing it before. Seems to be the phrase of the year with how often I heard it in 2025.
“The R2 and R3 really can’t come fast enough.”
You can say that again. The R2, even if it’s only somewhat successfull, should result in Rivian becoming self-sustaining.
But for myself personally, it’s the R3 that I’m the most excited about. It’s the one I’d want to buy for myself.
““We will launch more electric-powered Rolls-Royces, but they’re Rolls-Royces first,” said Brownridge. “We see very strong demand for V12 — where the client demand continues for that engine, we will continue to produce Rolls-Royces as well.””
In that price segment, customization is the key. And for what they charge, they can definitely continue to offer the V12… and then in turn, use the emissions credits from the BEVs BMW sells under RR as well as BMW and Mini to offset CO2 from the the low volume and heavily marked up V12s Rolls Royce is selling.
But me personally, if I was shopping in that segment, I’d want the BEV. The silence and smoothness of an electric powertrain is a perfect match for a luxury car in my opinion.
“Which brand that doesn’t currently offer a minivan should bring one to the market?”
In my opinion? Ford, Chevy, Buick (the new Cadillac of Minivans), Dodge, Mazda and Nissan.
Ford’s minivan should be the Transit Connect with a hybrid powertrain standard.
Chevy should bring back a new ‘dustbuster’ van and call it the TranSport… and a more luxurious version called the Silhouette for Buick.
For Dodge… Put the Grand Caravan back under Dodge… plus make a short wheelbase regular Caravan again. And bring back the Value Package version that used to own the minivan segment.
For Nissan, bring back the Quest as an electric van based on the Ariya/new Leaf.
Mazda should bring back the 5… and make it available with either a manual transmission or a hybrid (which would be the default ‘automatic’).
And for all these vans, if they’re not BEVs, then they should have hybrid powertrains.
But what kind of weirdo name is “Carnival”? It’s like they looked at the name Sedona and said,
“That’s really good. Too good for us, they’ll never believe it. How about something low-brow and really inexplicable? Like Carnival. That’s on-brand.”
Carnivals are great! They’re fun! Plus Carnival is also a great album…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnival_(Duran_Duran_EP)
Well, the amount of garbage and smashed food left on the ground after a carnival does resemble the floor of a typical minivan used for family duty, so they may be onto something after all…
lol
Can the van question just be us market? Hyundai needs to bring us the Staria! And the camper!
Who needs to build a minivan? Mazda.
MAZDA MUST BRING BACK THE 5!!!
And not just bring it back, but bring it back with two transmissions… a manual and a Toyota-style eCVT hybrid.
No Nissan-style CVTs and no constant-shifting 8+ speed automatics.
A MAZDA MPV would be great.
Maybe a combined effort with a good partner.
Toyota and Subaru come to mind easily.
So much for wishful thinking.