iSeeCars chief executive officer Phong Ly notes that Apple helped make the color white popular through the launch of the iPhone.
“And consumers may associate it with being modern,” Ly said in a news release.
White is one of the easiest colors to maintain, Ly said, adding that it actually hides dirt better than most colors.
Consumers might be keeping that in mind as they choose a color for their vehicle. According to the latest iSeeCars survey on the most popular car colors, white topped black by less than one percentage point.
Car color also plays a role in a new vehicle’s eventual resale value, according to iSeeCars, a car search engine.
“Less popular car colors tend to depreciate less because they are more scarce in the used-car marketplace, while grayscale colors depreciate close to average,” Ly said.
For the study, iSeeCars analyzed more than 9.4 million 1- to 5-year-old used cars (model years 2014-2018) sold in 2019. The study tallied the color of each car and the location of sale to determine the most popular car color nationally, in each state, and in each metro area.
Grayscale colored cars (white, black, gray, and silver) make up 77.1% of all vehicles on the road, according to the study.
At 23.9% of all vehicles, white is the most popular car color for car buyers.
At 23.2%, black cars ranked second, followed by gray and silver.
“Consumers may prefer grayscale-colored cars from a practicality standpoint since they are colors they are less likely to tire of,” Ly said.
The most popular non-grayscale cars? Red and blue, which came in fifth and sixth, respectively. Ly said people commonly associate red with sports cars, which he said might interest “sporty drivers.”
Ly mentioned “subdued blue hues” as being a likely popular choice among consumers who “want to stand out in the sea of cars in neutral colors without being too flashy.”
Combined, the remaining colors brown, green, beige, orange, gold, yellow, and purple account for only 3.5% of cars on the road.
The study also determined car color popularity by state, and echoing national trends, black or white comes out on top in every state.
White edged black as the preferred vehicle color in 27 states, and black took the top spot in 23.
When leaving out black and white, red was the most popular color in 38 states, with blue coming out as the most popular in 12.
Black and white also dominate when measuring most popular car colors by metro area, with white leading in 28 metro areas, and black coming out on top in 22.
America’s most popular car colors
| 1. White | 23.9% share |
| 2. Black | 23.2% |
| 3. Gray | 15.5% |
| 4. Silver | 14.5% |
| 5. Red | 10.3% |
| 6. Blue | 9.0% |
| 7. Brown | 1.4% |
| 8. Green | 0.7% |
| 9. Beige | 0.4% |
| 10. Orange | 0.4% |
| 11. Gold | 0.3% |
| 12. Yellow | 0.2% |
| 13. Purple | 0.1% |
SOURCE: iSeeCars.com
Source : AutoFinanceNews
