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BMW Claims Global Sales Crown in Premium Segment, Had Its Best Year Ever

The BMW Group has just posted its sales results for 2021, and the German conglomerate prides itself on an 8.4 percent growth last year when compared to 2020, while also surpassing the all-time high of the pre-crisis year 2019. With these results, BMW picks up the 2021 sales crown of the premium segment.
BMW iX and BMW i4 20 photos
Photo: BMW
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To be precise, the BMW Group sold 2,521,525 vehicles last year for all its automotive brands. Out of all those, BMW accounted for 2,213,795 units, which is a 9.1-percent increase in 2021 over the results that they achieved in 2020. The latter is also the reason behind the company's new sales crown, which also means its best year in history.

Over 2021, sales of fully electric vehicles more than doubled, reaching 103,855 units, which is something that the BMW Group prides itself on. According to figures, one in four vehicles sold by the BMW Group in Germany is electrified. The electric MINI Cooper SE is the company's highest-volume electrified vehicle, as provisional registration figures show.

One in ten BMW X3 vehicles sold worldwide in 2021 was fully electric. We also drove an iX3 last year, which was one of 37,939 units sold worldwide. Despite being launched nine years ago, the BMW i3 still had a 5.4 percent growth in 2021 with 28,216 units sold.

If we look at figures for individual brands within the BMW Group, the electrified vehicles within the conglomerate, which refers to PHEVs and EVs, had a 70.4 percent increase in sales in 2021. Rolls-Royce obtained an incredible 48.7 percent increase in sales last year, motivated by the Ghost, but not only because of it, as the Cullinan also attracted many new clients. Order books are busier than ever, and the company had more bespoke commissions than ever.

BMW Motorrad, the motorcycle division of the corporation, had a 14.8-percent sales increase last year, as it sold 194,261 units. In other words, 2021 was also the best year in the history of BMW Motorrad, not just the automobile division. The most popular model was the BMW 1250 GS, which had almost 60,000 units sold, but the R 1250 RT, R 18, and S 1000 R were "very well received," as officials described.

The BMW M department had a 13.4-percent increase in sales last year, with 163,542 units sold, with the M3, M4 doing "especially well but the X5 M and X6 M have also seen increases. The positive result is due to the new 4 Series derivatives in M form, but also the M40i versions of the X3, and X7. The fully electric BMW iX M60 and i4 M50 will be a part of BMW M's sales figures in 2022, and the company expects them to do well this year.

MINI had a more modest increase, of just 3.3 percent, which led to 302,144 units. The Cooper SE was chosen by more than one in ten customers.

If we look at sales results on regions, the U.S. market brought the biggest increase in 2021 when compared to 2020, as it had a 19.5 percent more units sold, adding up to 366,574 vehicles. The Americas had an 18.9 percent increase, which added up to 450,062 units, including those in the USA, while China was the country that bought the most BMW and MINI vehicles last year, with 846,237 units, marking an 8.9 percent increase in sales.

The European market brought an 8.9 percent increase in sales for BMW and MINI overall, with just over 948,000 units, while the German market had a 6.8 percent drop to 267,917 units, as provisional registration figures show.
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Editor's note: For illustration purposes, the photo gallery only shows the BMW iX and BMW i4.

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About the author: Sebastian Toma
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Sebastian's love for cars began at a young age. Little did he know that a career would emerge from this passion (and that it would not, sadly, involve being a professional racecar driver). In over fourteen years, he got behind the wheel of several hundred vehicles and in the offices of the most important car publications in his homeland.
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