Since BYD entered South Africa in June 2023, they did not release sales figures to the Automotive Business Council (Naamsa), which meant that the sales figures around new-energy vehicles (NEVs) shown to us never really reflected the appetite of South Africans for NEVs.
The strategy left local analysts blind to the potential footprint of a brand that had already overtaken Tesla to become the top-selling electric vehicle producer globally. That quiet global dominance finally made its localised presence known in March 2026.
BYD integrated into Naamsa’s data pool and disclosed their sales figures for the first time, shattering the existing framework of South Africa’s automotive landscape.
In its debut reporting month, the brand single-handedly drove the country to a historic record of 389 battery electric vehicles (EVs) sold. A staggering 239 of those units belonged to a single model: the BYD Dolphin Surf.
The Dolphin Surf was launched in September 2025 as the most affordable EV in the country, starting at R339 000.
BYD also dominated plug-in hybrid (PHEV) sales in March, selling 244 units, while total NEV sales jumped by 120% year on year.
The jump continued in May after BYD South Africa managing director Steve Chang revealed that the company’s order books sat at 1635 vehicles. Much of that comes down to affordability. Before BYD launched the Sealion 6 PHEV in April 2025, there was not one PHEV priced under R1 million.
WATCH: EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH BYD MANAGING DIRECTOR STEVE CHANG
BYD has since expanded on that initial offering by releasing two more affordable PHEV models. The latest is the Atto 2 crossover, which was launched on 11 June at R439 900, making it South Africa’s most affordable PHEV.
However, in the PHEV space, other Chinese competitors like Geely, Chery, Omoda and GWM have all released products in a similar price range since the launch of the Sealion 6.
In the EV space, Geely released the E2 earlier this year to rival the Dolphin Surf and Chery plans to release the Q later this year, which will also fall into a similar price bracket.
Despite being the needle movers, Chang says that BYD will not entertain price wars with these brands.
“What BYD is trying to do in South Africa is that we want to bring the technology here. That's always our mission. We spent a lot of money and time and energy for the past three and a half years to develop the market.”
“People say that's a first-mover advantage but in today's automotive industry, first-movers may not have the advantage, because you have all the other people coming in just trying to copy whatever you're doing,” he says.
“We don't want to entertain the price war. The real question sits with EV and plug-in hybrids and what's that? That's the reliability of after-sales services, parts availability and residual values.”
“If you keep offering cheap, lower prices into the market, there are no residual values. And then we need to help the customers with innovative financing schemes.”
“Because people are still worried about, ‘If I drive this car for five years, what is the value of the vehicle?’ So these are the things that we work on in the background and not just to do it for BYD—we actually do it for the market,” he adds.
Since BYD has become the first-mover in the NEV space, they have encountered multiple challenges such as range anxiety and charging infrastructure bottlenecks.
“Since we got here, it has been challenging but fun. The key word is education. Product education, customer education, dealer education and salespeople education,” Chang continues.
BYD has also committed to improving charging infrastructure in South Africa. In September 2025, BYD signed an official Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Eskom to figure out grid compatibility for a massive rollout of charging stations.
The next month, BYD’s global Executive Vice President and European head, Stella Li, announced that the brand would roll out between 200 and 300 Flash charging stations capable of delivering up to 1000 kW of power, with the first sites going live in April or May 2026.
However, to date, not one has been built.
Chang says that the delay is due to BYD headquarters rolling out updated flash chargers while planning had already begun in South Africa on the initial flash chargers.
“Last year we signed an MOU with Eskom. After that, we were doing our planning. While we were doing our planning for our Flash Charger 1.0, headquarters rolled out the Flash Charger 2.0. With 1.0, the charging speed was capped at 1000 kW.”
“With 2.0, we are now sitting at 1500 kW. So we had to adapt to the change. That's why we had to delay a little bit with our rollout plan. But this year is an accelerator. You will definitely see Flash Charging,” he says.
“And with Flash Chargers, right, we change the whole narrative differently. Because you will be able to charge your car within five minutes. Similar to the time you take to fill petrol,” he adds.
South Africa currently only has 650 public charging stations but Chang warns that the BYD rollout will not solve all of the charging infrastructure issues. He says that as a country, South Africa needs to look at increasing charging infrastructure in densely populated areas and housing complexes.
“In order to solve this day-to-day charging problem where you can’t find a charger, we need to focus on density areas to provide more charging points and also work with the body corporate, for example, on complexes to install more AC chargers. Because people need ACs just to top up,” he explains.
“More and more people understand, after they buy a product, they realise that, ‘Hey, I only need 45 minutes to charge my car in a day with the AC charger.’ That's all you need.”
Local manufacturing
In February, the department of trade, industry and competition warned that tariffs could rise from 25% to 50% on imported vehicles.
However, established local manufacturers are not looking for a protectionist sledgehammer.
Speaking at BMW’s state of the motoring industry event in February, BMW Group South Africa Chief Executive Peter van Binsbergen warned that a flat 50% tariff hike would be a system shock with severe unintended consequences.
Instead, he called for targeted measures, which would still include a tariff hike on imported vehicles but said it would mainly be to encourage Chinese manufacturers to start producing vehicles in South Africa.
Since then, Chery has acquired Nissan’s plant in Rosslyn and announced that they will begin manufacturing the popular Jetour T-Series in Pretoria from 2027. Given these looming tariff structures and the government's newly activated 150% tax deduction for EV investments, Chang reveals that behind closed doors, BYD has already done the heavy industrial homework.
However, factory lines ultimately require massive, sustained local market volume to justify their multi-billion-rand operational costs.
“I think what—what people don't know about BYD is that we already came into the country and did a very extensive feasibility study back in November 2024. I can't promise anything. All I can say is that BYD is always a forward-thinker.”
“And then, building a factory will increase our local investments, but it really boils down to market readiness," he says.
“You cannot put up a factory when you're only doing a few hundred cars in a month. When the market is ready, I think BYD will be there.”
For now, the BYD storm will continue to be anchored at the ports. The brand is betting its immediate future on an aggressive balancing act that attempts to out-pace local infrastructure bottlenecks with its own accelerated 1500 kW grid rollout, while allowing its affordable, dual-fuel PHEVs to normalise new-energy technology for a highly receptive public.
“Like I said, we’re trying to develop a market that wasn't there before,” Chang concludes.