BMW Remains Top Exporter By Value Of Cars From The U.S., Makes Up Nearly 20 Percent Of The Country’s Total

BMW has built more than 6.5 million cars at its factory in Spartanburg, South Carolina, since the plant was opened in 1994, with over 1,500 vehicles being assembled every day. Around 57 percent of the BMWs built in South Carolina are exported to 120 different countries around the world, and for the past decade it has made BMW the largest automotive exporter by value in the U.S., a claim it can continue to boast after a record 2024. Last year BMW exported almost 225,000 vehicles from the Spartanburg plant for an export value totaling $10.1 billion, which means that BMW made up almost 20 percent of all automotive exports from the U.S. by value, according to data from the census bureau.

In 2024, just over $58 billion in passenger cars were exported from the U.S. in total, while $214 billion’s worth were imported, so BMW made up just over 17 percent of the total, or close to one-fifth. That’s pretty impressive for one automaker. BMW says the top export markets for the plant were Canada, China, Germany, Great Britain and South Korea. In total BMW built 396,117 cars in Spartanburg last year, and the company says nearly 50 percent of all BMWs sold in the U.S. were assembled in Spartanburg, despite less than half of the company’s lineup being produced there. 371,346 BMWs were sold in the U.S. in 2024, which was not only a new sales record for the company, but enough to keep its crown as America’s best-selling luxury brand.

When you look at what models BMW builds in Spartanburg, it’s not surprising that it keeps taking this crown. The X3, X4, X5, X6 and X7 are all produced in Spartanburg, including the M variants of each, plus the XM is built there as well. Those SUVs are some of the brand’s best sellers globally, plus they carry some of the highest MSRPs in the lineup. While some of those models are also assembled in other parts of the world for local consumption or region-specific variants, like China or South Africa, the vast majority of them all come from South Carolina. So the next time you’re in Germany and see tons of BMW SUVs driving around, you can feel proud knowing they came from America. BMW also says more than 57,000 plug-in hybrids were built in Spartanburg last year, 14 percent of the plant’s total production.

The first BMWs to be produced in South Carolina were lower-end versions of the E36-generation 3 Series from 1994 to 1996, but starting in 1995 it was the sole factory to produce the original Z3, which ran from 1995 to 2002. Following that, the first-gen Z4 was also only produced in Spartanburg. BMW says the completion of the plant was the fastest factory start-up in automotive history, with just 23 months between groundbreaking and the first car being assembled.

BMW has invested $13.3 billion in the Spartanburg plant over the years and it’s now BMW’s largest factory in the world. It currently covers 8 million square feet, employs 11,000 people and has an annual production capacity of 450,000 cars, and it’s still growing. A 300,000-square-foot expansion to the main body shop is finished, with more than 300 new robots being installed, and the assembly hall for the X3 and X4 is being expanded by almost 50 percent in preparation to build fully electric vehicles at the plant, of which there are currently none. That expansion, the seventh major one for the plant, was announced in 2022 as a $1.7 billion investment. BMW says the plant’s first EV will be shipped in late 2026 — likely the upcoming iX3 — and there will be at least six EVs built in the U.S. by 2030.

Nearby, BMW is almost finished with a new high-voltage battery assembly plant, saying that the tooling and equipment is being installed with the aim for all work to be “substantially completed” by the end of this month. The $700 million facility will stretch over one million square feet and provide batteries for those upcoming EVs that will be built in Spartanburg.