Car statistics

We thought it was about time to look at some interesting statistics for cars in the UK. We hope you enjoy some of these.

Licenced vehicles

Let’s start with how many vehicles are currently licenced on our roads. Note, we said licenced. We all know that the majority of us are law-abiding citizens who pay our taxes and make sure we have a valid MOT and insurance on our cars. That’s the majority of us. There will always be a small minority who will try and get away with not paying – they eventually get caught though.

How many?!

Ok, back to statistics then. It might come as a little bit of a surprise to learn that as of March 2022, there were 40.4 MILLION vehicles on our roads. Holy Guacamole! That’s a lot of vehicles considering the UK population is 67.5 million. Compare that to the 1950s, when there were around 50 million people but only 4 million vehicles. Public transport was definitely more widely utilised back then.

Most popular

The Morris Minor was the most popular car back in the 50s, with more than 1.6 million manufactured between 1948 and 1972. Following the fuel crisis in the Suez Canal in 1956, there was a need to develop a more fuel-efficient car and so the Mini was born. Almost five and a half million original Minis were sold across the globe.

Who manufactures them?

By the 1950s, the UK was the second largest car manufacturer in the world (the US being the biggest manufacturer). Sadly, there are no longer any UK owned and built cars. If you’re thinking “but what about Jaguar?” No longer British, Jaguar Land Rover as it is now known, was originally British Leyland, bought by Ford and then by the industry giant Tata Motors, based in India. Aston Martin? Sorry, a mixture of German and Canadian ownership. We can almost feel your tears right now. Okay, surely the Mini? Nope, BMW bought it out way back in 2000 (prior to this it was owned by Rover).

Back to the stats. Of those 40 odd million vehicles on the road in 2022, a huge 81% are cars. The remainder of those vehicles is made up of LGVs and HGVs, motorcycles, buses, and coaches. Around 50 million people are registered with the DVLA as having a driving licence. The most popular car in 2022? Ford Fiesta.

We’re sure you’ll agree, that’s a whole lot of people with a whole lot of cars on the road. Make sure you’re legal by checking our cheap car insurance, where we compare hundreds of providers. Get started now by filling out this 3-minute form.