Romania’s Dacia and Ford Otosan plants built 355,715 passenger cars in the first nine months of 2026, according to figures published by the Association of Automobile Manufacturers in Romania (ACAROM). The total was 10.9% lower than the 399,199 cars built in the same period of 2025. The year-on-year gap was 43,484 vehicles.
Dacia’s decline was larger
Dacia’s Mioveni plant produced 182,558 cars between January and September 2026. In the first nine months of 2025, the same plant built 214,521 cars. Its output therefore fell by 31,963 vehicles, or 14.9%.
Ford Otosan’s Craiova plant produced 173,157 cars in the first nine months of 2026, compared with 184,678 in the corresponding period of 2025. The reduction was 11,521 cars, equal to 6.2%.
The difference between the two plants narrowed to 9,401 vehicles in Dacia’s favour. A year earlier, Mioveni had been ahead by 29,843 cars. The figures do not mean that Ford Otosan overtook Dacia on the nine-month total; they show that the two plants had different rates of decline.
| Plant | Jan–Sep 2025 | Jan–Sep 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dacia Mioveni | 214,521 | 182,558 | -14.9% |
| Ford Otosan Craiova | 184,678 | 173,157 | -6.2% |
| Romania total | 399,199 | 355,715 | -10.9% |
Both plants produced less in September
Romanian output reached 45,776 passenger cars in September 2026. In September 2025, Dacia and Ford Otosan had built 52,399 cars. The monthly difference was 6,623 vehicles, or 12.6%.
Mioveni produced 23,355 cars in September 2026, down from 29,031 a year earlier. Dacia’s monthly output fell by 5,676 cars, or 19.6%.
Craiova produced 22,421 cars, compared with 23,368 in September 2025. Ford Otosan’s monthly decline was 947 vehicles, or about 4.1%.
The gap between the plants was only 934 cars in September. In the same month of 2025, it had been 5,663 cars. That result makes the plants look almost level for the month, while the cumulative nine-month figures still leave Dacia ahead.
Which products are connected to the plants
Dacia’s official media material identifies Duster and Bigster as key products in its current programme. The two models are offered with several powertrain choices, including hybrid and LPG systems. Mioveni remains one of the brand’s main manufacturing locations, so the plant’s total output needs to be read alongside model allocation and production timing across the markets it serves.
Ford Otosan builds Ford Puma and the Courier family at Craiova. Ford confirmed in an official release that the all-electric Puma Gen-E is built in Romania, using electric drive units made at the company’s Halewood facility in the United Kingdom. The plant’s total therefore includes cars with combustion or electrified powertrains as well as a battery-electric Puma derivative. ACAROM’s production note reports total vehicles and does not break the nine-month result down by model or powertrain.
That limitation matters. A lower plant total does not by itself identify whether one model lost demand, whether production was temporarily slowed during a changeover, or whether the mix between versions shifted. A model-level conclusion would require separate production, delivery and order data, which are not included in the ACAROM figures used here.
The comparison with 2025
ACAROM recorded 399,199 Romanian-built passenger cars in the first nine months of 2025, down from 408,176 in the corresponding period of 2024. That earlier decline was 2.2%. The 10.9% reduction in January–September 2026 is therefore substantially larger than the decrease recorded one year earlier.
The comparison must use matching periods. January–September 2026 is compared with January–September 2025, rather than with the full 2025 calendar year. The 355,715 figure also refers to passenger cars built by the two plants. It is not a count of all automotive components made in Romania, and it is not a count of cars registered on the Romanian market.
Production and registrations describe different parts of the industry. A car built in Mioveni or Craiova may be exported, while a car registered in Romania may have been assembled elsewhere. The national production decline therefore cannot be translated directly into an equal fall in domestic sales.
What the narrower gap shows
Dacia started the period with a larger lead over Ford Otosan. After nine months, the difference had fallen to 9,401 cars. This is not a direct head-to-head competition: the plants build different products for different export markets and operate with different production calendars.
It does show that both sites now contribute similar shares of Romania’s passenger-car output. Dacia represented roughly 51.3% of the nine-month total, while Ford Otosan represented about 48.7%. These are shares of physical production, not market shares for the brands in Romania.
For employees, suppliers and logistics companies, vehicle volume is one indicator of how heavily assembly lines are being used. It does not provide a complete measure of business performance. The value of output can vary with vehicle mix, equipment and component content. The public data do support one clear conclusion: Romania built fewer passenger cars in the first three quarters of 2026 than in the same period of 2025, and Dacia’s reduction was steeper than Ford Otosan’s.
