BYD cut the ATTO 1 Essential to $19,990 drive away, nationwide. That makes it the cheapest new car on sale in Australia, plug or no plug.
For most of a decade the industry line was that the sub-$20,000 new car died with the last of the cheap exchange rates. Batteries were supposed to make that worse. A new car with a plug for less than a Picanto was arithmetic nobody could make work. BYD ATTO 1 Essential now costs $19,990 drive away, and that argument has left the room.
BYD calls it a special offer on the country’s most affordable electric car, aimed at households counting every bill. It is a cute little compact hatch with zero tailpipe CO2 and up to an equally bijou 220km of WLTP range. We’ve watched this company go after the bottom of one segment after another, most recently with the Seal 6 Touring at $39,990, the cheapest wagon going. This one goes lower than anyone thought possible, not only the cheapest EV, but the cheapest car. Buy one for each foot!
Above: Subaru Uncharted Drives Brilliantly but that price
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ABOVE: ATTO 1
The Picanto Just Became an Expensive Small Car
Kia lists the Picanto Sport manual at $22,290 drive away, the Sport automatic at $23,390, and the GT-Line automatic at $25,190. Those offers are good to 30th of September. Take the cheapest of them, the one with 3 pedals, and you’re paying $2,300 more than a BYD ATTO 1. The automatic is $3,400 more, the GT-Line is another $5,200 more, and all 3 of them drink dinosaur, even if it is only little baby sips.
Would you pay $2,300 extra for the manual Picanto and take a fuel bill as the prize, indeed, would you pay more than $19,990 for any new car now? Plenty of people will, and some with perfectly good reasons. It’s a choice now, rather than a fact of life and legacy car brands should all be quaking.
That $19,990 is a drive away price mind you, not an RRP that swells with wallet-crushing dealer delivery, stamp duty, and rego. Kia quotes drive away as well, so we are comparing apples with apples, except one apple is shiny and new. Anyone still selling at list price is in for a terrible shock. What’s worse is there are almost no other cars in this price range, and certainly none of them powered by a battery.
What $19,990 Buys in a BYD ATTO 1
The 220km WLTP figure is usually a generous result, and in traffic with the air con on you’ll certainly see less than that. For a city car charged at home, it’s all very academic. A 25km commute and a supermarket run will barely touch it. Cheap electric motoring isn’t new, and our GAC Aion UT review found 430km and 150kW for $31,990. A BYD ATTO 1 undercuts even that by $12,000 with an almost unbearable amount of cuteness.
Chief operating officer Stephen Collins said BYD wanted “to make vehicle ownership more attainable” while households counted every expense. The $19,990 drive away car, he says, delivers “outstanding value without compromising on technology, safety or quality”.
A New BYD Store Every Week
BYD started selling here in 2022. It has since added 8 new models and big updates to old models since last October, and the range tally hits 10 next month. The ATTO 2 small SUV gets a plug-in super hybrid powertrain, and the M9 is the first premium people mover BYD has built for families and fleets. That’s a product cadence the established names used to take a decade to make, and the sales table shows the result in our Toyota, BYD, and Tesla analysis. Old mastheads are slowly sinking into a mire of irrelevance.
Over the same 12 months BYD opened a sales and service centre every week on average, weighted to regional and rural towns rather than another capital city motor mile. The count passes 150 before the end of the year. Outside metro areas, the ease of dealer access is even more important, because a cheap car you can’t get serviced is just a boat anchor. The BYD range keeps stretching, from the rear-drive ATTO 3 EVO Premium at $46,990 down to a baby BYD ATTO 1 at $19,990.
More BYD Stories
- 2026 BYD ATTO 3 EVO Premium Goes Rear-Drive at $46,990
- BYD Seal 6 Touring Is Australia’s Cheapest Wagon at $39,990
- Toyota BYD Tesla Fight For Australia’s Sales Crown
Above: Ottocast MCM11 Flex Vacuum Magnetic Phone Mount
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Alan Zurvas is the founder and editor of Gay Car Boys, Australia's leading LGBTQI+ automotive publication. Before launching GCB in 2008, Alan's automotive writing was published in SameSame.com.au and the Star Observer. With over 16 years of hands-on car reviewing experience, Alan brings an honest, irreverent voice to every review — championing value and innovation over brand loyalty.
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