EU → UK vehicle imports · 2025 data
Britain is the EU’s biggest car export market
Almost one in three vehicles the European Union exports anywhere in the world crosses the Channel. Here is what that trade looks like in numbers — and what changes when the car coming over is yours rather than a manufacturer’s.
EU-built cars exported to the UK in 2025 — more than to any other country outside the EU.
The value of those cars. Add vans, trucks and buses and EU vehicle exports to the UK reach roughly €42bn.
Share of every car sold in the UK in 2025 that was built in the European Union.
Share of UK vehicle imports by value arriving from the EU.
Where EU-built vehicles go
Nearly a third of EU vehicle exports come to Britain
The EU exported around 5 million vehicles worldwide in 2025. About 1.5 million of them — some €42 billion worth — were destined for the United Kingdom, making the UK the single largest market for EU-made vehicles.
The traffic runs both ways: 60.4% of everything the UK exported on wheels in 2025 went to the EU.
Inside the 2025 trade
Electric, commercial, and a fast-growing challenger
The EU’s share is being tested
Chinese-built cars took 14% of the UK market in 2025, up 52.7% on 2024. The EU still supplies more than four times that share — but for the first time the mix of what lands at UK ports is moving meaningfully.
The cars already here
Where Britain’s cars were built
Decades of imports leave a mark. Of the cars on UK roads, German-built vehicles outnumber British-built ones by more than two to one — and the seven EU countries in this top ten account for roughly 22 million cars between them.
Cars licensed in the UK by country of manufacture, top ten, 2024. Bars scaled against Germany.
When the car is yours
Four clocks start the day it lands
Those million-plus cars arrive under manufacturer type approval. A vehicle you buy in France or bring back from Spain does not — it has to be declared, taxed, approved and registered by you. The deadlines are fixed:
Full detail on each step is on our importing cars from the EU to the UK page.
Doing it the short way
My Car Import collects from anywhere in the EU on our own enclosed transporters, handles the customs entry, carries out the headlight, fog light and speedometer changes, tests the vehicle at our own approved facility and registers it with the DVLA — typically within 10 working days.
Sources
ACEA, Fact sheet: EU–UK vehicle trade and Economic and Market Report, full year 2025 — export units and values, market shares. SMMT, Motor Industry Facts 2026 — UK registrations and cars on UK roads by country of manufacture. GOV.UK — Importing vehicles into the UK, exemptions from vehicle approval, and the UK Integrated Online Tariff (heading 8703). Figures are 2025 unless stated; car parc figures are 2024.
