Every third car in Poland experienced an accident or damage

(Munich, May 09th 2023) Poland is one of THE car countries in Europe, more than 26 Million passenger cars are on the road. But as much as the Poles love having a car, they don’t get the best ones into their driveway. CARFAX Europe analyzed data to more than 22M cars and found out: Finding a car younger than 10 years without any risks? Try winning the lottery instead!

Almost three out of four vehicles in Poland are ten years old or older, and of the 22 million vehicles analyzed, more than half are 15 years old or older. And it is mainly the older vehicles that are equipped with all kinds of risks. 75% of all cars have some kind of risk information (import, damage, accident, mileage inconsistencies, deployed airbags, etc.), from 10 years plus the risk even increases to around 85%.

Interestingly, vehicles between 4 and 9 years of age are most affected by accidents and other damage; more than one in two cars in this age category has already had an accident or suffered other damage. In general more than every third car in Poland, 35%, experienced an accident or other damage. That means there are around 8 Million cars on the Polish roads with a history like that – a huge risk for road safety. 11% of these cars are Volkswagen, followed by Opel (9%), Ford (8%) and Toyota (7%) which represents the market shares.

Import vehicles are another major risk. Overall, about 60 percent of all used cars in Poland were imported, and often the best vehicles do not enter the country. The risk of seeing an imported vehicle increases by 50 percent between the 4-6 and 7-9 age groups. The most popular import make is Volkswagen, 1 out 7 cars (15%) of all imports is a Volkswagen, followed by Opel (11%), Audi (8%) and Ford (7%).

In general, it can be summarized that the current vehicle stock in Poland is very old and at risk. Risks, some of which are drastic, are spread across almost all age groups. It is therefore essential in Poland to check the history of a vehicle before buying it. In this way, the value of a vehicle can be determined much better. In addition, strong risk factors can ideally be identified and avoided at an early stage.

The above data represents a sample of the Polish vehicle stock, without any claim to completeness. All the above information has been collected from data directly available to CARFAX. The actual statistics may therefore differ. If you have any questions regarding the data collection, please contact CARFAX directly.