Last year, 44,088 new passenger vehicles were sold in Croatia, which is 2.6 percent less than the year before, while in December alone, sales on an annual level increased by 8.8 percent, to 2,703 cars, data from Promocije plus indicates.

According to data from Promocije plus published on Thursday, the most new vehicles in 2022 sold in Croatia were Volkswagens, 5,288 of them, which is around 12 percent of the share of all new vehicles. The German car giant is traditionally the most popular in Croatia, whether as a family car, company car or taxi.

Škoda was the second most popular with 4,506 vehicles sold and a market share of 10.2 percent, Kia was third, with 3,413 vehicles sold and a market share of 7.7 percent.

Opel came in fourth place with 3,291 new cars sold and a market share of 7.4 percent in total sales, while Dacia was fifth with 3,217 vehicles sold and a market share of 7.3 percent.

Last year, 1,578 new Audis, 1,208 Mercedes, 1,156 BMWs, 247 Porsches, and 213 Teslas were sold, according to Promocija plus statistics. The electric car company from Croatia, Rimac, sold only two cars in Croatia last year.

The best-selling model in 2022 was the Škoda Octavia with 1,957 units sold, followed by the Dacia Duster, which was chosen by 1,523 customers, and the Opel Crossland with 1,284 vehicles sold.

At the high-end scale of the car market seven Bentleys were sold, four Lamborghinis, three Ferraris and three Aston Martins were sold.

Last year's statistics show that every other new car sold was petrol based with 22,824 petrol cars sold, which was a share of 51.8 percent of the total sales. In second place were hybrids and diesels were in third place.

In 2022 1,374 electric vehicles were sold, which amounted to just over 3 percent of the market share.