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The Ford Ranger might have found itself back on top of Australia’s sales charts in March, but a dig into the numbers reveal cracks in the sales ambitions of the Ranger, Toyota HiLux and Isuzu D-Max in the wake of fresh competition from China.
One of Toyota’s most senior executives in Australia, the brand’s Vice President of Sales and Marketing, Sean Hanley, recently told CarsGuide that a dual-cab might not ever be Australia’s best selling vehicle again, given increased competition was diluting the buyer pool, and his prophecy does appear to be coming true.
In the first three months of 2025, almost 6000 sales have disappeared from our three best-selling utes, with the Ford Ranger, Toyota HiLux and Isuzu D-Max all down year on year.
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The Ranger has managed a total 13,266 sales this quarter, compared to 15,761 in 2024. The Toyota HiLux managed 10,999 sales, compared to 12,490 this time last year. And the Isuzu D-Max has shaved 1751 sales, reporting 6196 units delivered, compared to 7947 last year.
That’s 5777 utes missing from the big three. Interestingly, the BYD Shark 6 has managed 4836 sales so far this year – almost enough to fill the gap in those sales results. If you add another newcomer, the JAC T9 (525 units) you’re getting even closer still. And that’s without counting the several thousand sales accrued by GWM and LDV so far in 2025.
It's just the beginning for the Shark 6, with EVDirect CEO David Smitherman telling CarsGuide that "The ultimate way to validate anything is the scoreboard. It's going to be north of 15,000 (sales this year)."
Plus, this is all prior to the arrival of the much-anticipated Kia Tasman, which is aiming for around 20,000 sales per year.
It would seem, then, that Toyota’s hypothesis is coming true, with Mr Hanley describing the ute market as set to be “completely saturated”
"I think it'll happen within the next year or two: an SUV will be the number one selling car,” Hanley told CarsGuide.
“Because the ute market is going to be so diverse and so competitively saturated in the next two years, that no one car company is going to dominate like it has in the last five years.
“There's going to be more players. There's only so many buyers – the [ute] segment's not going to astronomically grow."
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That’s less of a problem for Toyota, with its broad product range, as it might be for Ford or Isuzu, with both heavily dependent on their ute for success. That said, both have significant new variants coming, especially Ford, which will launch a work-ready plug-in hybrid to take on the BYD Shark 6.
But will the shine come off Chinese utes, or will they continue to knock favourites down the sales charts? Only time will tell.
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