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Tesla U.S. Sales Drop 10% to 48,500 Units in January, Motor Intelligence Estimates

Written by Cláudio Afonso | LinkedIn | X

Tesla’s registrations in the U.S. dropped 10% year over year in January, Motor Intelligence estimates. The company registered 48,500 vehicles, down from the 53,830 recorded a year ago.

California New Car Dealers Association said on Monday that registrations in the state fell 12% from January 2024.

Tesla registered 1,141 vehicles in France last month, a 63% decline from the 3,118 recorded in January 2024, industry showed on Monday. Registrations in the Netherlands fell 42% to 927 units.

In the U.S., Ford vehicle sales dropped 6% to 135,506 vehicles while GM posted a 19% increase with nearly 194,000 vehicles registered — including ICE, fully electric and hybrid models.

The EV startups Lucid and Rivian posted mixed results with Lucid recording a 51% growth to 665 units as it prepares to start customer deliveries of its second model, the Gravity SUV. Rivian sales dropped 39% from a year ago to 3,060 vehicles.

The Geely-backed EV brand Polestar registered 505 vehicles, down 40% from a year ago. The Vietnamese brand VinFast nearly doubled its figures to 595 units.

Last week, at the Q4 earnings call, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said he “sees a path” of Tesla being the most valuable company in the world by far.”

Musk added later in the call that the company is “setting up for what I think will be an epic 2026 and a ridiculous ’27 and ’28, ridiculously good.”

Tesla reported full-year net income of $8.4 billion, down 23% from 2023 and 40% from the record $14.1 billion profit in 2022. Full-year revenue rose 1% to $97.7 billion, marking a new record for the tech company.




Cláudio Afonso is the Founder and Editor of EV, an independent electric vehicle news publication owned by CARBA, the company he founded in early 2021. Between 2022 and 2024 he worked in European corporate communications at Nio, and he returned to lead EV in April 2024. He is based in Porto, Portugal.