Currently reading: White vehicles most popular globally for 10th year running
More than a third of the world’s vehicles are white, with black and grey coming close behind

White is the most common vehicle colour in the world for the 10th consecutive year and accounts for over one-third of vehicles globally, according to a recent report.

Paint supplier Axalta has revealed that white cars make up 38% of all vehicles using the world’s road, while 19% of vehicles are black, making it the second most common colour. In third place is grey, seen on 15% of vehicles.

This marks the third consecutive year in which white vehicles have comprised 38% of the world’s traffic. Black has also historically been a favourite of drivers, remaining the preferred colour for luxury vehicles. In Europe, 62% of all luxury vehicles are either grey or black, said Axalta.

Although white is the most common colour overall, there are differences between regions. White is most common in China, for example, accounting for 57% of the vehicle parc, whereas in Europe, white splits top honours with grey, each accounting for 25% of vehicles.

Yellow and gold, by contrast, are unpopular in many countries, but adorn 5% of all vehicles in China. On the other hand, Chinese buyers are not fond of blue vehicles, which make up just 3% of vehicles there, and blue is the colour of just 11% of vehicles in South Korea.

Axalta’s figures do not include separate measures for the UK, but Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders figures released last year showed the UK’s favourite car colour was grey, bucking the global trend. More than one in five new cars (22.6%) driven off forecourts were grey, with black and white a close second and third.

Scotland and the Channel Islands were more in line with global trends, preferring white, which was also the most common colour for drivers of zero-emissions vehicles. In the UK in 2019, black was the colour of choice for executive and luxury saloon cars.

READ MORE

Grey rules the roost as UK’s favourite car colour in 2019 

Grey topples black as the UK’s top car colour in 2018 

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russ13b 14 December 2020

It's not a bad colour, some cars and bikes look really good in white, but some have horrific marker pen panel gaps.

Old But not yet Dead 14 December 2020

 

Being charged a minimum of £500 for anything but white might have something to do with it.

289 15 December 2020

Oh the manufacturers have that covered Old but not yet dead......they have seen the trend and decided to call it 'special white' or 'super white' .....just plain old white in reality. In many cases not even metallic. Still gives them licence to claw back lost revenues in a name!!!

I never trust these roundups of favourite colour surveys....after all, ou can only but whats available.... and since the range of colours is frequently woeful fifty shades of grey or black mostly, no wonder this is a big seller.

White...well if you look at it globally - with so many hot climate countries - no surprises there!