Xiaomi Built a Car Factory That Can Produce an EV Every 76 Seconds

BEIJING — Xiaomi's electric vehicle plant in Beijing has drawn attention for a striking statistic: at full production speed, a completed vehicle leaves the assembly line roughly every 76 seconds. That figure, which Xiaomi has shared through factory tours and promotional footage, represents the line's cycle time at maximum output, the interval between one finished car and the next rolling off the line. It does not mean an entire vehicle is built from raw materials in 76 seconds; body stamping, painting, battery integration and final assembly happen continuously across the plant, with many vehicles moving through different stages of the line at once. At that pace, Xiaomi has said the factory can turn out around 40 SU7 sedans an hour.

From Smartphones to Cars

Xiaomi, long known for smartphones and consumer electronics, announced its move into electric vehicles in March 2021. Its first model, the SU7 sedan, launched in March 2024, positioning the company as a direct rival to Tesla's Model 3. The company brought manufacturing habits from its electronics business, including automated guided vehicles, sensor-tracked production steps and a heavy reliance on robotics, into a car factory built largely from scratch rather than adapted from an older facility.

Inside a Highly Automated Factory

The Beijing plant, located in the Yizhuang economic-technological development area, spans roughly 718,000 to 720,000 square meters. Xiaomi has said the facility uses more than 700 robots and describes key stages, including body assembly, painting and quality inspection, as fully automated across more than 200 processes. Automated guided vehicles move parts between robotic stations, and digital systems track each vehicle's progress through the line in real time. Xiaomi has said the first phase of the plant went from groundbreaking to completion in about 14 months.

Large-Scale Die-Casting

A key piece of equipment at the factory is a large die-casting machine, reported at roughly 9,100 tons of clamping force, that Xiaomi says can form what would otherwise be 72 separate metal components into a single structural piece for the vehicle's underbody. This approach, often called giga-casting or hyper-casting depending on the manufacturer, reduces the number of welds and joints needed, which can simplify assembly and cut production time, though it also concentrates risk if a large cast piece has a defect.

From SU7 to YU7: Ramping Up Production

Xiaomi's first factory, known as Phase 1, was completed in 2023 with an annual capacity of 150,000 vehicles and began running two shifts in June 2024 to meet SU7 demand. A second factory, Phase 2, was completed around mid-2025 and is dedicated to Xiaomi's SUV, the YU7, which launched in June 2025. Combined, Xiaomi has said the two phases are designed for a total annual capacity of about 300,000 vehicles, though the company has run lines above that on-paper figure using extended shifts. By November 2025, Xiaomi's auto unit had produced its 500,000th vehicle, reaching that milestone roughly 602 days after SU7 sales began, and was building vehicles at a pace of more than 350,000 a year.

Capacity, Demand and Expansion

Manufacturing speed matters for Xiaomi because demand has consistently outpaced supply. Wait times for the YU7 have stretched past 30 weeks at various points in 2025, and Xiaomi has said it is expanding further, with a Phase 3 plant in Beijing and a new factory in Wuhan targeted to begin production in 2026. Xiaomi has stated a goal of building and selling more than 1 million vehicles annually, with an internal target of 1.2 million, though these remain company targets rather than confirmed output.

How Xiaomi's Approach Compares

Xiaomi's use of large single-piece die-casting and heavily automated, robot-driven assembly echoes methods used by Tesla, which pioneered large-scale casting at its own gigafactories, and by other Chinese EV makers such as BYD and NIO that have also invested in automated, vertically integrated production. Various outlets have described Xiaomi's line as being among the fastest in the industry, but there is no independently verified, comprehensive comparison of cycle times across major automakers, so such claims should be treated as reported rather than established fact.

What It Signals About China's EV Industry

Xiaomi's factory illustrates a broader pattern in China's auto sector, where consumer electronics expertise, heavy automation and rapid construction timelines are being applied to car manufacturing at a scale and speed that established automakers are still adjusting to. Whether Xiaomi can sustain quality and profitability while continuing to expand output as fast as demand requires remains the real test ahead.