Jaecoo 7 is 3,410 sales behind the Ford Puma in the race for 2026's best-selling car

The Jaecoo 7 was Britain’s best-selling new car again in October 2026, but only just: it registered 3,412 cars against 3,369 for the Ford Puma, according to SMMT. Over the year so far the Puma still leads, with 46,295 registrations to the Jaecoo 7’s 42,885. That leaves a gap of 3,410 with two months to go. To finish 2026 as the UK’s top seller, the Chery-owned SUV has to outsell the Puma by about 1,706 cars in both November and December.

For UK buyers, the race matters less for the trophy than for what it says about the market. A Chinese brand that is new to the UK is now level with one of the most established nameplates in the country, and Chinese brands together took more than a fifth of all new car sales in October on our count. Neither leading car is a pure electric model in every version, which is worth knowing if you are shopping for an EV.

What did the October sales figures show?

The overall market grew 5.4% to 152,730 cars in October, SMMT said. Battery-electric cars took 32.0% with 48,858 registrations, and plug-in hybrids 15.0% with 22,898. “Almost one in three new cars registered in October was electric,” said Mike Hawes, SMMT’s chief executive.

At the top of the model chart, the margins were tight:

Rank	Model (all versions)	October 2026	Year to date 2026
1	Jaecoo 7	3,412	42,885 (2nd)
2	Ford Puma	3,369	46,295 (1st)
3	Volkswagen Golf	2,642	29,344 (5th)
4	Mini Countryman	2,480	Not in top ten
5	Kia Sportage	2,438	39,523 (3rd)
10	Jaecoo 5	2,171	Not in top ten

Source: SMMT. The Jaecoo 7 also topped September, with 10,814 registrations, as we reported in our September Chinese brands report.

How far behind the Ford Puma is the Jaecoo 7?

The gap is 3,410 registrations after ten months. At the end of September it was 3,453, with the Puma on 42,926 and the Jaecoo 7 on 39,473. October’s 43-car win trimmed it to 3,410.

Here is the race in numbers, all calculated by EV Compared from SMMT’s figures:

Measure	Ford Puma	Jaecoo 7
Registrations, January to October	46,295	42,885
Average per month so far	About 4,630	About 4,289
October 2026	3,369	3,412
September 2026	6,958	10,814
Gap to the Puma	n/a	3,410
Lead needed per month in November and December to draw level	n/a	1,705
Total lead needed over two months to finish first	n/a	3,411

What does the Jaecoo 7 need to do to win?

It needs to outsell the Puma by 3,411 cars across November and December combined, or about 1,706 a month. To put that in context:

• In October it managed 43. Repeat that twice and the Puma wins comfortably, still about 3,324 ahead.
• If both cars sell at their 2026 monthly average, the Puma pulls further ahead, finishing roughly 4,090 in front (3,410 plus two months of a 341-car difference).
• In September it managed 3,856. That was a number plate change month, when the market is far bigger, and the Jaecoo 7 sold more than 10,000 cars. A single month like that would be enough on its own.

November and December are not plate change months, so a September-sized swing is less likely. But the Jaecoo 7 does not need to be dominant, only clearly ahead twice. If Chery’s UK arm pushes heavy end-of-year registrations, or Ford’s own volume stays soft, the result could go either way. Ford as a brand registered 5,851 cars in October, down 35.2% on a year earlier, according to SMMT’s brand table. The Puma made up well over half of that.

These are our projections, not forecasts from SMMT or either carmaker. Fleet orders, pre-registrations and stock levels can all move a month’s figures by thousands of cars.

Is the Jaecoo 7 electric?

No, and this is the point most buyers miss. Jaecoo’s UK website lists the Jaecoo 7 with three powertrains: a petrol, a full hybrid it calls SHS-H, and a plug-in hybrid it calls SHS-P. There is no battery-electric Jaecoo 7 on the UK range. The range starts at £29,210, according to Jaecoo, though that from price covers the cheapest version.

SMMT’s model chart counts all versions together, so we cannot say how many of October’s 3,412 were plug-in hybrids. The Ford Puma figure is mixed too. Ford sells a mild-hybrid petrol Puma from £27,145 and the electric Puma Gen-E, which Ford UK prices from £26,245 including the full £3,750 Electric Car Grant, with up to 259 miles of WLTP range. SMMT’s separate electric top ten lists the Puma on 1,077 in October, so roughly a third of all Pumas registered that month were electric. We cover the Gen-E’s price in more detail in our Puma Gen-E grant report.

If you want a car that runs only on electricity, of the two, only the Puma Gen-E fits. If a plug-in hybrid suits your driving, our report on record plug-in hybrid sales explains how they work and when they make sense.

Is the Jaecoo E5 now one of the best-selling EVs?

Yes. SMMT lists it as the Jaecoo 5, and in its electric-only table the car took third place in October with 1,465 registrations, behind the Skoda Enyaq on 1,568 and the Mini Countryman on 1,494. In the all-fuel chart the Jaecoo 5 was tenth with 2,171, which includes the petrol version, so on SMMT’s figures about two thirds of Jaecoo 5 registrations in October were electric.

Jaecoo UK lists the Jaecoo 5 from £24,555 and advertises a £3,000 “Jaecoo EV Grant” on the E5, a discount the company funds itself rather than the government scheme. That puts the Jaecoo 5 in both the overall top ten and the electric top ten in October, alongside only the Ford Puma and the Mini Countryman.

What share of UK car sales did Chinese brands take in October?

On our count, 21.6%. We added up the 15 China-headquartered brands in SMMT’s October brand table: Aion, BYD, Changan, Chery, Denza, Geely, GWM, Jaecoo, Leapmotor, Lepas, Maxus, MG, Omoda, Skywell and Xpeng. Three of them, Denza, Maxus and Skywell, registered no cars in October. We did not include Chinese-owned brands that are based elsewhere, such as Volvo, Polestar, Lotus and Smart.

Brand	October 2026	October 2025	Change
MG	7,837	4,233	+85.1%
Jaecoo	6,089	2,851	+113.6%
BYD	6,065	3,499	+73.3%
Chery	3,707	1,263	+193.5%
Omoda	3,137	2,102	+49.2%
Geely	2,269	0	New
Leapmotor	1,773	856	+107.1%
Other Chinese brands	2,095	247	n/a
All 15 Chinese brands	32,972	15,051	+119%
Share of the market	21.6%	About 10.4%	n/a

Source: SMMT brand table, preliminary figures; totals and shares calculated by EV Compared. The brand figures match those reported by Electrek.

That is below September’s 23.3%, but September is distorted by the plate change, when BYD alone registered 20,140 cars. The year-on-year picture is clearer: Chinese brands have roughly doubled their share in twelve months. For the year to date, the same 15 brands have 337,730 registrations, about 17.9% of the market. These brand totals cover every fuel type, so they are not a measure of Chinese electric car sales.

How close is Chery to Volkswagen?

Very close. Chery’s four UK brands, Jaecoo, Omoda, Chery and Lepas, registered 13,589 cars in October between them, 8.9% of the market. Volkswagen, the biggest single brand, registered 13,687, just 98 more. In September the Chery group outsold Volkswagen outright.

Over the year to date, the four Chery brands have 137,960 registrations, about 7.3% of the market, against Volkswagen’s 151,489. Chery is also setting up a UK research base and talking about local production, which we cover in our report on its Sunderland plans. Other reports this week say the group wants to be seen as a British brand, but we have not been able to read the original remarks, so we are not repeating them here.

Why is the Jaecoo 7 selling so well?

Neither SMMT nor Jaecoo breaks down who is buying it, but two things stand out. First, choice: one car offered as a petrol, a hybrid and a plug-in hybrid, from £29,210, covers a wide range of buyers in a single showroom. Second, demand on finance: Select Car Leasing says the Jaecoo 7 is its most-delivered car for the second year running, as we reported in our report on Chinese brands and UK leasing.

Grant rules shape the race less than you might expect. Plug-in hybrids get no Electric Car Grant whoever makes them, and Chinese-built electric cars do not qualify either, so Chinese brands such as Jaecoo fund their own discounts instead. The possibility of UK tariffs on Chinese cars remains open, as we explain in our tariffs explainer, and would change those sums if it happened.

Our view

A Chinese plug-in hybrid finishing 2026 as Britain’s best-selling car is possible, but on October’s evidence it is not the likely outcome. The Jaecoo 7 needs two months of clear wins over the Puma, not narrow ones. Whatever happens, the bigger story is already settled: one car in five sold in October came from a Chinese brand.

For buyers, the practical point is simpler. Popularity is not the same as suitability. If you want an electric car, check exactly which version of a best-seller you are being quoted for, compare its price after any maker discount against grant-eligible rivals, and look at guaranteed future values on finance as closely as the monthly payment.