During the past calendar year, CNG car sales stood at 2,25,196 units relating to a record YoY growth
Rising price of petrol and diesel over the past year has turned the buyer’s attention to CNG powered vehicles. Maruti Suzuki led the market in terms of sales, followed by Hyundai while Tata Motors has just marked its entry into this segment with the Tiago CNG and Tigor CNG. Tata Motors expects its CNG car sales share to grow to 20 percent in the next 3-5 years.
Top 10 CNG Cars CY 2021 – Maruti Suzuki WagonR CNG Tops List
CNG cars sales went up to an all-time high of 7.3 percent in 2021. Taking each of the 10 CNG cars in India in the past calendar year, Maruti Suzuki had 7 of its models on the list contributing to over 83 percent of CNG car sales in the country. Hyundai Aura, i10 Grand and Santro CNG variants made up the balance.
Maruti Suzuki’s CNG range of cars in India consists of Alto, Wagon-R, S-Presso, Ertiga, Eeco, and new Celerio. The manufacturer also plans launch of CNG-powered variants of Swift, Dzire, and Vitara Brezza while the Wagon-R S-CNG will receive an update and has been spied on test recently.
Maruti WagonR claimed a top spot. It saw a total of 1,83,850 units sold in the period January to December 2021 out of which 1,05,728 units were petrol models and 78,122 units were CNG powered. Its petrol : CNG mix stood at 58 percent and 42 percent respectively.
Maruti Ertiga was the second best-selling CNG car in the past year. Sales of its petrol (63,332 units) and CNG (51,076 units) models stood at 1,14,408 units. This related to a petrol and CNG share of 55 percent and 45 percent respectively. 2022 Maruti Ertiga facelift is set for launch in March. The MPV will comply with stringent CAFÉ 2 norms that will be enforced from April 2022.
At No. 3 was Maruti Eeco van of which the company sold a total of 1,14,524 units, with a petrol share of 77 percent with 88,646 units sold as against a 23 percent CNG share with 25,878 units sold through the past calendar year. Tank capacity of Eeco CNG is 65 liters allowing it to deliver an impressive mileage of 20.88 km / kg.
Hyundai CNG Cars 2021
Hyundai Aura was the next best-selling CNG model in India with 19,127 units sold in the past year. The Aura is also powered by a petrol and diesel engine with 17,187 units and 1,270 units sold respectively to take total sales to 37,584 units. Its CNG percentage stood at 51 percent showing its demand was higher than that of its petrol and diesel engine variants.
Hyundai i10 Grand sales were at 95,515 units in the past calendar year. Petrol variant sales stood at 79,921 units along with 1,268 units of its diesel powered variants. CNG sales stood at 14,326 units equating to 15 percent while petrol variant sales were at 84 percent. Lower down the order Hyundai also had the Santro on this list with a total of 24,142 units sold last year out of which 20,011 units were petrol variants and 4,131 units were CNG in a ratio of 83:17 percent.
Maruti Suzuki noted total sales of 1,16,222 units for its DZire sedan in CY 2021. It saw 1,02,026 units of petrol variant and 14,196 units of CNG variant sold in a ratio of 88:12 percent. Celerio petrol sales stood at 26,164 units as against 6,679 units of its CNG variant sold while Alto saw 96 percent sales (1,59,704 units) of petrol sales as against 4 percent (6,529 units) of its CNG models. S-Presso sales were also more in favor of petrol variants at 60,551 units as against 4,926 units of CNG variants sold in the past year.