[motomaverick]

Dont think Bangalore has any color preference except perhaps when it comes to Fortuner or Scorpio (they are predominantly white). I see all sorts of colors here in Bangalore even the ugly purple for the Zen Estilo. Hyundai's are mostly gray though.

[Raghav_K]

I think Chennai people play safe and stick with standard colours like White, Silver, Grey, Red, Black etc.

Very rarely I see some non standard colours like Green, Orange etc.

[dreadknight5]

Originally Posted by sudeep11787

Red & Black are a bit different as compared to global stats.
Black is considered inauspicious, associated with low visibility. Scratches also are more visible in black as compared to White/Silver.

But why is red lagging behind? It looks great on beat, punto, old lancers , polo etc.
I guess graphite gray is going to be the next silver !

Red tends to fade much faster when exposed to sunlight than other colors. Also a faded red colored car looks very bad when compared to other colors. This combined with lack of sheltered parking in most cities probably contributes to the lower numbers.

In terms of overall color maintenance difficulty
1. White and Silver are the easiest colors to maintain.
2. Golden brown, light grey, blue , green etc would be the next set of easy
colors to maintain.
3. Dark versions of Grey, Blue etc are a bit difficult to maintain
4. Black is by far the toughest color to maintain followed by Red ( only due
to the fading problem)


People tend to look at color maintenance aspect as well when they choose their car color. The ones that buy black tend to understand that this color needs regular washing, sheltered parking and generally more usage of AC.

When I choose Black, virtually everyone tried to convince me to go for some other color. All of them had the same set of arguments -" this will get hot more, dirt is easily visible, scratches are amplified " etc. Pretty sure people have similar line of thinking about the red color as well.

[ad3952n]

Originally Posted by anilagdr

Unlike what ad3952n has stated, I feel it is easier and cheaper to maintain the exteriors of a white car.

Dear buddy, my observation was specifically based on the difficulties that people of Delhi-NCR face in maintaining the shine of White color. There are 2 basic reasons that play a significant role i.e Traffic and Pollution apart from the sunlight. Even, a general person's view is that it is very difficult to keep White shade clean over here.

However, since it's a region based choice so I feel may be it is easier to look after the White shade in your city since pollution levels and climatic conditions would be surely different.

Thanks

[mallumowgli]

Originally Posted by one-77

I think in Kerala people drive white/ silver cars mostly for the reason that the sun burns down on us all through the year, and daytime temperature ranges between 30 and 40 degrees. Light coloured cars are substantially "cooler" to drive here.

The temperature in Kerala is comparatively less than the rest of the country - varies between 32 and 35 for most part of the year. But traditionally Kerala always had a penchant for white color - be it cars or dress (Just have a look at any of the stadiums during a football match or better still during thrissoor puram - it will be a sea of white)

But Bangalore is more vibrant when it comes to color. Can't say the same for the rest of the state

TN preference generally starts from grey and goes through the entire range to black

[dpkbehera]

Unlike any other aspect of life, there are no grey areas when it picking the colour of a new car; it really is a black or white decision.
The annual Axalta Global Automotive Colour Popularity Report - the most comprehensive of its kind in the industry - finds that for the fifth year running, white is the most popular car colour across Asia, Europe and America, accounting for over one third (35%) of all vehicles sold. Black is a distant second - 18% - followed by silver (13%) and grey (10%).

In fact, of all the individual countries studied for this year's report only drivers in India prefer silver (30%) over white (29%). Meanwhile the Chinese are completely in awe of white, which accounting for 50% of all new cars in that market, as is Africa (46%) and South America (37%).
However, there are some regional tonal quirks. North America is where red is most popular, globally, specified on 11% of new cars compared with just 6% of Asian cars. And it's Europeans that love both blue (9%) and black (21%) the most.

"For the fifth consecutive year, white is the world's most popular colour. However, we did see some pockets of colour when we looked across regions," said Nancy Lockhart, Axalta Colour Marketing Manager. "For instance, red jumped eight percentage points over 2014 in South America, mid-shade blues are significant in Europe, and bright blues gained popularity in North America."
To see how popular these colour choices are, one need look no further than the LA Auto Show, which opens its doors to the public this weekend. With the exception of the new Lamborghini Huracan, which went with a radiant racing red, every new car on show is finished in white, blue, or a silver grey tone.
But while blue might be staging a comeback helped in part, according to Axalta by the growing popularity of compact and intermediate SUVs and crossovers, which seem to best suit the shade, green and yellow could be set to disappear from options lists altogether. Green accounts for just 1% of cars sold this year and yellow with 2% isn't faring much better. At 6%, even brown and beige are much more popular choices.
And while it might seem that white's popularity has exploded out of nowhere over recent years, Axalta's data, which stretches back 63 years, shows that the tone has been one of the five most popular paint finishes in all but three years since 1953.

Original report :
http://www.axaltacs.com/corporate/en...ems/color.html

[Vik0728]

In fact, of all the individual countries studied for this year's report only drivers in India prefer silver (30%) over white (29%).

Though its quite an exhaustive analysis/report, I think the majority of these numbers attribute to the taxi community here in India at least. Also, I think only Honda offers 2 shades of the same color (white) and not many other manufacturers do.

Nevertheless, White really has evolved as a color and as the saying goes "White is the new Black" is a fact. I still remember the days when my uncle bought his Amby and had quite a discounted price due to this shade being a non-metallic or something

[dpkbehera]

Often colors are dictated by the factors like maintenance, visibility, heat absorbing capacity etc rather than pure love for the color !!! Hence the figures above may be misleading.

[Nav-i-gator]

Feels good to be among exclusive 1% globally (green Chevy Beat).

In my opinion, every car looks best in the colour it is launched in (i mean, the colour that is shown prominently in launch campaigns). Like, A creta in white looks average, but in red (or maroon) looks stunning. ecosport looks best in that brick red color, amaze & xcent looks best in red, fortuner & scorpio in white. storme in that dark brown hue looks best.

Personally, I dont like white colour in small cars (hatchbacks and sedans alike), white looks best in SUVs, black looks best in premium sedans (rolls royal, Jaguars et al). A hot hatch (Punto abarth, Polo GT) looks best in red (or red black combo).

But i agree, colour choice is very personal.

[volkman10]

Global car color - 2016,

Link

According to numbers collected by PPG, 38 percent of the cars sold last year were finished in white. Second place goes to black, with 16 percent to its name, whereas silver and gray settle for 12 and 10 percent, respectively.

white is most prevalent in the Asia-Pacific region, where the achromatic color was specified by customers for 47 percent of all the vehicles sold this past year

[dark.knight]

White has been spoiled in India, thanks to the cabbie community of the past decade. However with the rise of Uber in India the movement has taken place from white-on-certain-models to any-colour-on-certain-models. Still, white remains a cab-color even today, specially when combined with say an Indica, Etios, or Swift Dzire that effect is multiplied.

Maybe other variants of white have to come in, the milk-white is passé as of today. BMW's pearl white is stunning, also Hyundai has a dull-blue white in their international lineup which looks nice. Black and grey are hard to maintain, keep the hose ready if your usual path has a lot of dust to endure, the car will look horrible with dust on such colours.

Each brand has different colours these days that are model specific, like brown, orange (yikes), and several shades of blue or green.. in U.K people want such colours to bring some cheer amidst the gloomy stormy climate as per what I've seen in videos. In India where we're surrounded by colours that literally burn our retina every place we look, we think of subtle, conservative finishes as elegant and sophisticated on our cars.

[GTO]

An interesting region-wise popularity report on the Economic Times:

North India: Red is preferred slightly more than black at 7%. Red along with the maroon shade together accounted for 11% of the total 2013 cars sales.

The northern part of the country is more biased towards white, with 66% of the cars sold in the region being painted in that colour

In the south, white accounts for 34%. south and west have slightly more acceptance for brighter colours like red and its maroon shade with 13% of the buyers choosing these colours. In eastern India, about 14% of new cars sold are painted red or maroon.

The luxury segment has the highest share of buyers opting black too, at 12%.

[swiftnfurious]

Originally Posted by sudeep11787

....But why is red lagging behind? It looks great on beat, punto, old lancers , polo etc...

C'mon, you missed the first gen Swift. (Polo is probably the best looking car on red color - that looks so rich!) I guess Red is considered "boyish" and hence the larger population stays away from it. White, on the other hand suits all age brackets, better with elderly guys. My dad was pushing me to buy a white or a silver when I wanted a red Swift; so much that it got annoying.

Originally Posted by dreadknight5

Red tends to fade much faster when exposed to sunlight than other colors...

My red Swift was parked in the open for 3 years in Bangalore, exposed to all the natural elements. I used to do a wax + polish session by 3M once in a year. My car looked as good as new even after the 3 years. This, after I realized that the car washing centre uses "Tide" to wash cars (and I noticed this almost after a year of washing once every 2 weeks ).

I no longer believe in the above theory. Maruti's paint job of those times is neither considered more than average.

[dreadknight5]

Originally Posted by swiftnfurious

My red Swift was parked in the open for 3 years in Bangalore, exposed to all the natural elements. I used to do a wax + polish session by 3M once in a year. My car looked as good as new even after the 3 years. This, after I realized that the car washing centre uses "Tide" to wash cars (and I noticed this almost after a year of washing once every 2 weeks ).

I no longer believe in the above theory. Maruti's paint job of those times is neither considered more than average.

Well i guess it depends on the intensity of sunlight and abuse your car received. Please refer the below link
https://www.reference.com/science/co...1fdaf25522e5a8

[krishnakarthik1]

Originally Posted by swiftnfurious

C'mon, you missed the first gen Swift. (Polo is probably the best looking car on red color - that looks so rich!) I guess Red is considered "boyish" and hence the larger population stays away from it.

When you love red cars you don't have the money to buy them and when you have the money to buy cars you grow up and buy silver cars! We all remember the first time we saw a red maruti swift don't we