Tesla is failing to sell the Cybertruck, neither is it buying them back nor accepting returns. The company is failing to adequately sell the electric pickup truck, one of its major products it unveiled relatively recently and which began rolling out last year.
The American company isn’t going through its best of times. The company will soon present its first-quarter results, and they don’t look like they’ll be surprising. Sales have plummeted in key markets, with the drop in sales in Europe being particularly notable.
Even in Norway, where the company has dominated the market for years, things aren’t going well. Sales figures from early 2025 suggest that this dominance is weakening, and that Musk will lose another battle. Tesla’s sales in Norway in January and February plummeted 44.4% compared to the same period in 2024.
And no, it’s not the fault of overall electric car sales, as the overall electric vehicle market grew by 53.4% and now accounts for 96% of all new cars sold in the country. It’s not the “slowdown” that’s to blame; there’s a fundamental problem with the Tesla brand.
Its main rival, BYD, is taking advantage of this circumstance. Thanks to this, it has once again surpassed Tesla and managed to earn more than $100 billion in revenue in a single year. Last year, 2024, the race was very close, with the two companies in a technical tie at year-end. However, now it seems BYD has the upper hand.
BYD will deliver 4.27 million cars in 2024, according to recorded figures. This is a far cry from the 1.79 million cars delivered by Tesla. And the most serious aspect is not that, but the fact that Elon Musk’s company failed to surpass the previous year’s figure, which stood at 1.81 million units.
For the first time in the last ten years, the brand isn’t posting better figures than the previous year. However, BYD didn’t sell as many electric cars, selling 1.76 million in 2024, very close to the number sold by Tesla. As you know, BYD is a brand that also sells hybrids, which Tesla doesn’t. And this is one of the biggest risks for Musk’s company: not selling these types of cars.
With this, BYD has sold almost 2.5 million more cars than Tesla. The Chinese brand achieved this by registering plug-in hybrids, as these types of cars and electric vehicles are classified in the same category in China. The subsidies for the purchase of electric cars extend to new energy vehicles, which are both electric and PHEV.
The Chinese brand has broken the barrier of 10 million units of this type manufactured. A milestone, especially considering the past few years. It took 15 years to reach the first five million. And the subsequent five million took only fifteen months.
Added to all this is the boycott of Tesla products. The President of the United States considers these attacks to be domestic terrorism and has expressed his support for the current head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Musk himself. He will soon leave his position.
The CEO of Tesla himself is part of Trump’s deficit-reduction scheme, and due to various statements and behaviors that aren’t exactly popular with the public, this movement has emerged. Authorities report arresting several people for incidents in various states.
Attorney General Pam Bondi has stated that they face lengthy prison sentences. On March 18 in Las Vegas, a Tesla Collision Center was set on fire. At least five vehicles were damaged after a person dressed in black approached the building with Molotov cocktails. And this is just one case.
The tariffs are not helping, as they have resulted in Tesla stopping selling its Tesla Model S and Model X models in China. And now the problems with the Cybertruck are added, with different media outlets claiming that the company is rejecting this car.
Apparently, it has 2,400 surplus units that it can’t sell, and it’s neither buying back nor accepting returns. Considering the brand said there were more than a million orders for the Tesla Cybertruck, something’s wrong. With thousands of units left in stock without a designated buyer, the numbers don’t add up.
The cause appears to be the technical defects that have been coming to light. This is in addition to the fact that a large number of users are waiting for a cheaper version. Added to all this is the fact that Tesla doesn’t accept the Cybertruck as payment for other models, and also doesn’t allow the buyback of defective ones, Electrek reports.