In 2020, 555,742 new motor vehicles and 875,554 second-hand vehicles were registered in Belgium. The number of new motor vehicles put into circulation has decreased by 19.2 %, while the registrations of second-hand vehicles has decreased by 3.9 %. The impact of the Covid-19 crisis was the most significant in March, April and May 2020. With only 5,450 new cars and 10,936 second-hand cars, sales hit an all-time low in April.
New passenger car registrations decreased by 21.3 % in 2020, while the previous five years always showed a slight increase. The decrease is the most significant in Walloon Brabant with -33.3 %, followed by the provinces Antwerp (-24.6 %), Flemish Brabant (-23.3 %) and the Brussels-Capital Region (-23.1 %). The registration of second-hand cars also experienced a slightly sharper decline than in the previous year (-5.9 % in 2020 compared to -1.4 % in 2019).
Motorbike sales continued to do well, however, increasing by 4.8 % for new and 9.9 % for second-hand motorbikes compared to 2019.
14,547 speed pedelecs were also sold in 2020, which is almost as much as in 2019.
The market share of new electric and hybrid cars increased by almost 12 % over one year
With a market share of 48.2 %, petrol cars still remain the most popular new cars. However, it is losing considerable ground (-12.1 %) to electric and especially hybrid passenger cars, which together now have a market share of 19.7 %. In 2019, this was only 7.9 %. Sales of hybrid cars (petrol or diesel + electric) more than doubled in one year: from 35,010 cars in 2019 to 71,457 in 2020. The share of new diesels remained unchanged in 2020 (31.2 %) compared to 2019 after years of decline.
For the first time in years, more petrol cars than diesel cars on the second-hand market
The downward trend in second-hand diesel cars continues, however, with the market share declining by 14.4 % between 2015 and 2020. Less than half of second-hand cars (48.2 %) are still diesel, compared to 62.6 % in 2015. With a market share of 49.1 %, there are therefore now more petrol cars than diesel cars on the second-hand market.