Phone Maker Xiaomi Made the Car That Apple Couldn’t

You more than likely know Xiaomi, so-called Apple of China, as a maker of smartphones that offer a decent alternative to Samsung. You might also know about its smartwatches, robotic vacuums and electric scooters. Good, if often unoriginal design, sold at a competitive price.

But did you know it also sells cars? Xiaomi Auto leapt into the packed EV market only in March 2024, yet already has a hit on its hands with the SU7. An electric sedan not dissimilar to the Porsche Taycan, it attracted almost 90,000 orders within 24 hours of going on sale—a stat that likely makes it the fastest-selling car of all time.

As well as flying out the door, the SU7 flies around the racetrack, too. A pumped-up version, called the SU7 Ultra and packing more than 1,500 horsepower, set a new Nurburgring lap record in November, beating both the Rimac Nevera and Porsche Taycan Turbo GT by over 15 seconds around the 12.9-mile course. Even more remarkably, it set the 6:46.9 record on a damp track and with an apparent loss of power part-way round.

Before we get too carried away, it’s important to caveat this by saying, yes, smartphone maker Xiaomi set a stonking lap time, but it did so using a stripped-out prototype that isn’t street legal. It’s also worth stating how the Nio EP9—also an electric concept—went fractionally quicker way back in 2017, and the Volkswagen ID.R holds the outright electric lap record, at 6:05.3.

Back to the street-legal SU7. The car sold so well at launch that Xiaomi Auto has raised its 2024 delivery forecast three times since, up from an initial goal of 76,000 to 130,000 by mid-November.

According to Chinese auto industry expert Mark Rainford, that revised figure is “more than even XPeng managed to deliver in the year to September,” despite selling cars for the past six years and operating in multiple international markets. November also saw Xiaomi post a 30.5 percent increase in third-quarter revenue.

Even Ford Boss Loves Xiaomi

But don’t just look at the sales figures. Ford CEO Jim Farley recently admitted to not only driving a Xiaomi car in the US, but after six months he didn’t want to give it back. Speaking on the Everything Elecctric Show podcast in October, Farley said: “Everyone was talking about the Apple car. But the Xiaomi car, which now exists and it’s fantastic; they sell 10,000, 20,000 a month—they are sold out for six months. That is an industry juggernaut, and [it comes from] a consumer brand that is much stronger than car companies.”

“I don’t like talking about the competition so much,” continued Farley, “but I drive a Xiaomi. We flew one from Shanghai to Chicago and I’ve been driving it for six months now and I don’t want to give it up.”

Photography: Xiaomi Press

The Chinese EV market is incredibly crowded, but Xiaomi’s first entry stands out owing to its premium styling (even if it appears to borrow somewhat from the Taycan) and low price. The SU7 starts from under $30,000, placing it $4,000 below the Tesla Model 3 in China. Even the hypercar-powerful SU7 Ultra seems like good value, with a production version set to cost around $112,500 when it goes on sale in March 2025.

With just one model in production, Xiaomi will already look to make full use of its own, 20,000 cars-per-month factory—itself a rarity among auto startups, who usually prefer to outsource the vast expense of building cars to others in a bid to sidestep the growing pains Elon Musk once described as “production hell”.

There is no shortage of Chinese electric car companies queuing up to take on Tesla. BYD has come closest in terms of outright sales, while under new Chinese ownership a resurgent MG has seen success by undercutting Tesla in the UK market. Of course, prohibitive tariffs mean Chinese-made cars are not viable, or indeed welcome, in the US—and remember, that includes vehicles built in China by brands from elsewhere, such as the Mini Cooper and Aceman, and the Polestar 2, at least until production in the UK and US comes online.