Bottom line: China’s used-car export map runs through three regions. On the latest full-year branch-series data (2024), the UAE, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Kazakhstan alone took about 65% of export value; in 2025 third-party counting named Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa as the main destination regions, while the Russia corridor turned from growth engine to policy hostage. Below, each region’s numbers carry their scope, and each policy touchpoint carries its date.

Where the volume went: the latest full-year structure (2024, SUCCA export-branch scope)

Destination Units 2024 Export value Share of export value
1. UAE 127,000 US$2.02bn 23.7%
2. Kyrgyzstan 53,000 US$1.52bn 17.8%
3. Russia 46,000 US$1.26bn 14.8%
4. Kazakhstan 29,000 US$0.73bn 8.6%
All other destinations ≈155,216 ≈US$3.00bn 35.2%

Totals for the same series: 410,216 units, up 49.4% year on year, worth US$8.532 billion, up 24%. Destination inputs are as published, rounded to the figures above; the “other destinations” row is derived by subtraction and inherits that rounding. The branch series is not the association series (436,000 units in the association reading) — the two are never spliced. Association-scope reporting adds that the top 10 destinations absorb about 90% of volume.

The per-unit reading is where the map gets analytical. Derived 2026-09-05 from the rounded totals above, the series implies an average of ≈US$15,900 per unit for the UAE (US$2.02bn over 127,000), ≈US$28,700 per unit for Kyrgyzstan (US$1.52bn over 53,000), ≈US$27,400 per unit for Russia (US$1.26bn over 46,000), ≈US$25,200 per unit for Kazakhstan (US$0.73bn over 29,000), and ≈US$19,300 per unit across all other destinations (≈US$3.00bn over ≈155,216). The Kyrgyzstan corridor moved the most expensive average cars — consistent with near-new flagships transiting toward Russia — while the UAE cleared cheaper average units at the largest scale.

CIS and Central Asia: the corridor under reconstruction

Russia was the trade’s largest effective market once Kyrgyz and Kazakh transit is counted — and it is the market that closed. On 2024-10-01, Russia raised utilization-fee rates for passenger cars by 70–85% in a single step, following a plan signalled in September 2024 to roughly double scrappage charges on imported cars from 2025.

The fee kept climbing: for a typical three-to-five-year-old passenger car imported for personal use, the utilization fee went from RUB 667,400 to about RUB 800,800 on 2026-01-01, with annual indexation announced to continue.

Russian industry reporting separately expects additional budget revenues of RUB 40–60 billion from raising the fee on cars above 160 hp imported by individuals — the import profile of much of the near-new Chinese flow.

For 2026, importer reporting describes a further squeeze on the EAEU side-door: where cars were first cleared in a cheaper EAEU state and moved on to Russia, the gap between Russian duties/VAT and the lower EAEU-country payments is now added onto the Russian utilization fee (grade C importer reporting — verify with a licensed broker before routing).

The transit numbers show a corridor still running, at a repriced cost. Russian customs-based reporting for 2025 records 53,600 passenger cars imported from Kyrgyzstan, against 17,100 from Belarus and 11,000 from Kazakhstan — the Kyrgyz leg is the largest and the most policy-exposed. Georgia had already banned used-car re-export to Russia in 2023.

Kyrgyzstan’s own duty advantage is narrowing: its customs duties on cars run around 15%, against 20–25% in Russia, but staged increases toward EAEU-common tariffs began in September 2025, and duty-free electric-vehicle imports face a 2026 quota after which the standard 15% EAEU duty applies.

Demand-side data confirms the cooling. Russian registrations of one formerly transit-only Chinese premium EV brand show the pattern: 7,623 units in 2024 collapsing to 3,796 in 2025.

The partial 2026 rebound rode on a single new model rather than a channel change: 1,050 registrations in January–February 2026, up 127% from 464 a year earlier, with the brand’s first hybrid flagship accounting for 86% of them — sold through classifieds channels while the brand still has no official representation in Russia. Officialisation, where it happens (as with Li Auto’s November 2025 Russia price list), converts trader margin into compliance and warranty value inside the sticker — the dynamic tracked in Model Watch.

The Gulf: terminal market and re-export hub

The UAE took the No.1 destination slot in the 2024 branch series (127,000 units, US$2.02bn) by combining two roles: a terminal market for GCC-spec cars and the Gulf’s re-export hub toward Africa and the wider region. Whole-vehicle customs data shows the hub role intact in 2025: the UAE ranked among China’s top three export destinations with 571,937 vehicles of all kinds — a new-vehicle-heavy figure, cited only as evidence of corridor depth, never added to used-car counts.

The Gulf’s fiscal profile is the region’s selling point: 5% import duty on CIF value under the GCC common tariff, plus VAT at 5% on the duty-paid value — roughly 10% of CIF combined, depending on the taxable base. Compare the EAEU’s duty-plus-VAT-plus-utilization-fee stack and the region’s pull is arithmetic, not sentiment.

Age policy is the region’s second differentiator. The UAE imposes no strict age cap on imported vehicles (per large regional platforms — confirm per shipment), which keeps it open to older used stock; Saudi Arabia admits used passenger cars only up to five model years old, per ZATCA rules as summarised by trade platforms and our Saudi guide. The practical consequence: older Chinese used stock clears through the UAE and Oman routes, while Saudi-bound units must be young enough to pass the model-year screen.

Africa: the rising, rule-fragmented margin

Third-party 2025 counting puts Africa in the main-destination trio alongside Central Asia and the Middle East. The continent is not one market — it is a patchwork of age limits, drive-side rules and duty regimes that fragments flows by country.

Kenya, the rules-strictest of the major East African gateways, admits used cars only up to eight years from first registration and only in right-hand drive — per the Kenya Revenue Authority — which excludes most China-built left-hand-drive stock and channels Chinese exports toward locally assembled or specially sourced RHD units.

West Africa is looser and duty-heavier. Nigeria’s used-vehicle age cap is reported at ten to twelve model years depending on the source and rule vintage, with import duty around 20% plus a 5% levy on used vehicles; confirm the combined rate with a licensed clearing agent before quoting any deal (grade B/C platform reporting).

Egypt is effectively closed to used-car imports: vehicles must be current-model-year or at most one year old and the importer must become the first owner, per the official trade guide — which makes Egypt a near-new/EV play rather than a used-car destination, with tariff exemptions for electric vehicles shaping the niche.

Academic surveys give the structural backdrop: roughly a quarter of African countries impose maximum age limits on used-vehicle imports, and several ban them outright. The direction of travel in 2025–2026 is toward stricter enforcement, not looser gates.

The rest of the map

Latin America recurred through 2025 as the industry’s favoured “next Russia” candidate in Chinese trade coverage — large left-hand-drive markets, no EAEU-style tax wall, but longer logistics and thinner service networks. Industry strategists size the prize as the ~117 left-hand-drive emerging markets that exclude the right-hand-drive used-vehicle exporters (Japan, UK, Australia, Thailand) — the structural gap Chinese used-car exporters claim almost by default. Neither claim carries full-year 2025 destination data yet; we flag them as direction, not data.

Methodology and scope notes

  • SUCCA export-branch scope: the 2024 destination structure (units, value, shares) — quoted from the July 2025 industry forum, rounded as published.
  • Destination-customs scope: the 2025 Russian import figures by origin country — measures what Russia imported, not what China reported exporting; the two series differ by transit timing and classification.
  • Whole-vehicle customs scope: used only as corridor-depth context for the Gulf, explicitly not merged with used-car series.
  • Third-party scope: 2025 regional direction from the Huaon full-year count, detailed in our 2025 full-year review.
  • Grades: S = official/primary; B = associations, major media, large platforms; C = importer blogs and unverified aggregators. C-grade items are marked inline and must be confirmed per deal.
  • Per-unit averages and the “other destinations” row are derived metrics computed on 2026-09-05 from the cited rounded totals.

Sources and grading

Last verified 2026-09-05. Regional structure reporting is re-checked quarterly; new data becomes a new dated report, and historical tables keep their original state.