Tesla launches Cybertruck reservations in China — is it a big market for trucks?

Tesla has launched Cybertruck reservations in China, an increasingly important market for the automaker, but will it be a significant market for Tesla’s electric truck?

After Tesla unveiled the Cybertruck last year, the automaker started taking pre-orders for the truck with a $100 deposit per reservation.

CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla received over 250,000 reservations for the Cybertruck within a week of unveiling the vehicle.

Tesla stopped updating its reservation tally, but other crowdsourced estimated counts put the total between 450,000 and 500,000 Cybertruck reservations a few months after the unveiling.

As we previously reported, sources told Electrek that Tesla Cybertruck pre-orders are already helping boost sales. Tesla employees say that they are seeing a surprising number of potential customers coming into the store because of the electric pickup truck.

Last month, another estimate put Tesla Cybertruck pre-orders to over 650,000,

Now we learn that Tesla has opened Cybertruck reservations in China (via /u/aaronhry):

When converting to USD, the reservation cost is slightly higher than in the US at $141, and reservation holders can lock in the Full Self-Driving package price at $9,000.

In the US, those are currently $100 and $8,000, respectively.

Does China like Tesla Cybertruck?

When you think of China, you don’t really think of pickup trucks, which are primarily an American thing.

Trucks are not really popular in the country for many reasons — not the least of which being many bans in city centers for emission reasons.

But the Chinese automotive is just so big that the numbers still add up to over 400,000 pickup trucks per year in the market.

Tesla might have an opportunity to expand that market with the Cybertruck, which has been attractive to non-truck buyers in other markets.

China also seems to be curious about the Cybertruck.

We have seen several Chinese DYI Cybertruck projects, including a few somewhat convincing ones:

With its new push for localized production, Tesla could also be looking to establish local Cybertruck production in China.

Electrek’s Take

That last part is only likely to happen if Tesla sees significant demand for the electric truck in the market.

How many Cybertrucks per year would you think make sense for Tesla to establish local production in China? Let us know in the comment section below.