The body color often reflects the owner’s personality. Conservative shoppers are more likely to choose vehicles with more earth tones, while more outgoing drivers prefer bright colors. In general, although car manufacturers offer colors to suit any personality, most drivers prefer shades that have stood the test of time.
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The popularity of car colors may vary from country to country – the most popular colors in the United States may not be popular in Germany, Spain or Mexico. Car color trends aren’t static – they change over time and new colors come into focus.
However, the color of the car is not just a question of style. For example, it seems that red cars are more likely to be involved in accidents, which just shows how important it is to choose the right color carefully. CarVertical’s car experts conducted a study to find out the most popular car colors and their impact on driving safety.
Drivers tend to avoid colored cars
Countries with warm climates have more colorful vehicles than countries in the north. Driving a brightly colored car in Norway, Canada or Sweden may cause consternation among some locals, but it will be perfectly normal in California or Italy, where bright colors are the order of the day.
In general, in countries with warmer climates, white cars are more popular because white reflects sunlight, making these cars less hot.
According to a recent study, the white color of cars is the most common in Australia (39.1% of the total car park) and in EU countries (26.8%). Australians also prefer silver (15.9%) and gray (14%) cars. Europeans prefer shades of gray even more (25.9%), followed by black vehicles (24.5%).
There is a similar share of black vehicles in the United States (24.7%). However, Americans also like white cars (20.9%) and silver (17.3%).
“71% of the cars tested on our platform were solid colors: black, white, gray or silver. This just shows that people are pretty cautious when it comes to buying vehicles,” says Matas Buzelis, car expert and head of carVertical communications.
Changing car color trends
Over the past 20 years, there have been significant changes in car color trends. 42% of the cars produced in 2002 and tested on the aforementioned automotive history platform were gray or silver in color. On the other hand, although white is currently one of the most popular colors, in 2002 there were practically no white cars.
The situation is completely different now. Of all the cars produced in 2020 that were tested, 26% were gray and 18% were white.
The proportion of black cars remained roughly the same from 2002 to 2020. Sometimes color trends only last a few years. For example, from 2012 to 2014 the number of brown cars increased, but in the following years it began to decline rapidly.
What color are cars the safest to drive?
According to a study by carVertical, the color of the vehicle has an effect on the likelihood of being involved in a traffic accident. 60% of the red cars tested on the platform were involved in accidents, which makes it the most dangerous car color.
Furthermore, brown (59%) and black (57%) are the colors of cars that suffer more accidents than others, followed by yellow (55%), blue (54%), white (50%) and gray (50%) . Although the differences between used cars are not significant, the study shows that vehicles of certain colors are less prone to accidents.
“Unsurprisingly, red cars are more likely to be involved in road accidents. Sports cars are usually painted red, and speed enthusiasts are more likely to choose red cars than conservative drivers. That’s enough to understand why the cars are red. Red cars are at the top of this particular list, ”Buzelis explains.
Over the past few decades, car manufacturers have introduced many bright colors. But it doesn’t look like gray, white or black will lose their popularity anytime soon.
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