Chinese carmakers continue to flood the European market despite the tariffs imposed by the European Commission on each fully electric vehicle imported from China.
Data from Schmidt Automotive Research show that Chinese-brand registrations across Western Europe have climbed from a 2.4% all-fuels market share in the first quarter of 2023 to 8.7% in the first quarter of 2026 — more than tripling in three years.
The gain decelerated slightly quarter-on-quarter, marking the slowest sequential increase in over a year after a run of double-digit jumps, yet the trajectory remains firmly upward.
By April the figure had already crossed 10%, according to Schmidt, pushing Chinese brands past Japanese manufacturers for the first time on a monthly basis.
Anti-subsidy duties that the European Commission began levying in late 2024 on battery-electric imports from China have done little to blunt the advance.
Several brands have sidestepped the tariffs by assembling vehicles inside Europe: XPeng at Magna Steyr’s plant in Graz, Austria; Leapmotor through its Stellantis joint venture in Poland — while others, notably BYD, are also constructing dedicated factories in Hungary.
Plug-in hybrid models, which are not subject to the duties, have further padded the numbers.
The Brand Awareness Push
Market share alone, however, does not translate into brand recognition among European consumers accustomed to decades of Volkswagen, Stellantis and Renault dominance.
To close the awareness gap, Chinese automakers have been increasingly turning to sports sponsorships, celebrity endorsements and cultural events — deploying marketing budgets across football, rugby, golf, fitness and the arts in a bid to embed their names in the daily lives of European audiences.
XPeng has been among the most aggressive.
On Wednesday, the push extended further east, with the brand’s Managing Director for Hungary, Croatia, Slovenia and Romania Marko Druzijanic announcing that the company celebrated a sponsorship agreement with Slovenian football club NK Maribor.
“Partnerships like this mean much more to me than visibility alone,” Druzijanic wrote on LinkedIn. “They are about bringing XPeng closer to people, becoming part of the local community and connecting our brand with passion, ambition and the drive to achieve more.”
Local dealer Avtohiša Meško, which opened an XPeng showroom in Maribor in April, will support the activation.
Football
The activation came just a few weeks after XPeng announced it became the premium and official mobility partner of Germany’s Bundesliga side 1. FSV Mainz 05 for the 2026/27 season.
Managing Director of XPeng Central Europe Markus Schrick called the Mainz club “one of the most likeable and popular Bundesliga clubs.”
Under the multi-year agreement, the company will supply G6, G9, P7+ and X9 models to players, coaching staff and officials, while gaining LED perimeter-board exposure, hospitality rights and activation opportunities at the MEWA Arena — including across the club’s women’s Bundesliga team.
XPeng entered Norwegian football in early June.
The Chinese carmaker announced a partnership with Norsk Toppfotball (NTF) to become the official car partner of the Eliteserien, Norway’s top-tier league.
Managing Director Claes Persson framed the deal as an extension of XPeng‘s fast-growing Norwegian footprint — the brand passed 10,000 vehicles on Norwegian roads in May and is targeting 7,000 new registrations in 2026 alone.
Other Activations
In March, the Guangzhou-based carmaker signed a three-year contract with France’s Ligue Nationale de Rugby (LNR) to become the official car and official supplier of the Top 14, the country’s premier rugby championship.
XPeng‘s 80 French concessions — one in each of the 14 host cities — gave the deal a built-in retail dimension, and the brand was already visible at the Top 14 semi-finals in Marseille in June and at the final at the Stade de France on June 27.
Beyond football and rugby, XPeng has scattered sponsorships across niche segments designed to reach affluent, brand-conscious demographics.
In Poland it partnered with HYROX, the fitness-race series, as an official national sponsor from April onward; in Greece, XPeng backed the Hole-in-One Challenge at the AEGEAN Messinia Pro-Am golf tournament in late June.
Further South and to the West, in Portugal — one of the countries where the brand is represented by Salvador Caetano — the company was one of the sponsor’s to the A Bola Padel Corporate League, the country’s largest corporate padel competition, now in its seventh edition.
In the United Kingdom, the brand also sponsored the London Art Fair in early 2026.
L03 Launch Deepens the European Bet
The marketing blitz coincides with XPeng‘s most significant European product move to date.
On July 16, the company staged what media described as the largest launch event a Chinese carmaker has ever held in Europe, unveiling the L03 coupe-SUV in Munich — at the heart of BMW’s home.
Priced from €35,600 in Germany, the L03 undercuts Tesla’s Model Y by more than €3,000 and is the first XPeng model to go on sale simultaneously in China and Europe.
CEO He Xiaopeng said he chose Munich because Germany “is where the auto industry was born.”
XPeng also demonstrated its second-generation VLA 2.0 vision-based assisted-driving system on Munich’s public roads the same week, signaling plans to bring the software to European customers in early 2027.
Other Chinese Automakers
BYD has taken a higher-profile, higher-budget approach.
In 2024 the Shenzhen-based group became the first Chinese carmaker — and the first electric-vehicle manufacturer — to sponsor the UEFA European Championship, replacing Volkswagen as the tournament’s official e-mobility partner for Euro 2024 in Germany.
BYD followed that with a sponsorship of the UEFA Under-21 European Championship in 2025.
At the club level, BYD has assembled a portfolio of Europe’s most decorated football teams in under 12 months — including a three-year deal with Inter Milan, replacing Nissan as Manchester City’s official automotive partner and a three-year partnership with Paris Saint-Germain.
Geely-backed Polestar became the official mobility partner of Borussia Dortmund in August 2025, signing a three-year deal reportedly worth €5 million annually.
Chery — China’s largest auto exporter in 2025 — announced earlier this month that it had become AFC Bournemouth’s official automotive partner in a three-season deal through the end of the 2028/29 campaign.
Chery also signed FC Barcelona striker Robert Lewandowski as its global brand ambassador in May.
