Car buyers absolutely love SUVs and that’s not necessarily a bad thing
Despite concerns around climate change and the consumption of resources, SUV sales keep rising. And Steve Walker thinks we should give this class of car a break
EnvironmentaL campaigners have been singling out Sports Utility Vehicles as the root of all evil for years. But the vilification of SUVs on the grounds of their supposedly unnecessary bulk, climate-changing emissions and general profligacy appears to be doing nothing to stop motorists from buying them.
According to the latest figures from analysts at GlobalData, 54 per cent of cars sold across the world in 2024 were SUVs. That’s a three per cent increase on 2023, and five per cent up on 2022. This strong growth comes at a time by which many of those who make a living watching the global car market had predicted we’d be seeing a swing towards smaller, lighter and cheaper electric cars. But the SUV has other ideas and so do consumers.
What’s going on? Well, as we know only too well at Auto Express, people really like SUVs, which persuades manufacturers to stick to the old (and profitable) adage that the customer is always right.
The tough looks, the higher seating position that makes it easier to get in and see out, and the outdoorsy image, suggesting an SUV driver could be off wake-boarding or rock-climbing, even though they almost certainly aren’t, all help SUVs get chosen above more conventional cars.
But there’s more to understand about this continuing success story. SUVs now come in a wide range of sizes, and the tall shape even lends itself particularly well to electric tech because there’s more space between the floor and the road for a battery. The SUV idea has come to dominate the design of modern cars to the point that it can be quite difficult to draw a line determining what is an SUV and what isn’t.
This ‘SUV-ification’ of the car market makes the rise in ‘SUV’ sales around the world seem far more predictable. It might also indicate that the growth in sales in itself isn’t quite the environmental disaster some might think. At least not in Europe, where small and mid-size SUVs dominate and an increasing proportion of these are electric cars and hybrids.
We would all like to see smaller, lighter cars that consume fewer resources in their construction and use, but ‘SUV’ is a lazy way of defining vehicles that don’t conform to this vision. Buyers want cars that are easy and affordable to live with. Legislators (in Europe at least) demand cars that are packed with safety tech and use electrified powertrains to lower emissions. Car makers want to turn a profit. The SUV is just what the compromise between these conflicting demands looks like in 2025.
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