Hybrid Car Review

Toyota and Nissan made the big splash this month in their hybrid car sales. Toyota sold 187,330 vehicles, an increase of 12.2 percent over February 2006. Of those, 10.1% were hybrids. Meanwhile, Nissan debuted the Nissan Altima Hybrid.

Total hybrid car sales were 22,998 units sold, up 53.8% from last February. I still don't have access to GM hybrid sales, but I've decided not to worry about that since GM hybrids are mild and I was already excluding the hybrid trucks for that reason. Nissan debuted the Nissan Altima Hybrid in eight states (those with stricter emissions for fleet sales).

Toyota sold 18,860 hybrids, or 82.0% of the hybrids sold in February. The Prius sold 12,227 units, an increase of 86.8% from last year. The Toyota Prius made up over 53% of hybrid car sales for the hybrid market. The Highlander Hybrid sold 1,892 units, an decrease of 28.1%. The Toyota Camry sold 3,332 units, making it the second most popular hybrid car.

The Lexus division sold 160 units of the GS 450h and 1,249 units of the RX 400h. The Lexus 400h dropped 30.7% from last February.

Honda sold 1,924 units of the Honda Civic Hybrid, an increase of 8.1%. The Civic Hybrid is the third most popular hybrid. The floundering Honda Accord Hybrid dropped to 312 units, a decrease of 60.2%

Ford sold 1696 units combined of the Escape Hybrid and Mariner Hybrid. That's an increase of 26.5%.

Nissan sold 206 units of the Altima Hybrid in its limited release.

Percentage-wise, 79.0% of the hybrids sold were cars against 21.0% SUVs.

Hybrid Car Sales, January 2007