Best Selling Cars Around The Globe – Trans Siberian Series Part 16: The Best-selling Cars in Mongolia

by Matt Gasnier

Published: June 25th, 2014

best selling cars around the globe trans siberian series part 16 the best selling

This is the final Mongolian post in our Trans-Siberian Series, exploring a very unique and surprising list of the best-selling models in the country. Next stop will be China! But first, a slice of modern Mongolian culture for you. As you will see below the Mercedes G-Class is at world-best levels in the Mongolian sales charts and has reached cult-level in the country. Proof: above is the music video for Mongolian R’n’b artist Tselmuun’s latest hit “Setgel”. From 2min49 in the video you can see a line of Mercedes G-Class behind the dancers, not one but 4 of them – so hot right now…

If you can’t wait for the next report, you can follow my trip in real time here, or check out 174 other car markets on my blog.

The Toyota Land Cruiser is by far the most popular new car in Mongolia.

After chasing, following up and chasing again many actors of the Mongolian automotive industry, here it is in all its glory thanks to Toyota’s distributor in the country Khet Motors: the official Top 12 best-selling new cars in Mongolia over the first half of 2013. Yep that’s the most recent official data available for this country, but better this than nothing!

Police orders have pushed the Kia Rio up to #2 so far in 2013.

These 12 models added up to 1,568 sales over the Full Year 2012 and 913 over the first half of 2013, which can be extrapolated as approximately 40% increase of the overall Mongolian new car market year-on-year… Talk about explosive growth.

The Lexus LX rounds up the 2013 year-to-date Mongolian podium.

Observation in the streets of Ulaanbaatar didn’t lie: the Toyota Land Cruiser is well and truly king around here, selling 501 units over the Full Year 2012 and 375 so far in 2013. It’s hard to estimate the Land Cruiser’s overall market share but it should definitely be north of 20%. Kia Mongolia tells me a special order from the Ulaanbaatar police has pushed the Kia Rio up to 2nd place so far in 2013 with 97 sales, and this makes sense as I did not see any ‘private’ Rios the entire time I stayed there.

The Mercedes G-Class ranks at a world-best #5 in Mongolia!

#2 in 2012, the Lexus LX570 is pushed down to a still incredible third position in 2013 so far thanks to 88 units sold above the Hyundai Tucson at 54 sales. But the most characteristic and unique element of the Mongolian new car market is found in 5th position: the Mercedes G-Class reaches its world-best ranking here thanks to 51 units sold and up from #7 in 2012! The G-Class is simply adored by Mongolian consumers and has reached cult-status, being included in numerous local music (Mongol pop or rap) videos.

The Range Rover is the #11 most popular model in Mongolia so far in 2013!

It is a very interesting models ranking indeed for Mongolia, with many other high-end models ranking inside the Top 12 like the Toyota Land Cruiser Prado at Hyundai Sonata at Toyota Land Cruiser 70 at Ford Everest at #10 and Range Rover at This is typical of very ‘young’ new car markets where only the wealthiest have the money to afford to buy a new vehicle, and therefore go all out when they do. Given the very large majority of the Mongolian population can only afford to buy used Japanese imports, the Mongolian new car sales charts end up looking like they belong to a petrol-rich Middle-Eastern country…

Mongolia 6 months 2013 – best-selling models:

H1: First Half, FY: Full Year

PosModel2013 H12012 FYPos1Toyota Land Cruiser 20037550112Kia Rio97n/an/a3Lexus LX5708825824Hyundai Tucson5411755Mercedes G-Class517976Toyota Land Cruiser Prado488967Hyundai Sonata4611948Kia Sportage44n/an/a9Toyota Land Cruiser 7037139310Ford Everest27n/an/a11Range Rover25471112Hyundai Santa Fe21n/an/aNissan Patroln/a628Hyundai Accentn/a628Hyundai Elantran/a4810Nissan Patrol Y62n/a4711

Source: Khet Motors

Hyundai Tucson

Toyota Prado

Hyundai Sonata

Kia Sportage

Toyota Land Cruiser 70

Hyundai Santa Fe

I was very surprised to spot a Ford Territory imported straight from Australia!

Hyundai Accent

Toyota Highlander

Toyota Venza

Hyundai Azera

VW Amarok

Ford Explorer

Lexus RX

Toyota Hilux Surf

Chevrolet Aveo

Hyundai Elantra

#BestSellingCarsAroundTheGlobe #MattGasnier #Mongolia #Trans-SiberianSeries

Matt Gasnier

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Sjalabais on Jun 26, 2014

If I were a "big 3" executive or even a German auto emperor reading this, I'd hurry up to get my high-margin 4x4 product line to Mongolia asap. Mongolia is a growing market, and en route to do so for quite some time. Now is the opportunity to define what is desirable, and it seems that Japanese fare is doing best. Apart from the G, that is - one ancient German taking over for ancient Ukrainians...

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Fred on Jun 28, 2014

Brown is a nice color for the Venza

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