Is this the biggest threat to BYD and Tesla? 2025 Chevrolet Blazer EV lighting up the sales charts but no sign of it coming to Australia

BYD and Tesla might soon be in a three horse race for global EV domination.

General Motors, surprisingly, is the latest maker to have booming electric car sales.

The legacy maker, known for its small block V8s and pulling the pin on Holden in Australia, is the second biggest seller of EVs in the US.

The company, which owns Chevrolet, Cadillac and GMC among others, has hit a purple patch with its current range of electric cars selling more than 62,000 units in the first five months of this year.

That’s still only half of what Tesla sold in the US in the same period, but GM’s sales have nearly doubled compared to 2024 while Tesla's are down nine per cent.

“Customers are responding in record numbers to our world-class portfolio of electric and gas-powered vehicles,” said Executive VP and President of Global Markets, Rory Harvey. 

“In the first two months of the second quarter, we more than doubled our EV sales compared to the same period last year.”

Leading the charge are the Chevy Blazer and Equinox electric SUVs. Both are well priced, good looking and well received by critics. They have more than 500km of claimed range and lots of tech features.

No sign of them coming to Australia, though.

The electric Silverado pick-up also isn’t on the radar for Australia just yet with the electric car focus being on Cadillac.

Instead, GM is sending an array of Cadillac electric cars Down Under.

This has been led by the Lyriq mid-size SUV, which has just gone on sale, with the smaller Optiq and larger Vistiq likely to arrive in the near future. Cadillac is withholding the giant Escalade iQ from the Australian market.

The Caddies aren’t cheap here, though. The base Lyriq Luxury is priced from $122,000 before on-roads and the Sport is a couple of thousand more. A far cry from the circa A$50,000 Equinox EV and A$70,000 Blazer EV.

GM executive Jim Roth told CarsGuide earlier this year the company was confident in success.

“We’re in launch phase, we’re in growth phase, we’re in expansion phase, and we don’t see any reason why the EV portfolio should not be a real segment dominator across the board [in Australia],” said Roth.

“When you have the right EV with the right attributes, range, styling and that price equation…making sure that you have those three things dialled in, we do really well in the market place.”

GM is also on the cutting edge of battery tech with its Lithium Manganese-Rich (LMR) battery breakthrough, which is the result of a partnership between GM and Korea's LG.

GM said, the new LMR batteries are 33 per cent more energy dense than lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries. The cut-price cells used extensively by BYD, and are expected to have a similar cost.