Our colleagues at SMMT (the Society of Motor Manufacturers & Traders) have published the full year figures for UK production of cars, commercial vehicles and internal combustion engines for 2025. These show, respectively, trends of -8%, -62.3% (largely due to the shutdown of the Stellantis factory in Luton, despite some of this production transferring to Ellesmere Port) and, perhaps surprisingly, +1%.
The fall in car production has to be seen in the context of the shutdown of the JLR facilities for the best part of two months due to the cyber-attack; their output fell by -22% compared to 2024 and this accounts for most of the decline in car production in 2025. Nissan remains the largest manufacturer but saw a -3% reduction in the number of cars they produced; Mini comes 3rd in the list and increased its output by +12%, although this remains well short of the previous levels of their output.
Overall, 77% of UK assembled cars were exported, with the European Union accounting for 57% of those vehicles that were shipped abroad; this is followed by the USA (15%) and China (6%). For engines, the export ratio is 65% but this is only the direct shipments as many of the engines supplied to the “home” market will be exported as part of the vehicle that they have been installed in. Although engine output increased by +1%, the total of 1.6 million units is lower than in 2023 (1.7 million) and well down on the pre-pandemic numbers and the peak of 2.7 million recorded in 2017.
One other notable statistic, which we highlighted in the new car registration data recently, is that of the 717,371 cars manufactured in the UK, 298,813 (41.7%) were either battery electric, plug-in hybrid or hybrid vehicles. The SMMT report notes that “With the start of next generation volume electric car production in Sunderland, and the planned launch of seven new EV models across the UK, output is expected to grow in 2026.”
As noted above, the weakest area was commercial vehicles, with a sharp reduction due to the closure in Luton. This came after a very strong result in 2023 and 2024 – production of commercial vehicles in 2024 was at its highest since 2008 (the last year of UK production of Ford Transit vans in Southampton), but the 2025 total of 47,344 vehicles was, by a considerable margin, the lowest ever recorded.
You can get the details from the SMMT website at https://www.smmt.co.uk/vehicle-data/manufacturing/ with the press release at https://www.smmt.co.uk/news/ (29 January) our file summarizing the SMMT data is available on request from MTA.