2024 has come to a close, which now provides the opportunity to scan the sales charts to see which automakers went into 2025 celebrating and which are scrambling to find a fix. We will update our list of the 25 bestselling cars, trucks, and SUVs when all information becomes available, but for now we’ve pulled out a few trends, failures, and surprise successes from the data, separating the winners from the losers of the world of automotive sales in 2024.

Winner: Subcompact SUVs

While the number of small hatchbacks and sedans in the U.S. has dwindled, the proliferation of subcompact SUVs prove there is still an appetite for affordable transport. The Chevy Trax led the way in 2024, eclipsing 200,000 units with sales up 84 percent, becoming Chevy’s third-biggest-selling vehicle behind the Silverado and Equinox. Its fancier counterpart, the Buick Envista, notched 51,316 sales, slotting it behind the also-subcompact Encore GX as Buick’s second bestseller. The Toyota Corolla Cross’s 93,021 sales represented a 31 percent boost, while Honda HR-V sales rose 24 percent to 151,468 units. The Nissan Kicks, Subaru Crosstrek, Volkswagen Taos, and Hyundai Kona also all saw increases.

Winner: Mid-Size Pickup Trucks

Full-size pickups still top the sales charts but the mid-size trucks made strides in 2024. The Chevrolet Colorado fell just short of 100,000 units, up 38 percent, while its luxe sibling the GMC Canyon jumped 70 percent to 38,215 units sold. The Nissan Frontier registered 68,155 units, a 17 percent rise. Over at Ford, the Ranger was up 43 percent with 46,205 units finding homes, and the compact Maverick showed buyers are willing to go even smaller, with a 39 percent jump to 131,142 units sold.

There were a couple of exceptions. The Toyota Tacoma still leads the segment but competition ate into its 192,813-unit total, down 18 percent. Jeep’s Gladiator also struggled, just cresting 42K units and down 24 percent.

Winner: Volkswagen Cars

In 2024, Volkswagen sales were up 15 percent year over year. An 8 percent increase for its SUV lineup certainly helped, but Volkswagen’s three remaining cars made the biggest leaps. The Jetta sedan did the heavy lifting, recording 71,829 sales, a 52 percent climb from 2023. While the totals were smaller, the sporty GTI and Golf R also experienced growth. Just over 11,000 GTIs found homes, a 49 percent increase, while 4196 Golf Rs were sold, up 30 percent. Sales may have been buoyed by the fact that 2024 was the final model year where VW hot hatches were equipped with a manual transmission. We’ll see if the auto-only GTI and Golf R keep up the sales surge in 2025.

Winner: Lincoln

Lincoln got off to a strong start and continued that momentum throughout the rest of 2024. The brand finished the year up 28 percent, led primarily by two recently updated models. The second-generation Nautilus arrived with a classy look and a dashboard-spanning screen, boosting sales by 50 percent to 36,544 units. The Aviator also received styling tweaks, and sales shot up 62 percent to 25,235 units. The compact Corsair had a good year, and while Navigator sales were down, Lincoln took the wraps off an overhauled version of its full-size SUV for 2025.

Winner: EV Crossovers

A slew of new EVs arrive in 2024, and a few got off to especially hot starts. In its first full year on sale, the Chevy Blazer EV surpassed 23,000 sales, while the less expensive Equinox EV racked up 28,874 sales after reaching dealerships in the spring. But both GM siblings were outdone by their platform mate, the Honda Prologue, which hit 33,000 sales. Established players also saw growth in 2024, with the Hyundai Ioniq 5 up 31 percent to 44,400 units, the Ford Mustang Mach E rising 27 percent to nearly 52,000 units, and the Toyota bZ4X and Subaru Solterra twins experiencing substantial gains. Kia’s three-row EV9 outdid the lower-priced EV6 in its first full sales year, and even the luxurious Cadillac Lyriq made a mark, hitting 28,000 units, up from just 9K in 2023.

Loser: Volkswagen ID.4

One major model was missing from the list of EVs above: the Volkswagen ID.4. In September, the ID.4 was recalled for defective door handles that could cause the doors to open unexpectedly, triggering a stop-sale order. This decimated the ID.4’s 2024 sales, as just 646 units found homes in the fourth quarter. This meant 17,021 ID.4s were sold across the whole year, a 55 percent drop from the nearly 38K units sold in 2023. With the faulty handles now sorted, the ID.4 can start recovering lost ground in 2025.

Loser: Stellantis

The Gladiator wasn’t the only black mark on Stellantis’s record in 2024: every brand except for Fiat—which registered a measly 1528 units—was down. Jeep sales fell 9 percent as the Cherokee and Renegade were phased out and the Grand Cherokee faltered, while the departure of the 300 and a slow year for the Pacifica put Chrysler down 7 percent. Alfa Romeo sales took a 19 percent nosedive as the Tonale did little to make up for the Giulia’s and Stelvio’s slides. Ram was also down 19 percent amid a 16 percent slide for its popular pickup trucks. Dodge struggled the most, experiencing a 29 percent drop, with the Challenger and previous-generation Charger bidding farewell and the new Charger—coming in both gas and electric forms—not yet available.

Loser: Sporty Subarus

Sports cars sell in minuscule numbers these days, but Subaru’s performance vehicles took an especially hard hit this year. While the Toyota GR86 managed a slight increase to 11,426 units, sales of the nearly identical Subaru BRZ slid 20 percent to just 3345 units. The more practical Subaru WRX, meanwhile, tanked by 25 percent with 18,587 units sold. With the future of the Toyota-Subaru sports car partnership unclear and an electric STI-badged WRX still years away, the brand’s performance-car lineup seems to be in the doldrums.

Loser: Cadillac Sedans

We’re avid fans of the Cadillac CT4-V Blackwing and CT5-V Blackwing, potent sports sedans with enthusiast-pleasing manual transmissions. But these represent a tiny fraction of overall sales for Cadillac sedans, and the less athletic versions of the CT4 and CT5 don’t seem to be capturing the public’s attention quite as well. Although Cadillac refreshed the CT5 for the 2025 model year, it didn’t come soon enough to stop a 20 percent slide to 14,861 units sold. The CT4 trudged along without a facelift, with sales plummeting 32 percent to just 6208 units.

Loser: Gas-Powered Chevrolet SUVs

The Blazer EV and Equinox EV impressed, but across the showroom floor, Chevrolet’s gas-powered SUVs were not as successful. Aside from the attainable Trax, every internal-combustion Chevy SUV saw a decline. The Blazer dropped 20 percent, the Suburban was down 16 percent, the Tahoe slid by 5 percent, and the Trailblazer decreased by 6 percent. A new generation of Traverse arrived in 2024 but couldn’t prevent a 14 percent drop. Similarly, the Equinox fell by 2 percent as the fourth generation arrived partway through the year. The Equinox and Traverse could be poised to bounce back in 2025 now that the generational changeover is complete.