Is the Ford F-Series really the best-selling truck year after year?

Another way of looking at truck sales might change your mind

Despite rising gas prices and shrinking wages, Americans love and continue to buy full-size pickups. And, when it comes to top overall sales per year between the F-series, Ram, Sierra, Silverado, Titan, & Tundra, Ford technically wins out every year. In fact, Ford’s won best-selling every year since 1976.

Looking at the numbers, it’s always Ford as #1 followed by Silverado or Ram fighting for second.

But, what if we counted the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra as one truck. After all, both trucks share the same GMT T1XX platform, are built in the same factories (Silao MX, Fort Wayne IN, and Flint MI) share engines & transmissions, are dimensionally similar, and are within each other’s cargo and towing capabilities.

Sure, the front end design, key pieces of sheet metal, perceived comfort, quality, & branding might be different between Silverado & Sierra, but casual observers can reasonably conclude they’re essentially GM truck twins underneath.

Of course, GM top brass will tell you that there’s a marked difference between Silverado and Sierra, enough that neither target market will cross-shop between the two.

But, for the sake of this blog post, let’s combine them.

Here are the numbers for total sales for F-series, Silverado+Sierra, and Ram thanks to GoodCarBadCar for 2005-2021, top number in bold.

The same numbers in chart form.

When you combine Silverado and Sierra, GM full-size trucks actually beat Ford F-Series from 2005-2009 and in 2015, 2020, and 2021.

Dodge full size trucks are a distant third, but are slowly closing the gap.

The truth is, while GM is more than happy to let Ford lay claim to best-selling truck year after year, when it comes down to total full-size trucks sold, the numbers speak for themselves.