Elon Musk, chief executive officer of Tesla Inc., during the US-Saudi Investment Forum at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, US, on Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025.
Stefani Reynolds | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The value of Tesla’s brand lost $15.4 billion, about 36%, in 2025, marking a third-straight annual decline, according to research and consulting firm Brand Finance.
A lack of innovative new models, and the relatively high price of Tesla’s electric vehicles compared to competitors eroded its brand value, said Brand Finance CEO David Haigh, as did CEO Elon Musk‘s continued “overreach” into geopolitics, and his lack of focus on his autos business.
Tesla’s brand value now stands at an estimated $27.61 billion, Brand Finance said in its 2026 ranking. That’s down from $43 billion at the start of 2025, $58.3 billion in 2024 and a peak of $66.2 billion in January 2023.
Based in London, Brand Finance analyzes thousands of companies’ financials, looking at revenue, licensing agreements, margins and other hard data, and combines those data points with results from comprehensive consumer surveys to estimate the monetary value of brands.
On key measures such as “reputation, recommendation, trust, and coolness,” Tesla’s scores took a dive over the past year, according to Brand Finance Valuation Director Lorenzo Coruzzi, especially in Europe and Canada.
The company’s recommendation score in the U.S. reached a new low, 4.0 out of 10, meaning consumers weren’t willing to tell their friends and family to buy a Tesla. The EV maker’s U.S. recommendation scores previously stood as high as 8.2 in 2023.
At least 1,000 respondents in 18 different countries answered questions about Tesla.
Consumers’ general familiarity with the Tesla brand improved in most markets last year, which he said was expected as the company is no longer a startup and has been expanding sales geographically.
The company’s loyalty score increased from 90% to 92% in the U.S. in 2025, an indication that customers who own Tesla vehicles are willing to keep driving them for the next twelve months.
Tesla’s most significant rival, BYD in China, was the rising star in the automotive sector, with its brand value gaining about 23%, around $17.29 billion, up from $14.03 billion last year.
Five other automakers outranked Tesla in this year’s list, including Toyota, Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen and Porsche, with Toyota strongest in the sector with an estimated brand value of $62.7 billion.
The dramatic drop in Tesla’s brand value from 2025 to 2026 showed, once again, that general consumers view Musk’s company very differently than Wall Street does.
Overall, 2025 was a volatile year for Tesla stock, which entered the year in a favorable position as Musk joined President Donald Trump‘s White House to run the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, an effort to dramatically downsize the federal government and slash federal spending.
But Musk’s work with Trump, incendiary political rhetoric and endorsements of far-right political figures such as Germany’s anti-immigrant party AfD, and Tommy Robinson in the UK, sparked a consumer backlash that persisted through 2025.
The loss of a federal tax credit for EV purchases in the U.S. proved another business challenge.
Tesla shares would rally in the back half of last year, however, after the launch of the company’s ride-hailing app, and pilot Robotaxi service in Austin, Texas. Musk also single-handedly helped Tesla’s share price recover by purchasing about $1 billion worth of stock in September.
Tesla’s share price gained about 11% by the end of 2025, with new records in mid-December following news that the company was testing “automated driving systems,” or some autonomous vehicles, in Austin without any occupants
Tesla is set to discuss its fourth-quarter financial results and plans for the year ahead in an earnings call on Wednesday after the market closes. The EV maker previously reported a decline in deliveries for the quarter and the full year.
Investors can submit and vote on questions that they want management to answer on the Q4 call via Say Technologies’ online forum.
One question getting lots of upvotes ahead of the call concerns whether Tesla investors may get special access to invest in Musk’s aerospace and defense company, SpaceX, which aims to go public this year.
A sub-brand of SpaceX, the satellite internet service known as Starlink, cracked the Brand Finance top 500 rankings for the first time in 2026 with a current estimated value of $5.19 billion.
Haigh said it is unlikely that Starlink’s rising brand value could help lift Tesla.
“They’re treated entirely separately,” he explained.
While Musk heads up both SpaceX and Tesla, the automaker is judged against its peers in autos, and Starlink is judged against other internet service providers, Brand Finance research found.
“Starlink has got a unique proposition for now,” Haigh said, “although there are a number of other companies planning to send lots and lots of satellites up to compete.”
Read the Brand Finance Global 500 2026 list here.
