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BYD Slashes Price of Electric Car and Becomes Cheapest in Australia [video]
- motionlessveloc 6d agoNon-video story: https://thedriven.io/2026/09/16/australias-cheapest-new-car-is-now-an-electric-car-and-byds-stunning-move-will-change-the-conversation-about-evs/ https://thedriven.io/2026/09/16/australias-cheapest-new-car-... TL;DR: AUD 19,900 driveway (means taxes, registration etc included), or about US$14k. The main limitation is the 220 km (135 mi) range, which is fine for a city runabout but not great for road tripping.
- rwbt 6d agoI'd love a city run around car inclusive of all taxes for $15k or less.
- hdgvhicv 6d agoI bought a 4 year old leaf with 25k on the clock in May for £7k ($10k). Get about 150 miles on a full charge. I’d rather a little more as I tend to do 90 a day, so if it doesn’t charge offpeak overnight for some reason I’m left with a manual recharge during the day. But I do a lot of miles (25k a year) The main downside on long trips is the DC is chamedo, not standard ccs, so there are fewer locations and they are sometimes broken or full.
- Nursie 6d agoIt’s pretty tiny too, so not a road trip car IMHO. That said, coupled with home solar to power it, this is a very cheap way to get on the road and I will likely go this direction in future - one of these for the city and something a bit bigger/more rugged to go bush once in a while.
- rightnutwingjob 6d ago$20k for the car plus $5k for roof top solar, plus $500,000 for the house to put it on. Or: a $2000 Corolla and the rental home you’re already in.
- luipugs 6d ago$500,000? That's just the price for the garage.
- dbetteridge 6d ago500k doesn't get you much house in Australia these days, try double that.
- andrew_lettuce 6d agoThat's great if you already have a clean, high mileage Corolla or Accord, but good luck finding one for 2k
- rightnutwingjob 6d agoYou’re worried I missed the target price for the car by a couple of grand. But not that I was off on the price of a houses by a factor of three. You can get a run down two bedroom weatherboard round the corner from my two bedroom rental unit for around the $1.2 million mark. BARGAIN!
- Nursie 6d agoI’m not in a rental home, and wouldn’t be anyway. I want solar and a battery (don’t have it yet, it’s on the list) to cut my energy bills and guard against power cuts anyway. So neither of these things is an ‘extra’ expense for me getting a small EV. There are a total of 5 corollas available in Australia for $2k or less. Each one is ratty, beat up and 19+ years old, I wouldn’t want to chance taking any of them on the freeway, and you’d still have to fuel them.
- rightnutwingjob 6d agoNo one cares about you. You’re good mate, you’re rich. Choose a different car for under $5000 then. It’ll still be cheaper than having to buy a new car, plus house, plus solar & battery. Also won’t work for anyone living in a unit / flat / appartment, whether they rent or own.
- defrost 6d ago> a bit bigger/more rugged to go bush once in a while. Depends whether you're taking the Birdsville track or the Bibbulmun track really. The shorter one can be done a on a red postie bike, the longer one won't even need that :-)
- Nursie 6d agoBeen thinking more along the lines of the Munda-biddy actually :) But I haven’t got on my bike for a few years now because at the moment all my spare energy goes on managing our plot. There’s always something needs moving, sawing, building, repairing, digging… So I’ve gone from having a (pudgy) cyclist’s physique with very strong calves to more of a farmer’s build with bigger arm and shoulder muscles than I’ve ever had before and a big ‘ol belly. But in all seriousness I also like to go remote once in a while and access national parks. I’m not going to be hooning it round destroying dunes, but getting to beautiful places like Cape Peron is tough without a the right vehicle.
- defrost 6d agoI've been through the Bungles on a push bike - so that's a thing, but yeah, Cape Peron would be a hard slog without a boat or vehicle that can push across deep sand - water would be a tough carry. > without the right vehicle A loong time ago (late 1970s) I got to traverse the horizontal falls a couple of time in a home made sea kayak after being dropped off "nearby" (and later picked up again) by an old pearling lugger .. pretty low carbon effort that one, just a lot of paddling (and fishing, and digging for fresh water, and dodging the odd shark and salty croc).
- Nursie 6d agoNice, I have great respect but also a level of “WTF” when encountering cyclists in the deep wilds, especially in the heat! Passed an old guy on a pushbike with a trailer on the nullabor in 2010 and just thought “wow, that’s commitment”
- Raed667 6d agoThat's an insane price and the range is fine for the daily needs of the large majority of people. €12k in France (where i am) can't get you any new car, even the cheapest ICE Dacia is more expensive than that now.
- chvid 6d agoThe BYD is sold in Europe but there is higher VAT and a special EU Chinese car import tax - so these cars are about 20k euro. There is also the Renault Twingo which is in the same class.
- Raed667 6d agoI checked the Twingo and it is starting at €16k and an Opel Corsa (without any options) is more than €19k
- pantalaimon 6d agoThe tax is only on electric cars, vehicles with a combustion engine are excempt - that's why you see all those ads for BYD Hybrids now.
- drcongo 6d agoElsewhere in the thread you claim there are no BYD cars in the EU, yet here you're an expert on the taxes BYD pays in the EU.
- Nursie 6d agoAustralia doesn’t tariff Chinese car imports, on account of no longer having any car industry of our own to defend. That said we do still have a hefty “luxury car tax” for anything over $80k, which is a hangover from when there was an industry here. The government aren’t going to lift that any time soon. Its current function is to select for expensive trucks over expensive sedans, because trucks are “commercial” and exempt, making our roads less safe overall. Thanks government.
- 6d ago
- burnt-resistor 6d agoRange isn't a big issue in recent generation BYD vehicles that support FLASH Charging in areas that have 1.5MW chargers.
- beAbU 6d agoI doubt a $15k econobox ev is going to support 1.5MW charging. Also, I think you are underestimating the sheer size and desolate spreaded-outness of Australia.
- burnt-resistor 5d agoFor now, flash charging is in China, Europe, UK, and Malaysia (soon). The chargers actually have battery packs in them because the charging current is almost always too much to be supplied by the grid directly.
- grahar64 6d agoIn NZ there are BYDs everywhere. Why are they not in US yet?
- hdgvhicv 6d agoFreedom
- usrnm 6d agoDidn't Americans send all their freedom to Iran?
- burner420042 6d agoYou mean the state of Iran?
- bestouff 6d agoSo now Iran with their freedom ?
- 6510 6d agoyes, diesel is 1 cent per liter. For $50 can drive the whole month non stop.
- Ylpertnodi 6d agoYes, and now they're running out.
- red75prime 6d agoFreedom from those pesky car manufacturers that demand protection of domestic workforce?
- 3848485858 6d agojust destroy your industrial base and become fully dependent on china bro
- xbmcuser 6d agoWith free electricity bring offered in the afternoon because of excess solar would be a great car for most peoples daily commute cheaper even than public transport as this is less than $6 per day over 10 years
- batisteo 6d agoThis is sad news, city have to get rid of cars, and make public transport free if needed
- clivedup 6d agoCheaper EVs is a good thing. Australia is more than cities. Cities can make public transport free and congestion charges if they want to reduce usage of cars.
- nujabe 6d agoI don’t think congestion charges would cover building/maintaining public transport.
- TomK32 6d agoAll infrastructure for cars and the fallout from their pollution (don't forget the tyres) is heavily subsidized by the tax payer and not as cost effective as a tram or railway.
- TomK32 6d agoAustralia is one of the most urbanized countries in the world with 87% of its population living in cities and suburbs. Being car dependent is a political choice pushed by the car industry for decades. Getting people into public transports, onto bicycles or their two feet requires reducing the vast space cities waste on privately owned cars. Super blocks that focus on active travel, less surface parking space and slower speeds are what is needed.
- 6d ago
- throw3x 6d ago[flagged]
- jscyc 6d agoThat's a pretty stunning price. For context I was looking at a second hand 2018 Nissan Leaf (grey import here in Australia) a couple weeks ago for 20k.
- feverzsj 6d agoMade by extremely overworked and underpaid workers. For either moral or safety reason, you shouldn't buy them.
- einszwei 6d agoThe irony of your comment is that these chinese evs are made by some of the most heavily automated manufacturing lines. (Not disputing that there are exploited workers here) But I hope you aren't buying any phones, laptops which indeed have lot of exploitation and sometimes even slave labour (see cobalt mining in DRC). Or not buying any supermarket meat, eggs or milk. It is incredibly easy to pass a moralistic judgement.
- Incipient 6d agoNot disagreeing with you, but also two wrongs don't make a right. Just because someone else, or someone does 'thing A' that's disagreeable, doesn't mean doing 'thing B' becomes fine.
- crote 6d agoRather the opposite, actually. With the rising living standards and a looming population cliff due to the one-child-policy wages in China have steadily been rising - and they'll get even higher in the future. Any Chinese industry relying on cheap and mostly-unskilled labor is in serious trouble. They know this, which is why they have been heavily pushing for automation. As a result, companies like BYD have been setting up "dark factories" for a while now. Want cars made by overworked and underpaid workers? These days that means buying American.
- seanmcdirmid 6d agoChinese auto factories are heavily automated, to the point that some are already lights out. Yes, they still need technicians and some blue collar labor, but it’s not Mao or even Jiang’s China anymore.
- yen223 6d agoWhen they say cheapest, they mean cheapest new car including petrol cars. I have no idea why ICE cars are so pricey nowadays here.
- deleted 6d ago[deleted]
- joinHNtheysaid 6d ago[dead]
- legitster 6d ago[flagged]
- DivingForGold 6d agoWill be earth shattering when the CCP "pulls the plug" and then BYD and other Chinese manufacturers fail to honor vehicle warranties, even abandon their warrantee / service centers throughout the world
- maxglute 6d agoWhat plug is there to pull, PRC auto export prices are still 2x domestic MSRP, there's so much fat there to sustain overseas growth and undercut everyone else.