Every year, our pals over at BASF’s Automotive Coatings division release their Color Report, and every year I excitedly leer at the graphs and findings, hoping for a revolution of real colors overthrowing the tyranny of the grayscale hordes – but it never actually happens. And, for 2023, it once again didn’t happen, though BASF’s report does suggest that “the traditional automotive color wheel is going through a transformation.” However, this transformation is happening in the dominant achromatic space, so forgive me if I’m not all worked up. Still, it’s interesting, as always, and worth digging into.
I should also mention I seem to have called something one of the nice BASF color-analysts said “psycho-babble” at some point and they’re not letting me forget that, nor should they.
Let’s get started here, with a global overview of car colors. This is how humanity is painting their cars in the current era:
From my perspective, this remains a pretty grim picture. We’re still at a staggering 81% achromatic/grayscale colors, and only 19% actual, real colors, of which 12% are just red and blue. What’s the situation here in North America?
About the same, 80% grayscale. Ugh. Blue and red still dominate the true colors, but orange and yellow don’t even show up, and green is down to 1%, compared to the global 2%.
The big shift that our BASF color-divinators are all worked up about is how white, the globally dominant car color, is slipping, losing ground to the literal Dark Side, black:
“Achromatic colors, which have always formed the foundation of automotive color, are experiencing a significant shift. While white continues to hold its position as the most popular color for light passenger vehicles, it has seen a notable decrease in market share. In contrast, black has surged in popularity, gaining market share at the expense of white.”
So, the huge transformation is that black stole three points from white. Oh boy.
Let’s take a quick look at how things break down in the four regions BASF divides the Earth into (likely for ease of future conquering):
We’ve looked at North America, so let’s go around the rest of the globe and see what’s happening. Asia Pacific is the lone rainbow ray of hope for real color-colors, showing an increase in color diversity, which BASF attributes to “more varied body styles.” That could be, but personally I suspect the wild diversity of the Chinese car market is a big factor here, with so many new brands and models popping up, and a customer base interested in newness and novelty. It’s not unrelated to the BASF justification, really.
In Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) the boring achromatics gained two percentage points, but there are some interesting bright spots in Europe, like Italy’s impressive 30% share of chromatic colors; BASF also notes interesting regional preferences:
“When European consumers chose colors, there were country-specific preferences. Germany loves blue (11%), Spain and the UK prefer red and orange (approximately 9%), France adores green (6%), and Italy shows its love for all the colors, with its share of chromatic colors being the largest among all five countries (30%).”
South America is a bit of a disappointment, with 86% achromatic colors. Yawn. It seems like BASF is trying to make this sound more exciting by noting that “effects pigments” are popular, stating:
“Colors aren’t just colors any more. They are experiences,” said Marcos Fernandes, director, BASF Coatings South America. “Whether it’s a pearl or metal flake or other pigment, the effects make the color leap from the vehicle into the eyes of the beholder. It gives a certain flair that’s becoming more and more popular.”
At the risk of pissing off my BASF friends even more, I can’t not note that reading “Colors aren’t just colors any more. They are experiences” in reference to, what, a slightly metal-flaked gray(?), made my eyes roll so far back that I think I puked out a bit of my pupil. Sorry, I appreciate interesting pearlescents and glittery metallics and matte finishes, but in the end that’s still just a lot of cars in boring non-colors.
Perhaps the one bit of chromatic good news here is the surprise Verdant Tsunami, the doubling of the percentage of green cars globally, from 1% to a staggering 2%. This is an encouraging sign, as green cars are fantastic. I shared this excellent news with my lovely wife, Sally, and she was so moved that she asked if she could write a little something about it.
I said sure! Sally likes cars but isn’t quite the hopeless car geek many of us are, so I like getting this more rational-human perspective. Plus, she’s a very talented designer, which I think gives her good insight into colors generally. And she even made this great graphic to head her section!
First off, full honesty, as a person who’s only ever owned used cars, I’ve never owned a green car. Reading about their lack of popularity over the years (only 2.15% of cars are green according to CarMax), I feel partly responsible. As a teenager, my dream was to own a green VW Beetle or a 1994 convertible Chrysler Lebaron. I never owned either by the way – my first car was a 1980 Silver Honda Accord and I loved it like a brother, but what I would have given for a green Honda Accord! My dreams would have partially come true.
I’ve settled over the years for the silver, white, and occasionally blue cars that seem to cloud the freeways and parking lots with their monotoned predictability. Where was the creativity, where are my people, where are the green cars?
One auto maker that has consistently produced cars in beautiful shades of green is Lexus. Now, while they aren’t my favorite cars – sorry to the Lex-Heads out there – I can’t deny the brand’s color choices and quality of paint are definitely some of the best I’ve ever seen. Damn, even the white that Lexus uses is undeniably beautiful, with its pearlescent flecks of gold and pink that seem to sparkle like a glass of champagne!
When Lexus’s color mavens does a green, they do it with heart, in what seems to be a silent but undeniable nod to the enthusiasts that cut and crop pictures of Lexus Nori Green LC 500s to mount on their vision boards.
When I saw the BASF Color Report this morning, one of my first thoughts was, “where is green on this report,” fully expecting to blurt out a profanity when its rank didn’t meet my expectations.
But to my surprise, the color green has actually gained a popularity point! I like to think that green is having a moment with the cool kids, much like nerds did in the late 80’s or girls with glasses did in the mid 00’s.
The time has come, and hopefully will continue to come, for green cars to shine their olivey-limey rays of light down upon us from their brilliant viridescent 2% pedestal. Hooray for green cars!
Reports from Autotrader point towards green having “above-average resale value” along with its cousins gold and blue. This says something to me, or rather it hints at something having to do with class and car color, but I’m a goony simpleton who drives a black SUV that blinds me with the glare of screaming warning lights that seem to permanently have residence on my dashboard.
It’s okay though, my day will come. My vision board of green cars, green Chanel purses, and green size-6 Fashion Nova dresses will definitely not let me down and perhaps (PERHAPS) writing about this longtime fantasy of mine will somehow bring a four-wheeled knight in shining green paint to my driveway.
Well said, Sally. Maybe we’ll get rid of that ass-pain of a Tiguan and find you something nice and green and without a constantly-burning check engine light.
I am here to remind you once again, friends, to go find the black-painted used car of your dreams and simply have it wrapped.
Didn’t the Autopian partner with a firm that does high-quality paint protection film? Surely they offer that stuff in a nice rich BRG?
I wish the miata came in a new dark green, with tan interior of course. . .kinda a classic roadster combination. They used too. . .I vote to bring that back.
You wanna have some fun, look at what a Saab 900 is selling for, then look at what a Saab 900 in Beryl Green is selling for.
Porsche will paint your car any color you like. I wonder if there are any paint-to-sample Candy Apple Red 911s out there. If not, somebody should order one.
Some dude posted his PTS build in the Porsche subreddit expecting everyone to gawk at his build. Instead he got absolutely clowned for paying for paint to sample and choosing grey. Faith in humanity mildly restored.
I wanted the green color for my car, but when I saw it in person it had a weird gold tone, and the combination didn’t appeal to me. Went with the blue.
On my spouse’ new car, we got a nice dark green that I really like.
I would pay, say, $500 extra if that meant I could get my next car in a fiery orange, or canary yellow.
That was an awesome read Sally. Sorry, but you are now on the staff, and we all expect more content from you in short order.
I’m curious, is this information based just on BASF data or have they found a way of getting colour data from manufacturers that they do not supply?
BASF might not make all of the paint pigment in the auto industry, but I expect they make so much of it that they serve as a pretty big sample size with which to estimate the entire field.
BASF doesn’t make your car’s paint grey, it makes your car’s paint greyer. Or something.
https://www.basf.com/us/en/products/paint-coating-industry.html
I’ve always liked to think that I am ahead of my time. I was a nerd with glasses well before the 80’s/00’s. My car colors in chronological order have been ’67 VW white, ’81 Corolla brown, ’86 MR2 silver, ’01 Highlander green, and ’04 Acura TL green. I still run the last two.
“I was a nerd with glasses well before the 80’s/00’s.”
Did you also sport a pocket protector and know how to use a slide rule?
Yes, to both! I so hated doing boring error analysis on my slide rule in freshman physics that I turned in my lab reports with “-15 no error analysis” written on the front. Managed to pass that course and ended up getting a PhD in applied physics some years later. My wife has had me dress better for the last 40 years.
Error analysis is boring?
IIRC, it involved doing a lot of square root of the sum of squares. After a few hundred calculations on a slide rule, I found it boring. I guess it is good that some engineers get a thrill from this type of work.
Ah. Spreadsheets make that a LOT easier.
Mine were red, red, lime green (hand me down) and red. I detect a trend.
I wonder how much commercial vehicles skew the white-ness of the world’s car population…
I now wonder how much Amazon vans skew the world’s grey population…
I almost didn’t buy my beige (“champagne frost pearl”) Accord because I wasn’t in love with the color, but I have to admit it has really grown on me. It’s kind of unusual in my neck of the woods (Pennsylvania), but it would be right at home in the south, where I could not imagine owning a black car in the summer!
Both our vehicles are grey and it saddens me every time I open the garage. When you buy used color tends to take a backseat to trim level /condition and what’s actually available.
Trying to do my part going forward and got on the list for a new GX in Nori Green. Hopefully we will see it before 2026.
You have no idea how much I want a Y2K-era metallic lime green New Beetle for stupid hoonery right now. I want it. I need it. It needs to happen. It is the dumb thing I need in my life.
I love green. My first car was green. (Shamefully my subsequent cars have been white, black and white).
Also I suspect the rise in black could be a reflection of current global sentiment, where everything feels bleak and shitty and people are just becoming more and more negative. I dunno, just a guess.
Is Sally aware of the teal Lebaron convertible in SWG’s fleet?
In several ways I can’t blame anybody who chooses a white car. White cars, especially single stage white, are extremely easy to make great looking paint corrections on, and they hide dirt and stay cool.
Black cars should not exist. I do not think there is a single car that doesn’t look better in some color other than black. It doesn’t look good, but that doesn’t even compare to the inconvenience of black’s tendency to show dirt, scratches, dings, and any paint repairs that are sub-Concours quality.
You know what’s somehow even worse? Non-grayscale cars that aren’t actually good looking. Champagne and gold are atrocious colors.
Blue is generally my favorite car color.
Can confirm. Ford’s Oxford White was extremely easy for the body shop to match on my car (no sparkle) after I got t-boned.
I suppose I could conceivably lease a black car, but I’ll never own one. Goddamn swirl marks!
White cars don’t tend to look dirty until they are filthy, they just look duller. Black however starts to look dirty 30 seconds after you wash it. I have cars in both colours.
This. I’ve owned three black cars and will never, ever again own one unless it’s free.
I passed on SLs in the standard colors (beige, red, white) until a Petrol Blue model came up. It’s so flipping pretty.
https://www.theslshop.com/showroom/1987-mercedes-benz-560sl-r107-1689-petrol-blue-with-palamino-leather/
> even the white that Lexus uses is undeniably beautiful, with its pearlescent flecks of gold and pink that seem to sparkle like a glass of champagne!
Jason, that’s what the designer dude meant by “color is an experience.”
My daily is beige but on the registration it’s white. Next time I’m moving I’ll see if I can switch it to beige to do my part.
When I last bought a new car (2020 Honda Fit) the Honda configurator would only let me spec out a manual in silver or gray. No deep blue, no Milano Red (a classic Honda color) and that orange was right out unless I opted for a CVT. So I settled for silver and have wondered ever since, I know it was on runout but surely the “still wants an actual color” and “still wants a stick shift” crowds have some overlap?
Arguably moreso, but it must be to their benefit with their ordering and distribution, as they’ve done it on brand new model intros and not just a runout like your Fit. And/or they figure a manual buyer will buy whatever color as long as they can get a manual.
When they introduced the 2013 Accord, they limited the manual sedan to black, silver, or gray, depending on trim. Some coupes could get different exterior colors, but still only black interior.
The 2018-20 manual Accord Sport (with either 1.5T or 2.0T) seemed to make progress with multiple exterior color options including San Marino Red and Still Night Blue. Nowadays on a Civic, you can get the Si or manual Sport in multiple colors, but if you want a Sport Touring manual, you’re limited to 3 colors (one is the bright Boost Blue) and only black interior. There is the Integra if you want a sportier, more appointed small car/hatchback with a stick and some flexibility in color inside and out, even red or off-white interior. That’s something, but I feel like it’s at risk of disappearing any given model year too.
I see way too many primer gray cars, and cars with matte finishes, yuck!
Glad to have an old green BMW, colors are nice. I’ve made it a goal for myself to not buy any more boring colored cars, so no silver/black/gray/white.
Where are all these purple cars, and are any of them not Porsches?
https://paintref.com/cgi-bin/colorcodedisplay.cgi?manuf=Porsche&con=m&gncl=purple&rows=100
I know Honda sells the Civic hatch in a rather fetching mauve. Maybe that’s it?
Dodge Challengers and sometimes Chargers. Plumb Crazy is a classic Mopar color with roots going back to the late 60s, so naturally a lot of Mopar guys are actually willing to buy purple cars because nostalgia/uniqueness.
AKA Statutory Grape.
If my car had green as an option, I would have bought it. I got blue, which is better than the grayscale colors, but it’s no green.
Same!
I hate, hate, HATE those grey cars that are so popular these days. You know the ones I’m talking about – the ones that are a primer grey with a glossy clear coat over them. Talk about trying to polish a turd. HATE WITH A PASSION.
You’re not alone, I have heard others hating on gray. Never understood it, gray is at least as good as white or black, and I prefer it over silver.
No it’s definitely worse that white or black 😛
I’m with both of you, I’m mostly over the flat primer greys, but a metallic grey, that I don’t mind at all and would take over silver.
I call them battleship grey. Now I have 2 gray cars, but one is called ‘Maximum Steel’ with a blue undertone and metallic sparkles, and the other is ‘Sterling Gray’ again with the metallic sparkles. I also have 2 blue cars (one Orient Blau BMW and one Acapulco Blue classic Mustang,) a white BMW and a Olive green Jeep.
Back when I was younger, I pretty much didn’t car about color, I went with best overall condition (Purple Camaro anyone?) Now that I’m a bit older I will reject a car if the color is hideous, and I’ll probably stay away from gray for a bit. I’d like my next car to be red, really, it’s been awhile since I have a red car.
There is one bright side to this report – beige has almost disappeared.
Is it really a win to replace beige with greige?
Yes, yes it is.
Guess I’m doing God’s work…a full 60% of my current fleet of 5 vehicles is decked out in color. 2 green, 1 brown, and then my 2 contractor-white work trucks. I love green vehicles, and I think it’s a travesty that there are so few on the road.
Lexus has one of the nicest blue
https://photos.app.goo.gl/BZjtiq5ceRRLWApe6