Chinese car maker BYD saw sales jump at the end of last year, leaving it closer to claiming the title of the world's best-selling electric vehicle (EV) maker of 2024. The company says it sold 207,734 EVs in December, taking its annual total to 1.76 million, as subsidies and discounts helped attract customers.

The EV giant sold 1.76 million electric cars in 2024, per figures released on Wednesday, putting it within touching distance of beating Tesla.

Thus, to keep its crown as the world's top seller of electric cars, Tesla needs to deliver over 400,000 cars in the final quarter to keep ahead of BYD. The U.S. carmaker sold a record 1.81 million vehicles in 2023, and it is expected to reveal its fourth-quarter deliveries for 2024 later this week.

China’s BYD Co. enjoyed a year-end surge to push total sales to 4.25 million passenger cars last year, narrowing its gap with Tesla Inc. as the two vie for the crown of top-selling electric-vehicle maker of 2024.

BYD’s aggressive year-end sales push worked. China’s leading EV maker sold a record number of electric cars in 2024,

Chinese electric-vehicle growth continued in December, with BYD set to take the crown of largest seller from Tesla for the second time. Growth alone, however, wasn’t enough to give all the Chinese EV stocks a boost.