On September 2, Li Auto's flagship pure electric MPV, the new Li Auto MEGA, was officially launched. The new car is only available in one model, the Home edition, priced at 508,800 yuan, which is 20,000 yuan cheaper than the starting price of the old model.
The new car continues the current model's highly recognizable streamlined body, with upgrades mainly focused on the chassis, assisted driving, and cabin experience. In line with Li Auto's product positioning, the MEGA remains targeted at multi-member families, further emphasizing the "mobile home" product concept.
Before the launch of the new car, Li Xiang, chairman of Li Auto, once again responded to the controversy over the exterior design of the MEGA on social media. He stated, "The risk of imitation is always much lower than that of originality," and that if they change their initial intentions due to external voices, it will be difficult to create a product that can truly be remembered by the world. "We hope MEGA will be a product that can truly be remembered by the world, and we will never change our commitment to the product just because of a little more noise," Li Xiang said.
This also means that despite the controversy surrounding the MEGA's styling, Li Auto has not made significant adjustments to its appearance to cater to more universal tastes, instead choosing to retain its original contours and product recognition.
In terms of specifics, the new car's exterior has undergone adjustments to details such as the front and rear bumpers, door handles, wheels, and tailgate. In terms of mechanical and intelligent configuration, it has added rear-wheel steering, wire-controlled steering, and an active anti-roll bar, optimizing user feedback on the current model's turning, parking flexibility, and cornering roll; in terms of auxiliary driving hardware, the number of lidars has increased from 1 to 4, and it is equipped with Ideals' self-developed Mahle M100 intelligent driving chip; the cabin has added a through-type integrated screen and a roof lamp, and the seats and small tray have also been adjusted.
In addition, the new car continues to enhance the scenario-based cabin experience. The second-row seats can switch between modes such as 45-degree welcoming, 90-degree viewing, and 180-degree facing, and can be used in conjunction with removable small desks to form a face-to-face reception room mode with the third row, covering usage scenarios such as parent-child interaction, temporary office work, and short-distance board games.
However, while configuration upgrades address product shortcomings, whether they can be translated into sustained sales depends on pricing, market capacity, and the competitive environment.
When it was first launched in March 2024, Li Xiang expressed confidence that MEGA would become the best-selling product above 50,000 yuan, regardless of energy form or vehicle form. According to the China Automobile Dealers Association's wholesale data, MEGA's sales volume in the month of its launch was 3,229 units, but it quickly dropped to 1,145 units in April, with a total of 10,798 units sold in 2024.
In 2025, with the product's revitalization and the launch of the MEGA Home family edition, MEGA sales experienced a rebound. In June of that year, wholesale sales reached 2,304 units, making it the top-selling MPV above 500,000 yuan for the month. Sales continued to rise in August and September, reaching 3,121 and 3,277 units, respectively, with cumulative annual sales totaling 18,541 units.
Entering 2026, MEGA sales declined once again. According to the sales data from Dongche Di, from January to July this year, MEGA's monthly sales were 414 vehicles, 388 vehicles, 576 vehicles, 670 vehicles, 469 vehicles, 326 vehicles, and 336 vehicles, totaling approximately 3,179 vehicles. Among them, July sales decreased by about 88% year-over-year. The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers' narrow-definition passenger car wholesale data also showed that MEGA's sales for the month were 336 vehicles, and its sales ranking in the new energy MPV market has fallen to the lower end.
The new generation of MEGA has addressed some of the shortcomings of the current model, but it has not changed the market boundaries formed by its high price, large size, and positioning as a pure electric MPV and family flagship. Meanwhile, models such as the Zhiyi V9, Tengshi D9, HiPhi 009, and Xiaopeng X9 continue to be updated, and the supply of high-end new energy MPVs is increasing, leading to further intensification of competition.
Based on MEGA's previous sales performance and market capacity, the new car's launch may lead to a rebound in orders initially, but it is unrealistic to replicate the sales performance of mainstream models that sell over 10,000 units per month. A more noteworthy indicator is whether it can return to a stable level of monthly sales of thousands of units from the current hundreds of units and further approach the sales peak in the second half of 2025.
It's worth noting that on September 1, Li Xiang stated on social media: "If we only consider short-term sales, making SUVs is more cost-effective. I think sedans and SUVs are selling well now, but the ultimate form of family cars will be MPVs. As we enter the L3 and L4 era, the driving attribute will be weakened, and the inherent advantages of MPVs, such as large space, high comfort, and easy entry and exit, will be infinitely amplified. Doing a good job on MPVs now is essentially laying the groundwork for our future product capabilities."
Furthermore, even if sales recover, the MEGA is more likely to be a flagship model optimized for product structure rather than a main product driving overall sales for Li Auto. According to calculations by Guotai Junan Securities, in the second quarter of 2026, MEGA sales accounted for about 2% of Li Auto's total sales for the period.
For Li Auto, the significance of MEGA lies not only in its absolute sales volume, but also in the potential contribution of high-priced models to the product structure, average selling price, and profitability.
Li Auto's second-quarter 2026 earnings report showed a gross margin of 11.0% for the period, up 3.1 percentage points from the first quarter but down 9.1 percentage points from the same period last year. The vehicle gross margin was 9.4%, up 3.3 percentage points quarter-over-quarter and down 10 percentage points year-over-year.
Li Auto's management attributed the month-over-month improvement in gross margin mainly to the delivery of the new Li L9 and changes in the product mix. This suggests that even if the overall sales volume changes are limited, an increase in the proportion of high-priced models can still support the average selling price and gross margin. As one of Li Auto's currently highest-priced models on sale, if the new generation MEGA achieves sales recovery, it is expected to bring incremental improvement to the company's product structure.
However, a high selling price does not necessarily equate to high profit margins. MEGA's actual contribution to the profitability of Li Auto depends on the pricing of new cars, the cost per unit, promotional efforts, and final sales volume. Relying solely on a low-sales flagship model is unlikely to fundamentally reverse the profit performance.
CICC believes that if the new MEGA is launched in September and the continuity of new product orders and the progress of capacity ramp-up meet expectations, Ideal Auto's sales, product structure, and gross margin are expected to improve quarter-over-quarter in the fourth quarter. However, the institution also notes that whether the improvement can be sufficient to reverse the 2027 profit forecast depends on the order conversion of MEGA and subsequent models such as the i9, as well as whether the L6, a core model, can stabilize its sales.