The legendary "Golden September Silver October" has returned. In the just-concluded September, some new energy vehicle brands achieved new sales highs, with certain brands continuing their recovery trend. The market penetration rate of new energy forces keeps climbing, and Leapmotor is even about to join the ranks of mainstream automakers.

According to official data from various companies, Leapmotor achieved 66,657 units in September sales, becoming the first new energy brand to break the 60,000 monthly sales threshold. Hongmeng Zhixing continued to rely on AITO's excellent performance, ranking second with 52,916 units sold, while maintaining the highest average transaction price among brands. XPeng Inc. broke through the 40,000-unit barrier for the first time, selling 41,581 new vehicles. After some production capacity improvements, Xiaomi Corp. achieved over 40,000 units in September sales. NIO Inc.'s three brands combined to sell 34,749 new vehicles, also setting a historical record. Li Auto delivered 33,951 new vehicles, though the i-series still hasn't achieved the expected sales boost effect.

**Li Auto Still Not Recovering, How Long Can NIO Inc.'s Growth Continue?**

In September, Li Auto's i6 went on sale and achieved 20,000 large orders, but with the short delivery timeframe for the i6, it hasn't yet helped Li Auto's sales rise. Compared to August, Li Auto's sales increased 19% month-over-month, but still declined 36.8% year-over-year.

The main reason for the lack of sales improvement may still stem from competitive pressure on the i-series production capacity and market recognition issues. The competitive pressure situation is becoming increasingly severe. Compared to before August, in the extended-range market vehicle segment, the continued growth of Leapmotor and AITO sales has put Li Auto under continuous pressure from both sides. Additionally, the increasing number of competitors in the 200,000 yuan hybrid and extended-range markets is another major reason why Li Auto L6 sales cannot maintain their basic market position.

While Li Auto's i-series showed decent large order results after the i6 launch, production capacity delivery issues and whether the i6's momentum can maintain long-term high order volumes will depend on subsequent changes in user demand.

Based on Li Auto's current product strategy, sales growth in the near term will most likely come from the i-series, as the L-series currently faces increasingly severe market pressure, and users are experiencing "aesthetic fatigue" with the L-series. Moreover, product capabilities and technological innovation have been surpassed by same-level or even lower-priced products. Therefore, it's particularly difficult for Li Auto to change the L-series' current situation. A better approach would be to focus marketing on the i-series, using product differentiation to create new market segments, which could potentially achieve growth.

**NIO Inc.'s Current Situation Looks Better Than Li Auto's**

If Li Auto is under attack from both sides, NIO Inc. is the "enemy" of other same-level brands. In September, NIO Inc.'s three brands sold over 34,000 new vehicles combined, with the NIO Inc. brand delivering 13,728 new vehicles, ONVO delivering 15,246 new vehicles, and Firefly delivering 5,775 new vehicles.

Overall, NIO Inc. is in an upward trend, but looking closely at each brand's sales, the NIO Inc. brand sales increased 30.4% month-over-month, Firefly increased 32.9% month-over-month, while ONVO declined 7.2% month-over-month. ONVO should have been the highest-volume brand under NIO Inc., but now shows a month-over-month decline trend.

Looking again at how NIO Inc. and Firefly attracted customers through new BaaS purchasing models, it's clear that NIO Inc. is currently also a company highly dependent on sales policies and marketing strategies to sell cars. Without user-satisfactory sales policies, any of NIO Inc.'s three brands could face difficulties. Therefore, I believe that in this year's market closing season, if NIO Inc. cannot continue to provide strong sales policy support, it will face certain difficulties in achieving continued sales growth.

**XPeng and Xiaomi Both Break 40,000 Units, Who Has More Staying Power?**

September saw both XPeng Inc. and Xiaomi Corp. break 40,000 units in sales - unexpected yet reasonable. XPeng Inc.'s product marketing strategy this year has fought a beautiful turnaround battle for the company. Unlike previous years, XPeng Inc. no longer obsesses over making every model a hit, but instead focuses on creating several benchmark models that can not only maintain stable sales growth but also establish product foundations for individual models in the market.

For example, the MONA M03, which has consistently been XPeng Inc.'s sales champion, has now become the top choice for A-class pure electric sedans in the 100,000 to 150,000 yuan range. The new XPeng P7, XPeng P7+, and XPeng G6 also perform well in their respective market segments, benefiting from these models' relatively high cost-performance ratios. Worth mentioning is that the XPeng X9 has consistently maintained the sales leader position in the high-end pure electric MPV market, attracting considerable traffic for XPeng Inc.

Xiaomi Corp. achieved a breakthrough in production capacity, bringing over 40,000 units in delivery results. However, Xiaomi Corp.'s current delivery volume is still digesting previous order quantities, making it impossible to judge its current real sales level. Additionally, for Xiaomi Corp., various recent events have pushed it into the spotlight. First was the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra owner order cancellation incident, along with the collapse of the Xiaomi SU7 used car market, the shattering of the "financial product" filter, plus the "fine print" promotional incident regarding high-strength steel posters, and the OTA recall incident involving 110,000 SU7 units. In the year and a half since entering the car market, Xiaomi Corp. has transformed from pure internet celebrity faith to the market testing phase that most new energy brands experience.

This means that going forward, the probability of Xiaomi Corp.'s orders continuing "wild growth" won't be high, and whether the extended-range vehicle model to be launched next year can continue the exaggerated data of the Xiaomi YU7 remains unknown. However, one thing is certain: Xiaomi Corp.'s return to normal market competition is just a matter of time.

From this perspective, although both achieved monthly deliveries of 40,000 units, XPeng Inc. and Xiaomi Corp. are in completely different market situations. The former is steadily building market reputation and has reached a stable state, while the latter may still be facing a bottleneck period, with subsequent continuous production capacity improvements potentially bringing significant increases in delivery volumes.

**Conclusion**

This year's competition among new energy forces has been particularly intense. Although each new energy force's situation and brand tiers divided by sales volume are more obvious than before, the sales gaps between top-tier, mid-tier, and bottom-tier new energy forces are growing larger, with increasingly clear divisions. The overall significantly positive trend also confirms this year's intense competition.

In the just-concluded "National Day Golden Week" battle reports, some of the major new energy forces have already delivered their strongest single-week performance of the year. With new energy vehicle purchase tax set to be implemented next year, as long as new energy forces show sincerity in the fourth quarter, combined with the "dual momentum" foundation of national subsidies and purchase tax, they should be able to reach even higher levels.