Today, cars are manufactured all around the world and the total motor vehicle production in 2019 was 91,786,861 units, down a little from a peak of 97,302,534 in 2017. While 2020 data is now available, we will be using the older data from 2019 automobile production as 2020 was gravely impacted by lockdowns around the world so some countries that had harder or longer lockdowns produced fewer vehicles. That screwed up the rankings for 2020.
East Asia, North America, and Western Europe remain by far the world's greatest regions of car production while India, Brazil, and Thailand also produce significant amounts of vehicles. The countries that produced more than 1 million motor vehicles in 2019 that did not make this list are Thailand, Canada, Russia, Turkey, The Czech Republic, The United Kingdom, Indonesia, and surprisingly, Slovakia. Here are the top ten motor vehicle producing countries in 2019 ranked!
10 China - 25,720,665
It's no competition. China wins. China's motor vehicle production growth has been nothing short of phenomenal. As recently as 2000, they only produced around 2 million motor vehicles, then in the midst of the Great Recession, they overtook the United States.
While China's domestic car brands are up and coming with the likes of Great Wall and Geely growing, much of China's motor vehicle production is driven by foreign companies like BMW and GMC operating there.
9 United States Of America - 10,880,019
The United States dominated the automobile industry for many years since the Second World War. Today it is a close second along with Japan. American motor vehicle production peaked in 1999 with 13,024,978 vehicles produced. While America has maintained an annual car production of around 10 million vehicles per annum since the 1950s, its relative share of total vehicles produced around the world has fallen dramatically. Back in 1950, it produced less than 10 million vehicles, but that represented around 75% of all the motor vehicles produced in that year globally.
One caveat to comparing motor vehicles around the world is the type of vehicles being produced. This is a one for one comparison. But in America, a disproportionate number of vehicles are large pickup trucks while in other countries they are small passenger cars. There's no comparing a Ford F-350 with a little Ford Fiesta.
8 Japan - 9,684,298
Coming in a close third, Japan is world-famous for its good quality vehicles and currently is home to the world's largest car manufacturing company - Toyota.
Also, interestingly, Japan's peak motor vehicle production was almost the same as America's at 13,486,796 in 1990. Since the year 2000, Japan's annual car production has remained largely stable.
7 Germany - 4,661,328
Germany is home to many of the most famous and sought-after mass-producing car companies, including BMW, Volkswagen, and Mercedes Benz. Still, their annual car output is only around half of Japan's.
Germany's car production peaked in 2007 with 6,213,460 motor vehicles rolling off the assembly lines.
6 India - 4,516,017
India is something of an up-and-comer in the automotive industry. Today it produces the fifth most motor vehicles in the world and is only just a whisker short of claiming the fourth spot from Germany.
But as recently as 1990, India produced as little as 362k motor vehicles, while in the year 2000 it was still as little as 800,000.
5 South Korea - 3,950,617
South Korea is the home of Hyundai and Kia. South Korea's highest production year was 2011 with some 4,657,094 motor vehicles produced but has been seeing a slow and steady decline ever since.
One trivia, there have been rumors circulating online of Apple being in talks with Hyundai to produce its secretive Apple Car from its mysterious "Titan" project.
4 Mexico - 3,986,794
Back to North America, and The United States' southern neighbor Mexico claims the 6th spot. Mexico isn't known for its own car brands, but it still manages to attract a range of foreign car companies to set up shop in Mexico.
Mexico's best year for motor vehicle production was in 2013 with 4,664,779 vehicles produced.
3 Brazil - 2,944,988
South America's only contribution to this list and the only country from the Southern Hemisphere (or at least partially from the Southern Hemisphere).
In 2020 Brazil was just shy of 3 million motor vehicles and like Mexico, their best production year was back in 2013. In 2013 Brazil managed to manufacture 3,712,380 motor vehicles.
2 Spain - 2,822,355
Spain manages to edge out all its other European counterparts (apart from Germany of course). It's remarkable how Spain managed to out-produce France given that Renault, Peugeot, and Citroën are based there and Spain's only large car brand is Volkswagen-owned SEAT.
Spain's production is once again approaching its peak level set in the year 2000 with 3,032,874 produced after having fallen to some 1,979,179 in the year 2012
1 France - 2,202,460
France comes in at tenth on this list just head of Thailand and Canada. France's best year was 3,919,776 motor vehicles way back in 1989. Today, France's car production has stabilized at around some 2 million per annum.
Many of France's cars are smaller vehicles suitable for Europe's smaller roads and taste for smaller vehicles.
In summary, China single-handedly produces around a quarter of the world's motor vehicles after a meteoric rise in the 2000s