Just under 85 million passenger cars will be sold worldwide in 2026 on BloombergNEF's new outlook, a 1% increase on last year, and the market does not peak until about 2037 at just under 100 million.
The headline growth hides the regional problem. China, the world's largest car market, is running 14% below what the firm expected at the start of the year and is leaning on exports to keep its domestic manufacturers' volumes up.
"They're getting you to your in-and-out burgers, as you mentioned."
Adam Grant runs intelligent mobility research at BloombergNEF, and the note he was on air to discuss covers passenger vehicles from this year out to 2050.
The full segment is covered here so you can skip it.
Here are the 5 numbers that matter.
👤 Guest: Adam Grant, Head of Intelligent Mobility at BloombergNEF
🎙️ Hosts: Paul Sweeney and Scarlet Fu, who anchor Bloomberg Intelligence from Bloomberg's Interactive Brokers studio in New York
🧩 Other segments: Matthew Bloxham, Senior Tech Media Telecom Analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence; Mandeep Singh, Head of the Technology Research Group at Bloomberg Intelligence; and Laura Rapaport, Founder and CEO of North Bridge
📰 Published: 16 September 2026 on the Bloomberg Intelligence feed
🟣 Apple Podcasts | 🔗 Episode page | ⏱️ length not available
Key Takeaways
Global passenger car sales come in just under 85M this year, a 1% rise, and peak at just under 100M around 2037
China is running 14% below what BloombergNEF expected at the start of the year and is using export markets to fill the gap
The growth markets are India and Southeast Asia, which start from very low vehicle ownership per person
The fleet matters more than the sales number: about 1.4B passenger vehicles on the road today, rising to just under 1.7B by 2039
Robotaxis now carry meaningful numbers of trips and are, in his words, no longer science projects The United States and China are the only two markets with leading commercial operations
1. 85M Cars, Up 1%
Grant came on to discuss a new BloombergNEF note covering passenger vehicles from the near term out to 2050. A host introduced him after claiming his own expertise on the subject, having ridden in a Waymo "from Santa Clara University to a In-N-Out Burger."
"But for 2026, we're on track for just shy of 85 million passenger cars sold globally," he said. "That's a modest 1% increase from last year."
The growth does not stop there, but it does end: "Where sales go from here, there's a long pathway with still some growth in the industry ahead, but we have the outlook peaking at just under 100 million vehicles sold globally in about 2037."
His point is that the top-line number conceals what is happening underneath it, which is why he moved straight to the regional split.
2. China Leans on Exports
The world's biggest car market is the source of the shortfall against plan, and Grant described a domestic industry compensating by selling abroad.
China is running "14% below what we'd initially expected at the beginning of the year," he said.
The response he describes is export-led: the country is leaning on export markets to keep production and sales from its domestic automakers high.
That keeps factory output and manufacturer volumes high even where domestic demand has come in short of expectations.
3. Where Growth Comes From
Asked what kinds of vehicles are leading the growth, Grant answered on geography first and drivetrains second.
On body style, his answer was blunt: "SUVs are incredibly popular."
On drivetrains, he noted hybrids having "a resurgence in popularity in the United States."
The markets carrying real growth in total sales are "markets like India and Southeast Asia," which he said are growing rapidly from "very low bases of motorization or vehicles per user."
He then moved the frame from sales to the installed base: about 1.4 billion passenger vehicles are on the road today, rising to just shy of 1.7 billion by 2039.
From there, he said, the question becomes which types of vehicle complete which types of trip — which is how he introduced robotaxis.
4. No Longer Science Projects
Grant's framing of driverless vehicles is that they have crossed from demonstration to commerce.
"So we spoke about robotaxis, and those are increasingly becoming real businesses that are contributing meaningful trips and are no longer science projects," he said.
He tied that straight back to the host's own trip: "They're getting you to your in-and-out burgers, as you mentioned."
The host's counterpoint was availability rather than capability. He said the business is barely past its earliest stage in the United States and that "It's almost impossible to get one, although I did and had a good experience."
5. Where Robotaxis Run
Asked where outside the United States the business is actually growing, Grant named two leading markets and three regions behind them.
"Well, the U.S. is a leader in this space, and a lot of the most serious robo-taxi deployments that we track are in the United States," he said.
The other is China, where he counts a handful of cities with what the firm would classify as "fully operational commercial deployments." His definition of that phrase is practical: "that means that there's kind of no strings attached or very few strings attached in order to be able to get a ride."
The Chinese experience differs in one respect he flagged: riders may have to work harder to get a driverless car "because they're intermingled with a human-driven ride-hailing fleet."
"But really, those are the two markets that have leading operations at the moment," he said.
Expansion is happening in the Middle East — Dubai and Abu Dhabi, and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia — and Europe is an active growth market, though he said it is at an earlier stage than the United States, "you're really just starting to get the first initial deployments in those markets at this stage."
Bonus Insights
The host who introduced Grant called him "the real pro" after volunteering his own Waymo trip as credentials, and the exchange set up the robotaxi half of the segment.
Grant's outlook runs to 2050, but every number he gave on air was inside the next 13 years, which is where the sales peak and the fleet forecast both sit.
He did not separate electric vehicles from the total in this segment. The distinction he made repeatedly was between vehicles sold and vehicles on the road, and between which vehicle completes which trip.
Grant's bottom line is that global passenger car sales still have a decade of slow growth ahead before peaking near 100 million around 2037, that the near-term risk is concentrated in China and is being offset by exports, and that robotaxis have stopped being a technology story and become an operating business in two countries.
Products, Companies & Tools Mentioned
Waymo (The host's own robotaxi trip, which Grant used as his example of a driverless service carrying real trips)
BloombergNEF (Whose new passenger vehicle outlook, running to 2050, is the source of every figure in the segment)
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