Maruti Suzuki to hike prices of its cars from January

If you are planning to buy a Maruti Suzuki car soon, you have just one month to drive home one before it gets costlier. Maruti Suzuki, India's largest passenger vehicle manufacturer, has announced today (November 27) that it will increase the price of its models from New Year. The new prices will be applicable from January 1 next year. However, Maruti Suzuki has not specified if the fresh price hike will be applicable across all models and also the rate of price increase. The latest hike in Maruti Suzuki car prices will be implemented due to rising production costs.

On Monday, a regulatory filing from Maruti Suzuki said that the hike has become necessary due to ‘increased cost pressure driven by overall inflation and increased commodity prices.’ However, the carmaker assured that it is taking steps to minimise its effect on buyers. It said, “While the company makes maximum efforts to reduce cost and offset the increase, it may have to pass on some increase to the market. This price increase shall vary across models."

Watch: Maruti Suzuki Invicto MPV: First Drive Review

Maruti Suzuki has not specified the quantum of the proposed price hike. The carmaker currently sells small to mid-size cars with few in the compact or large segment. Alto, its entry-level model as well as the smallest car in its lineup, comes at a starting price of ₹3.54 lakh (ex-showroom). The Invicto MPV, based on Toyota Innova HyCross, is the largest car Maruti sells. The price of Invicto starts from ₹24.80 lakh (ex-showroom).

Models like Baleno, Swift and WagonR are the three top-selling cars from the Maruti stable. These three cars generally are the highest-selling vehicles in India on a monthly basis. Of late, Maruti Suzuki has also stepped up its SUV game, and has become the largest SUV manufacturer with models like Brezza, Fronx, Grand Vitara and Jimny as offerings. Maruti Suzuki has grabbed 22% of the SUV market share, so far in FY24, which is quite close to its target of 25% for the financial year. The Grand Vitara compact SUV, rival to the likes of Hyundai Creta and Kia Seltos, recently became the fastest model in its category to clock one lakh sales since its launch last year.