Cars like the Subaru Forester, Nissan X-Trail, and Volkswagen Golf are certainly big parts of why their respective brands are successful, but there’s more to their respective manufacturers than these popular models.
As we did a few weeks ago, we’re comparing the first cars to be sold in Australia by several popular manufacturers with their newest nameplates.
We’ve included only the newest nameplates to be offered in Australia by each of these companies, though existing nameplates may have subsequently received new powertrains and variants.
This is the second instalment in a feature series. You can read Part 1 here.
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Subaru: 360, Solterra
Subaru got its start in Australia through private imports, as many other brands did. A used-car dealer in Ballarat, Victoria, reportedly imported around 73 examples of the Subaru 360 in 1961, making it the first Subaru sold locally.
Weighing just 450kg and powered by a 356cc two-cylinder engine, the 360 was mechanically compliant with Japan’s Kei car regulations, and its bubbly styling earned it the “ladybug” nickname. This helped make it immensely popular in its home market as brands sought to motorise Japanese citizens post-war.
But in Australia and other overseas markets, the 360 was poorly received. This was particularly notable in the United States, where businessman Malcolm Bricklin imported 10,000 examples, only for the car to be criticised for safety concerns and a lack of power, leading to its rejection by the public.
Meanwhile, overheating issues plagued the earliest Australian examples, possibly due to our warmer climate and higher-speed driving demands. While a later update eventually remedied the problem, the dealership ceased further imports amid unsustainable losses caused by the 360.
Mind you, this and subsequent models like the Leone (1973) contributed to Subaru’s reputation as a fairly unremarkable, uninspiring car brand throughout the 1970s and 80s, though the Japanese automaker did have a unique selling point in its four-wheel drive models.
Subaru tried to shift its rather staid reputation with the introduction of sportier models like the XT (1985) and SVX (1993), though these were largely unsuccessful. It arguably wasn’t until the Impreza WRX launched in 1994 that Subaru truly vaulted into the public eye, with the turbocharged, rally-derived sedan now one of Subaru’s longest-running nameplates.
Several other cars, like the Forester, Outback, and performance Impreza WRX STI, followed, cementing the brand as a household name in the Australian market. Though not always a top-seller, Subaru consistently places on the fringes of the top 10, but Chinese challengers in particular have shaken things up.
Subaru’s newest model is intended to take on many of those new rivals, but it hasn’t been popular so far. That’s the Solterra, the brand’s first fully electric vehicle – and a twin to the Toyota bZ4X – that launched in November 2023.
It’s currently Subaru’s slowest-selling local model, but orders are now open for a significantly updated version that brings revised looks, more power, more range, and improved tech, all at a much lower price than before.
MORE: Explore the Subaru showroom
Chery: J1 and J11, Tiggo 9
This list’s youngest brand is Chery, though in 15 years it’s found the time to take two bites of the Australian cherry. Its first stab was in 2011, when it launched with the J1 light hatch and J11 SUV.
Distributed independently by Ateco, which is now responsible for brands like Renault and Ram, Chery’s first two cars (and the J3 small hatch that shortly followed) quickly fell afoul of government regulations mandating electronic stability control.
While this initially barred the brand from Victoria, the federal implementation of these regulations forced the brand to discontinue the J1. That wasn’t before its price was slashed to an astonishing $9990 drive-away, making it one of the only sub-$10,000 drive-away cars sold post-2000.
The other issue these cars faced was safety. A three-star ANCAP rating for the J1 prompted Chery to recall the model and address the structural integrity of its seats, while the J11 could only manage two stars.
Later updates to the J3 and J11 brought new engines and electronic stability control, but a lack of factory support from Chery soon saw the brand’s Australian operation wither away by 2015.
Chery’s second and current Australian effort kicked off in 2023, this time with full factory backing from its Chinese head office. In March 2023 it re-launched with the Omoda 5 SUV (now C5), which recorded more than 5000 deliveries in its first year on sale – quickly surpassing the 4670 sales recorded by Chery as a whole in its first attempt.
Since then, Chery has skyrocketed to become a top-15 brand in Australia, continuously threatening Western stalwarts like Volkswagen and Nissan. It’s even knocking on the door of the top 10, following on from compatriots BYD, GWM, and MG.
Chery has most recently decided to shake up its brand positioning. The Omoda Jaecoo brand has launched with standalone Omoda and Jaecoo models – confusing, we know – while Chery itself has continued to introduce new nameplates.
The most recent is the Tiggo 9, a large plug-in hybrid SUV due for an imminent Australian launch.
MORE: Explore the Chery showroom
Nissan: Type 12 Phaeton, Ariya
The first Nissan imported to Australia wasn’t called a Nissan at all. Instead, and perhaps unsurprisingly, it was a Datsun, and specifically the Type 12 Phaeton in 1934.
According to Nissan, the Type 12 Phaeton is “the oldest model of Nissan that had been already manufactured in December 1933 when [Nissan Motor Corporation] was established”, making it the oldest model in the brand’s heritage collection.
Entering production earlier in 1933, the Type 12 Phaeton measured in at under three metres long and produced just 9kW of power. The use of ‘Phaeton’ refers to its body style, as it was a convertible four-seater with a fabric roof; it’s not to be confused with Volkswagen’s future ultra-luxury Phaeton flagship which ironically wasn’t a phaeton at all.
It superseded the Type 11 that launched in 1932, with the only difference being a larger engine – such was the pace of Nissan that the Type 12 was replaced by the Type 13 in 1934. The Type 13 was supposedly more stylish.
Following that, the first Nissan-badged model, the 70 sedan, broke cover in 1937.
After shifting focus to build trucks, airplanes, and engines for the Japanese military ahead of the Second World War, Nissan returned to building cars. Among the first cars born out of restarted development was something arguably ahead of its time: the Tama, a fully electric car with just under 100km of range, built in response to oil shortages.
While not brought to Australia, the Tama loosely foreshadows Nissan’s newest nameplate. But between then and now, Nissan introduced the first Patrol locally in 1960 (two years after Toyota introduced the rival LandCruiser FJ25), and established Nissan Australia in 1966 with the opening of a manufacturing facility in Sydney.
From 1983, the Datsun name was phased out, and in the 2000s Nissan Australia largely phased out passenger cars in favour of SUVs, with exceptions being the GT-R, 350Z and 370Z sports cars. It also offered the electric Leaf, which paved the way for the brand’s newest local nameplate: the Ariya.
The much-delayed electric SUV was a long time coming for Australia, given it debuted in 2020. With up to 504km of driving range and the option of all-wheel drive, the Ariya launched in September 2025.
MORE: Explore the Nissan showroom
Volkswagen: Type 82 “Kübelwagen”, Tayron
The first Volkswagens in Australia emerged from the Second World War. The story goes that while fighting in North Africa in the early 1940s, Australian soldiers became the first from our country to come into contact with the German Volkswagen.
The German army had elected to use the Ferdinand Porsche-designed Kübelwagen as light transport vehicles in the region, with several examples captured by the Australian soldiers and used behind the lines by Australian field officers. All Kübelwagens were left in the African desert when Australian forces were withdrawn in 1943.
Fast forward to 1946, and the Australian Army imported a wartime Kübelwagen sourced from Wolfsburg (Volkswagen HQ) by the British Army, thus making it the first Volkswagen in Australia. Remembering its competence during the war, the Army wanted to evaluate the Kübelwagen in local conditions for potential Australian use.
That exact Kübelwagen is now part of the Australian War Memorial’s collection in Canberra. The first VW passenger vehicles followed in 1947, when Australia purchased eight cars as part of wartime reparations for £160 each (around A$11,000 today).
Six stayed in Germany, while two (a Type 11 sedan and Type 51 sedan with Kübelwagen running gear) were shipped to Melbourne as prototypes. The first Volkswagen to be privately imported and owned, however, was a black, right-hand drive 1946 model, imported in 1951 by a German immigrant.
Volkswagen established an official Australian subsidiary in 1953, with the first cars arriving for sale in November of that year. Tax incentives prompted a shift to local assembly, with the Beetle the first to see large-scale Australian production.
1967 even saw the arrival of the first Australian-developed VW, the Country Buggy (resembling the iconic Thing), built from Beetle and Kombi components. Local assembly continued at Clayton, Victoria, until 1976, when Nissan took ownership and control of the former Volkswagen plant.
After a tumultuous 1980s, the German brand slowly grew to cement its place in the Australian market. Our abridged history can’t go without mentioning the Dieselgate scandal, in which Volkswagen was caught in 2015 cheating in emissions testing of some of its diesel models.
But despite this, Volkswagen has been a consistent top-15 brand in the Australian market in recent years. Its latest new nameplate is the Tayron, a seven-seat SUV based on the Tiguan that serves as a direct replacement for the defunct Tiguan Allspace. It launched in September 2025.
