The Best-Selling Car Brands in the UK

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• Published: 21 May 2009 in Motoring and Car Insurance

Confused.com takes a look at the UK’s most popular four-wheeled friends

Assuming you’re reading this in a UK town, city or suburb, take a minute to have a look at the cars on the street outside. Note cars in driveways, on the curb side, and those driving past. Go on, we’ll wait here while you take a peek...

...Back yet? Good, now here are some no-brainer statements:

• Some of the cars you saw were the same model
• Even more were the same make
• Few, if any, of the cars were British
• Almost certainly, none of them was a Maybach

The reason there’s a good chance that those bullet points are true is because the UK car industry is overwhelmingly dominated by a clutch of well-known brands, each with their own ubiquitous best-selling models.

The third bullet point is likely to be true because Britain has been out of the domestically-owned, mass-market car game since 1994 (when BMW put Rover on a leash). These days, ‘British car’ means coach-built enthusiast marques such as Bristol, Morgan, Noble, or kit-car fave, Caterham.

Anyway, here’s the list of the best-selling car brands in the UK, with a little more information on each brand following on...

Here are the best-selling car models in the UK for 2008.

*Data from The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT)

One last thing, remember the fourth bullet point at the top of the page, the one that reads, ‘Almost certainly, none of them was a Maybach’? Well, that wasn’t some random statement. Sadly for Maybach, their über-luxurious 57 & 62 models, with prices starting at over £250k, were the worst-selling cars in the UK in 2008.