Who's winning the small crossover sales race in SA?

Small crossovers have become big business in South Africa and the sales battle towards the summit of the segment is closer than ever. Let’s take a look at how the top performers have fared in 2022 so far…

Not many automotive segments have enjoyed anything even approaching appreciable growth over the past couple of years in South Africa, but there is one that stands head and shoulders above the rest (despite the relatively diminutive stature of the vehicles in question). Yes, we’re talking about the entry-level crossover corner of the market.

A few short years back, your options when shopping for a pint-sized crossover were exceedingly limited. But that’s no longer the case. While Indian-built, sub-four-metre crossovers dominate this part of the market by sheer number, there’s also a popular model imported from Europe (and a progressively popular one from China, too). In short, buyers are spoiled for choice.

So, what happened in the first two months of 2022? Well, we’ve rummaged through Naamsa’s detailed sales figures, applied a little basic arithmetic and identified the strongest year-to-date sellers in this broader category.

Thanks to a particularly convincing performance in January, the Toyota Urban Cruiser tops the table with a whopping 2 381 units registered in the first two months of the year. South Africans really have taken to this Suzuki-built crossover.

Considering the Volkswagen T-Cross bears the highest base price here (and is shipped over from Spain), it’s fascinating that this model places second with a year-to-date tally of 1 771 units. That’s more than enough for it to hold steady as VW SA’s top-selling imported model.

The Chinese-built Haval Jolion (1 599 units) grabs a highly credible third place, with more than 1 000 units registered in January 2022 alone, when it breached the four-figure mark for the first time in South Africa. The Ford EcoSport claims fourth in the year-to-date sales race with a total of 1 394 units. Despite its advanced age, the EcoSport continues to put in impressive sales performances for the Blue Oval brand’s local division, effectively doing all of the heavy lifting in the company’s largely stagnant passenger-vehicle range.

Meanwhile, the Suzuki Vitara Brezza slots into fifth place with a total of 1 222 units. Though that’s only a little more than half of the Urban Cruiser’s effort, it’s interesting to note that the gap between the two Maruti-built models has narrowed somewhat over the past few months. Still, as we’ve pointed out before, there’s clearly something to be said for the sheer power of the Toyota badge in the South African market.

Sixth spot goes to the Hyundai Venue (1 108 units), which was one of the first of these modern baby crossovers to make local landfall back in late-2019, while the Nissan Magnite (781 units) and Renault Kiger (721 units) twins are separated by a mere 60 units in seventh and eighth, respectively. The Kia Sonet (312 units) takes ninth place, though we expect that figure to grow when the long-rumoured 1.0T derivatives (perhaps even in conjunction with a fresh flagship GT Line trim level) are eventually added to the range down the line. Finally, the Honda WR-V (73) closes out the top 10 (note, we decided to exclude the likes of the Mahindra XUV100 Nxt and Suzuki Ignis from this exercise based on how small they are, and likewise felt the 4×4-equipped Jimny didn’t really play in this space).