BMW M3 becomes BMW M's millionth car as Munich turns electric
One million M cars, and the next M3 from Munich will have no engine
BMW M has built its one-millionth car, an M3 sedan finished in BMW Individual Fire Orange III. Plant Munich head Peter Weber handed it to BMW M chief Frank van Meel at the factory, more than five decades after BMW Motorsport GmbH was founded in 1972 and 40 years after the first M3 went on sale. The count includes only full M cars, not M Performance models.
Plant Munich has built the BMW M3 only since 2020
BMW's Munich plant took over M3 production in 2020 with the current G80 generation, although the factory has been building cars for more than a century. The E36 and E46 M3s came from Regensburg. The petrol chapter will be short: BMW says Munich will build only electric cars from 2027, after a €650 million conversion that put a new body shop and assembly hall on about a third of the site. The paint has its own history. Fire Orange was the only colour of the 2013 M3 Lime Rock Park Edition, a run of 200 coupés for the United States.
Four generations of BMW M3 add up to about 241,000 cars
The first four M3 generations, built between 1986 and 2013, total roughly 241,000 cars: 17,970 E30s, 71,242 E36s, 85,766 E46s and 65,985 of the V8-engined E90, E92 and E93. That is a quarter of the million, from the single model that made the badge famous. The rest came from the M5, the M2 and M4, the X5 M and X6 M, and a range that kept widening. The E30 was a homologation special, built because touring-car rules demanded 5,000 road cars. BMW sold more than three times that.
BMW M delivered a record 213,457 cars in 2025
BMW M closed 2025 with 213,457 deliveries of M and M Performance cars combined, its 14th record year in a row. That is close to 9% of the 2.46 million cars the whole BMW Group sold, MINI and Rolls-Royce included. The best-seller was not a full M car but the X3 M50, proof that the M Performance range now carries the volume while cars like the M3 carry the reputation. The split explains the milestone: full M cars needed more than five decades to reach a million, while the combined range now delivers more than a fifth of that figure every year.
The electric BMW M3 arrives in 2027 with four motors
The next M3 built in Munich will be electric, and it will be called M3, as van Meel confirmed in June. It uses BMW M's Neue Klasse technology, with one motor per wheel and a front axle that can disconnect to leave the car in rear-wheel drive, for efficiency as much as for character. BMW released new images of the camouflaged prototype on the same day as the milestone, and its shape follows the M Concept Neue Klasse shown at Le Mans closely, down to the stacked Track Lights in the bumper corners. It will be the second Neue Klasse model built in Munich after the i3.
A petrol BMW M3 with the S58 six stays in the plan
The combustion M3 is not finished. BMW M has committed to a next-generation petrol M3 with the S58 3.0-litre straight-six, mild-hybrid assistance and no plug-in system, sold alongside the electric car rather than replaced by it. BMW has not said which plant will build it. The current G80 still has one send-off to come: the M3 CS Handschalter, a rear-wheel-drive six-speed manual with 480 hp, sold only in North America. Buyers who want the six will keep it. Munich will simply no longer be where it is built.
AutoNext Take
BMW M has chosen the right car to mark the right moment. The M3 turned a racing department into a brand people pay extra for, and Munich is where that brand now has to prove it can thrill without the engine that built it. Splitting the next generation into an electric M3 and a petrol one is not indecision. It lets each version be judged on what it does best, and 14 straight record years say the buyers are still there to judge.
The electric M3 is the one BMW has dated, for 2027, so the first new M3 anyone compares with the millionth will most likely have no engine at all. If BMW publishes a Nürburgring lap for it that beats the current M3 CS, the argument over whether an M3 needs six cylinders will be settled by the car that has none.
