UK’s favourite car colours 2025: green surges but it’s still grey all the way
For eight years running, grey is the number one colour for UK car buyers, followed by black and blue – but green isn’t far behind
Brits appear to have turned their back on superstitions as the popularity of green cars surged in 2025, although grey remains the UK’s favourite car colour, accounting for more than one-in-four registrations.
Statistics released by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders show that over half a million (558,050) grey cars were registered in the UK throughout 2025. This represents 27.6 per cent of all registrations, although it also reflects a minor 0.2 per cent drop in grey’s market share, despite a higher quantity entering the roads than in 2024.
Yet while grey maintains its position as Britain’s favourite car shade for the eighth year running, it appears as if colour might be making a comeback. Green, while historically considered an unlucky paintwork choice, spiked by almost half (46.3 per cent) in popularity last year, compared with 2023. Suitably, it’s on electric cars that green saw the biggest boost in popularity, jumping up by almost double and accounting for one in 20 new electric cars – up from just one in 300 the year prior.
Of course, while green is now the UK’s seventh-most popular colour, it still only makes up around five per cent of overall sales; blue fares much better in this regard, although it hasn’t seen quite the same jump as green, which is now at its most popular point in 20 years. Still, blue had a modest five per cent uplift in market share to just over 15 per cent, coming in behind black, which accounts for 23 per cent of all new cars.
Elsewhere, white missed out on the podium, making up 13 per cent of sales and suffering a nine per cent slump in popularity; fewer people chose a red car, too, with the shade dropping from fifth to sixth-most popular. It’s turquoise that’s the UK’s least-favourite colour, though (granted, very few manufacturers offer it as an option), with just 12 examples entering the roads last year.
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“UK car buyers’ preferences remain pretty consistent, with monochrome continuing to lead in popularity,” said the SMMT’s chief executive, Mike Hawes. “The surge in green, however, matches the growing popularity of electrified cars as the new-car market decarbonises.”
So why do Brits prefer monochrome colours? Speaking to Auto Express last year, senior valuations officer at CAP Hpi, Craig Bridgman, said: “As a nation, we’re quite safe with the colours we choose. Grey is a fashionable colour – especially with some manufacturers, like Audi – and it does typically hold a little more value than something more unusual.”
Despite the fact that British buyers tend to prefer relatively flashy specs on their cars – i.e. tinted windows and larger wheels – we are more conservative in terms of colour, steering away from brighter shades such as pink and turquoise.
“If you had two identical cars – one grey and one brown – the former could sell within a few weeks, while the other could take a few months,” Bridgman continued. “[Furthermore], if you had two mainstream used cars (circa £15,000) with one in grey and another in brown, the latter could suffer anything between £300-500 in terms of resale value.”
Top 10 car colours in 2025
- Grey – 27.6%
- Black – 23%
- Blue – 15.2%
- White – 13.1%
- Silver – 6.3%
- Red – 5.8%
- Green – 4.9%
- Yellow – 0.5%
- Orange – 0.5%
- Mauve – 0.3%
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