Subaru’s Monthly Tally is In
Subaru can pat itself on the back this month with a strong sales performance. Last month, the company shifted 57,748 vehicles, a better figure than May 2025’s total. That represents an increase of 10.4%, and those numbers aren’t to be sniffed at, either. May’s tally is also higher than April’s total, which is good news for the brand.
With that, Subaru needed that increase following months of year-on-year decline. It’s not all good news, though, but we’ll get to that a little later.
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The Frontrunners
Unsurprisingly, it’s the Forester that remained at the top of the Subaru sales for May. The compact crossover saw 19,577 deliveries last month, marking a year-on-year increase of 26.8%. However, the Crosstrek wasn’t far behind, posting 17,409 sales during the same period, representing a 10.2% increase over last year.
Combined, the crossovers saw 36,986 new homes in May, representing over two-thirds of Subaru’s total sales in the previous month. So far this year, Subaru has sold 91,566 Foresters and 71,573 Crosstreks. To say these two models are doing a lot of heavy lifting is a massive understatement, although it also shows strong numbers considering Subaru is far smaller than the likes of Honda and Toyota.
The Not So Good News
So, May 2026 was better than May 2025. The uptick in sales over the previous month is also cause for celebration. However, Subaru still has a fair bit of work to do if it wants to match its 2025 sales at the very least. Year-to-date sales are 252,431, down 8.3% from last year’s 275,260.
Granted, 12,819 units isn’t a large enough gap to cause alarm, but a good chunk of Subaru’s current models are seeing declines. In terms of year-to-date sales, Ascent sales are down by 13.3%, from 18,384 to 15,940. The BRZ and Solterra are down 8.1% and 7.6%, respectively, and neither posted particularly strong sales last month. Also, Outback sales have yet to recover from a particularly slow March following a 42.9% sales drop, while Impreza sales have practically been halved.
Subaru
On the Flipside
Still, at least Outback sales are slowly but surely recovering as it seems more buyers are starting to warm up to its new look. Also, Forester and Crosstrek sales are on an upward trajectory, and Subaru will need to keep up that momentum to finish the year strong.
While BRZ sales went down, the WRX’s soared last month. The sport sedan found 1,195 new owners back in May, representing a massive improvement of 149.9%. Subaru is also quite proud of the fact that about 25% of the cars it sold in May were a mix of hybrids and EVs.
Subaru started 2026 slow, but it seems that its key sales drivers are helping the brand recover from that. As we enter the halfway point of the year, the company can’t afford any more declines if it wants to beat last year’s total of 643,591 units.
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