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In 2020, Hyundai Elantra reigned as the best-selling car models in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, with approximately **** thousand units sold. Japanese manufacturer Toyota’s models Camry and Hilux closely followed, registering sales of respectively thousand and thousand units in that same year. Toyota and Hyundai have long been dominating the Saudi Arabian automotive industry, accounting for the highest combined share of vehicles on the market.

Saudi Arabia’s automotive market

As of 2020, Saudi Arabia was the automotive market leader in the entire Gulf Cooperation Council region, holding the largest share of the regional vehicle sales volume. That year, passenger vehicle sales in Saudi Arabia dropped, reflecting the impact of the coronavirus outbreak on the global economy, but was forecast to exceed pre-COVID level by 2022. As an import-driven automotive market, Saudi Arabia has yet to unleash its full potential. The country’s first ever locally manufactured car, a SUV named “Ghazal 1”, unveiled back in 2010, marked a turning point for its domestic automotive production industry.

Sustainable alternatives

In Saudi Arabia, road transportation remains one of the prime contributors to the high carbon dioxide emissions, as the country relies heavily on natural gas, crude oil, as well as other petroleum products to fuel its energy consumption. Ranked among the world’s highest CO2 emission from transportation per capita, Saudi Arabia appears to still have a lot of room for action. In order to pursue its Vision 2030 goals towards a more sustainable economy diversifying away from oil, the Saudi government decided to push electric vehicles (EV) consumption by sealing a deal with Lucid Motors, an EV manufacturer headquartered in California. This includes an initial purchase of ** thousand vehicles and optional purchases of up to another ** thousand vehicles over a ten-year period.