Car sales and research website Select Car Leasing has conducted a survey that provides a fascinating insight into which automakers are the most searched for online and where.
The website pored over Google search data from the last 12 months to find out which were the most searched for car brands on the all-seeing search engine. They looked at the data for individual countries, giving us a rough idea of which car brands are the most popular or the most talked about in which countries. The results are fascinating and, in some cases, confusing.
Not surprisingly, the most frequently Googled car brand in North America is Tesla, with Google recording more than two million searches for the brand in the last 12 months in the US and Canada alone. Tesla is making vehicles that have some people excited due to their innovation, so it’s easy to see why consumers may be searching for the brand frequently. Tesla is also often in the news due to their stock price and CEO Elon Musk’s outspoken nature and questionable twitter antics, which may prompt more people to punch ‘Tesla’ into their Google search bar. Tesla is also the most searched for automaker in China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Norway, Barbados, Turks and Caicos, the Cayman islands, the Bahamas and Bermuda.
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Mexico is one North American country that’s not Tesla-obsessed. The country loves Chevys, with citizens there searching for Chevrolet about 550,000 times over the past year. Surrounding countries have a bit more expensive taste. El Salvador’s most Google car brand was Lamborghini. The same is true for Honduras, Haiti, Jamaica, El Salvador, the Dominican and Grenada. Nicaragua and Panama Google Hyundai more than any other brand, while Guatemala shows extreme interest in Honda. Costa Rica searches for Suzuki more than any other car company, but we get the feeling citizens there are searching for the company because they are interested in its motorcycles too.
Things are different in Europe, where the German luxury brands reign supreme. France, Spain, Italy and Latvia are searching for Volkswagen the most, while Germany, the, UK, the Netherlands, Portugal and Belgium show extreme interest in Mercedes-Benz. BMW appears to be popular in Eastern Europe, with residents of Serbia, Bulgaria, Cyprus and Montenegro Googling it more than any other brand.
To view the full results from this survey, flip through the infographics in the gallery above. We think you’ll be surprised at how often companies like Hyundai pop-up and how major brands like Audi, Ford and Jeep are less frequent.