Gary Zhou 
Tesla China may still be allocating a significant portion of its resources to vehicle exports for now, but the company’s domestic sales already seem to be rising. In the week ending October 22, Tesla China saw 8,100 insurance registrations, an 8% increase from the 7,500 registrations that were observed in the previous week.
Tesla China does not report its weekly sales figures, though a general idea of the EV maker’s performance in the domestic Chinese market could be inferred from vehicle insurance registration data. Fortunately, industry watchers, as well as some domestic automakers like Li Auto, have taken it upon themselves to aggregate and report China’s weekly vehicle insurance data.
And as per Li Auto’s recent update, Tesla China saw 8,100 vehicle insurance registrations in the week of October 16 to October 22. Considering the insurance registrations from the previous weeks, it would appear that Tesla China has seen around 16,600 insurance registrations in October so far.
Tesla’s China-based factory, Gigafactory Shanghai, currently serves as the company’s primary vehicle export hub. It is also the sole factory in Tesla’s arsenal that is capable of producing the Model 3 Highland for now. Considering that the upgraded Model 3 has been launched in multiple countries, Giga Shanghai would be very busy this Q4 addressing the global orders for the newly revamped all-electric sedan.
Tesla China’s export efforts for the upgraded Model 3 are evident in recent drone flyovers of the Shanghai Nangang Terminal, where the EV maker typically gathers its vehicles before they are exported to foreign territories. A recent drone flyover from longtime Tesla watcher Wu Wa suggests that another batch of upgraded Model 3 sedans will soon be leaving China for foreign markets.
Tesla has been performing well in China despite the company’s sales largely coming from just two vehicles — the domestically produced Model 3 sedan and the Model Y crossover. As per data from the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA), Tesla was able to sell 74,073 Giga Shanghai-made vehicles in September. From this number, 43,507 were delivered in China, and 30,566 were exported.
