What cars did we all buy in 2017?

Britain’s 2017 car sales figures are out, and the headlines are mixed. A total of 2.5 million cars is 5.7 per cent lower than in 2016. Diesel cars shoulder most of the decline – their sales are down a whopping 17.1 per cent – with a small gain in petrol car sales (2.7 per cent) and a huge hike in EVs, hybrids and fuel cells (34.8 per cent) plugging the gap.

What hasn’t changed much are our buying tastes. While SUVs and crossovers continue to fill the market, there’s just one in the 2017 top ten bestsellers. The rest of the list looks much like it has for the last ten years or more. Scroll through to see what we’ve been buying in bulk…

Merc sold 43,717 of its titchiest car in 2017. It was also the tenth best seller in December 2017, too.

A couple of thousand more people went for Merc’s traditional saloon. Wonder how many of the 45,912 C-Classes were tyre-smoking C63 AMGs?

Yep, Britain’s trademark small hatchback may not be entirely British any more, but we still buy the things in droves – 47,669 sold in 2017.

A new Polo (pictured above) is just about to launch, and the outgoing car didn’t feature at all in December’s top ten bestsellers (its 2017 total is 47,855). Perhaps the new car will propel the Polo further up the pecking order.

Yep, a firm British favourite. It’s been muscled down the bestsellers list a little over the years, but finished 2017 strongly, with 49,370 sold.

The Astra’s pipped by its littler relation. The Corsa’s popularity knows no bounds, and despite a plethora of interesting superminis launching of late – including a belting new Seat Ibiza – the Corsa continues to sell in huge numbers (52,772 in 2017).

While three SUV-type things were in the December 2017 top ten sellers, only the Qashqai makes the year’s overall list, with 64,216 sold. Perhaps things will change in the coming years. Or perhaps the sheer breadth of crossovers on sale means it’s difficult for more than one to rise above the crowd...

And the only crossover on the list is pipped by a true British favourite, the traditional-as-it-gets Ford Focus (69,903 sales). Despite being over six years old now, though, it’s a cracker; still great to drive and with a handful of fast versions available, not least the crackers Focus RS.

The good old Golf quite comfortably topped the December bestsellers list, and its hybrid and fully electric versions will be part of that big hike in alternative fuel vehicle sales. Again, even the best crossovers appear unable to topple our favourite hatchbacks, with 74,605 Golfs selling in 2017.

It’s yet another victory for the Ford Fiesta, though. VW may have sold over a thousand more Golfs in December, but the Fiesta sold nearly 20,000 more units overall in 2017 (a staggering 94,533 cars). The new Fiesta’s arrival no doubt helped, and with a new ST hot hatch due this year, we’d expect it to have an even better 2018.