Tesla Australia’s fightback hits pause

Tesla Australia sold just 555 Model Ys and 362 Model 3s in July 2025, bringing an end to two strong months of growth Down Under.

The US brand sold an incredible 4859 vehicles in June, with another 3897 vehicles finding homes in May.

Those numbers ensure the brand maintained its status as the top-selling EV producer, but last month’s tally of just 917 cars wasn’t due to a lack of demand.

Instead, Tesla Australia claims the slump was triggered by a gap in the arrival of new Model Ys and Model 3s from the firm’s factory in Shanghai.

The brand says it expects a bumper month for sales in August, thanks to an overflowing order book for its recently facelifted Model Y.

As it stands, in the first seven months of this year Tesla has sold a total of 15,063 cars, down a hefty 41.4 per cent on the same period in 2024.

Seizing on an opportunity, the dip in Model Y sales saw the BYD Sealion 7 beat the world’s best-selling car locally, claiming the number one spot on the EV chart for the first time, with the Chinese brand shifting 1427 examples of its mid-size all-electric SUV.

Despite the drop-off in sales, Tesla is still expected to remain the best-selling electric car brand year-to-date, although BYD could potentially overtake it later in 2025.

Helping boost its sales, the US brand says it will include a $2000 bonus for any customer trading in an eligible vehicle to order and take delivery of a new or demonstrator Model Y by September 30, which is alongside a $3000 discount for customers ordering via a novated lease or using finance from Plenti or Westpac.

Tesla’s latest blip Down Under echoes a wider problem in Europe that saw it sell just 987 vehicles in the UK market last month (down from 2462 units) and just 1100 cars in Germany (57.8 per cent down on July 2024).

Sino-Swedish brand Polestar had a decent July, relative to this time last year, returning an impressive-sounding growth in sales of more than 123 per cent, but that only translates to 230 sales last month.

Fuelling the growth is the arrival of cars like the Polestar 4 that sold 86 cars in July alone, but was still outsold by the smaller, entry Polestar 2 (141). Disappointingly, just 3 Polestar 3s found homes in July.

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