With the used market steadily growing — and then experiencing a massive boom at the end of 2016 — you might be curious not just about the cars that proved to be the most popular purchases, but also which ones were searched the most frequently. While used trucks and SUVs, in particular, saw a massive increase in search volume and sales, it’s still nice to see that the top 10 most sought after used vehicles in 2016 represents a good blend of vehicles. Surprisingly enough, you won’t see any hatchbacks floating around on this list that was compiled by CarGurus, a leading car shopping resource. Why is that surprising? Because, hatchbacks were extremely popular in 2016. Maybe the lowered and steady gas prices let trucks and SUVs overtake the hatchbacks in the used segment. Who knows? Anyway, let’s take a look at some numbers.
10 Most Searched Vehicles in 2016
This data was compiled by CarGurus, from its first ever Year in Review Used Car Shopper Interest Study. This study analyzed the car shopper search trends for 2016, with analysts looking at the 900 million used car searches conducted by the 21 million unique monthly CarGuru users last year. Then, they identified the most sought after make, model, and year over year shifts in interest for each one. Pretty straight forward, right?
Here’s a list of the used car models that were searched the most often, along with their consumer interest percentage changes from 2015 to 2016.
- 1. Ford Mustang (-3.2%)
- 2. Ford F-150 (+10.8%)
- 3. Jeep Wrangler (+5.1%)
- 4. Chevrolet Silverado (+12.4%)
- 5. Chevrolet Corvette (-2.1%)
- 6. Chevrolet Camaro (+4.4%)
- 7. Toyota Tacoma (+6.9%)
- 8. Honda Accord (-2.1%)
- 9. BMW 3 Series (-4.4%)
- 10. Dodge Charger (+2.4%)
It’s interesting to see that even though interest in used Ford Mustangs dropped by 3.2% between 2015-2016, it’s still remained in the number one spot. Right behind it, the F-150 experienced a 10.8% increase in sales. Interest in Jeep grew by 5.1%, which is always nice to see. Chevy’s Silverado experienced the most growth in consumer interest from 2015-2016.
So, how did the brands do overall in terms of consumer search growth? Thankfully, CarGurus gave us insight into that as well.
10 Most Searched Car Brands in 2016
Here are the 10 most searched car brands in 2016. Again, organized from the most searches to the least. Interestingly enough, the brand searches don’t correlate with the model searches.
- 1. Chevrolet (2.4%)
- 2. Ford (+3.9%)
- 3. Toyota (+2.3%)
- 4. BMW (+0.3%)
- 5. Honda (-2.9%)
- 6. Dodge (+0.6%)
- 7. Mercedes-Benz (+1.3%)
- 8. Nissan (-8.3%)
- 9. Jeep (+3.9%)
- 10. GMC (+5.8%)
While the brands might not directly correlate with the models sitting at the top of the search charts, it’s interesting to note that Chevrolet, Ford, and Toyota all offer full-size trucks. They top this list, which backs up the fact that used trucks and SUVs experienced a spike in interest and sales throughout 2016. However, the companies that didn’t offer trucks dropped lower on the list. The only exception to that rule would be GMC, which experienced the highest growth of year-over-year search volume on this list. Meanwhile, Nissan lost the most interest from 2015 to 2016.
Overall, the numbers are good, and they bode well for a healthy used car market in 2017 as well, especially for trucks.
