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The Toyota RAV4’s beginnings were, to be honest about it, modest, but it has become one of the most popular models on the planet. Here in North America, the compact SUV is the best-selling vehicle on the market outside of the three pickup trucks from the big American manufacturers.
Last Toyota announced that its RAV4 had just passed an important milestone, namely the sale of its 10 millionth model.
The feat was actually achieved at the end of February. By the end of that month, in fact, total sales of the model had reached 10,080,834 units. And this figure is growing every month, albeit much more slowly at present given the current global situation. Sooner or later, that situation will end and sales of the RAV4 should ramp up again to normal levels.
IF you’re wondering whether that puts the Toyota SUV on the list of the best-selling models in history, well it's getting ever-closer to the all-time best performers. Along the way, the RAV4 will soon surpass the Ford Model T, which sold just over 15 million units between 1909 and 1927. Soon, because at its pre-pandemic rate, about one million RAV4s were being sold annually on the planet. In 2019, the company sold some 965,000 units.
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Next up after that is the Volkswagen Beetle, whose (final) sales total sits at around 21.5 million units. While that seems attainable for the RAV4, it’s less likely to be able to catch the world's best-selling car, at least until Toyota stops producing the Corolla. That model reigns comfortably at the top of the charts with over 45 million sales since 1966.
As for the RAV4, it debuted on the market back in 1994, and in that first year Toyota sold over 53,000 models of it.
The United States has been a major contributor to the model’s success, it’s worth noting. Last year, it outsold the Corolla and Camry by more than 100,000 units each. It’S been the same story in the early part of 2020. And consider that with 448,000 units sold in 2019 on American soil, nearly half of the RAV4's worldwide sales took place in the United States.
