01What we costed, and what we left out
A five-year ownership cost is only useful if you can see what is inside it. We have built this from three things we can source exactly, and deliberately excluded a fourth that we cannot.
| Cost | Where the figure comes from | How exact |
|---|---|---|
| Depreciation | Our own listing data: the weighted median asking price at 0–1 years against 4–6 years, for the same model | Measured, and corroborated by two independent methods |
| Fuel | Manufacturer combined-cycle consumption for the mainstream variant, at the subsidised RON95 price | Exact rate, estimated consumption |
| Road tax | The JPJ rate schedule applied to the median engine size we observe in listings | Exact rate, observed displacement |
| Insurance | Excluded — see below | Not comparable between models |
Insurance is left out on purpose. Since Bank Negara liberalised motor insurance each insurer prices its own risk, and your premium is a rate applied to the sum insured, then adjusted by your no-claim discount, your age, your location and your claims history. Two people insuring identical cars routinely pay very different premiums. Including a single made-up number per model would have added noise dressed up as precision, so we have named the omission instead.
02The five-year bill
| # | Model | Depreciation | Fuel | Road tax | Five-year total | Per year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Perodua Axia | RM7,722 | RM5,970 | RM100 | RM13,792 | RM2,758 |
| 2 | Proton Saga | RM7,966 | RM8,358 | RM350 | RM16,674 | RM3,335 |
| 3 | Perodua Myvi | RM9,445 | RM7,015 | RM450 | RM16,910 | RM3,382 |
| 4 | Perodua Aruz | RM12,693 | RM9,552 | RM600 | RM22,845 | RM4,569 |
| 5 | Honda City | RM14,413 | RM8,060 | RM450 | RM22,923 | RM4,585 |
| 6 | Toyota Vios | RM17,235 | RM7,761 | RM450 | RM25,446 | RM5,089 |
| 7 | Mazda CX-30 | RM25,801 | RM9,552 | RM2,200 | RM37,553 | RM7,511 |
| 8 | Proton X70 | RM30,336 | RM11,343 | RM1,800 | RM43,479 | RM8,696 |
| 9 | Honda HR-V | RM35,817 | RM9,701 | RM1,800 | RM47,318 | RM9,464 |
| 10 | Mercedes-Benz E200 | RM122,183 | RM10,000 | RM1,900 | RM134,083 | RM26,817 |
| 11 | BMW X5 | RM208,785 | RM13,880 | RM8,185 | RM230,850 | RM46,170 |
The spread is the first thing worth noticing. Running a Perodua Axia costs about RM230 a month on these three lines; running a BMW X5 costs about RM3,850. The gap is not a lifestyle difference, it is seventeen times the money.
03On a cheap car, depreciation is not the biggest cost
The received wisdom — that depreciation dwarfs everything else — turns out to be advice about expensive cars that has been generalised to all of them. In our numbers it does not hold at the bottom of the market.
| Model | Depreciation share of the bill | Depreciation | Fuel + road tax |
|---|---|---|---|
| Proton Saga | 48% | RM7,966 | RM8,708 |
| Perodua Axia | 56% | RM7,722 | RM6,070 |
| Perodua Myvi | 56% | RM9,445 | RM7,465 |
| Perodua Aruz | 56% | RM12,693 | RM10,152 |
| Honda City | 63% | RM14,413 | RM8,510 |
| Toyota Vios | 68% | RM17,235 | RM8,211 |
| Proton X70 | 70% | RM30,336 | RM13,143 |
| Honda HR-V | 76% | RM35,817 | RM11,501 |
| BMW X5 | 90% | RM208,785 | RM22,065 |
| Mercedes-Benz E200 | 91% | RM122,183 | RM11,900 |
The inversion matters because it changes what you should optimise. If you are shopping under about RM50,000, fuel consumption and road tax are genuinely worth comparing, because together they are roughly half your cost. If you are shopping above RM200,000, fuel economy is close to irrelevant — the difference between 6.7 and 9.3 litres per 100 km is RM3,880 over five years on cars that shed RM122,000 and RM209,000 respectively.
Which is why the SUV premium is not about fuel
Compare the Perodua Aruz and the Honda HR-V. The Aruz uses 6.4 litres per 100 km and the HR-V 6.5 — effectively identical, RM149 apart over five years. Their five-year bills differ by RM24,473, and 94% of that gap is depreciation. Anyone choosing between the two on fuel economy is optimising the wrong line by two orders of magnitude.
04Servicing, and why it does not change the order
Scheduled maintenance is the obvious missing line. We have left it out of the ranking because it is not published consistently across every model, but where it is published it is small enough not to reorder anything.
| Model | Published five-year servicing | As a share of the five-year bill |
|---|---|---|
| Honda HR-V | RM3,874 (semi-synthetic oil) | 8% |
| Proton X70 | RM4,588 | 11% |
| BMW X5 | About RM12,600 for a five-year package | 5% |
Two things follow. First, adding servicing raises every total by roughly 5% to 11% without changing the order — the HR-V and X70 stay adjacent, and the X5 stays last by a wide margin. Second, servicing follows the same pattern as fuel: it is a meaningful share of a cheap car's bill and a rounding error on an expensive one. A RM12,600 service package on an X5 is 5% of what the car costs you; RM3,874 on an HR-V is 8%.
05What to actually do with this
- If cost is the whole decision: the Perodua Axia, at about RM2,758 a year. Nothing else we costed comes within RM500 a year of it.
- If you need a bigger car: the Perodua Aruz at RM4,569 a year is the cheapest thing here with SUV packaging, and costs less to run than a Toyota Vios.
- If you are comparing two cars under RM50,000: compare fuel and road tax properly. They are roughly half your bill at that end of the market, which is not true higher up.
- If you are comparing two cars over RM200,000: ignore fuel economy and concentrate on depreciation and repair risk. Fuel is under 8% of the bill on both cars in this table.
- In every case: the depreciation half of this is model-level. What your specific car loses depends on its year, variant, mileage, service history and condition.
Frequently asked questions
What is the cheapest car to own in Malaysia over five years?
Of the eleven models we costed, the Perodua Axia at about RM13,792 over five years, or RM2,758 a year, across depreciation, fuel and road tax. The Proton Saga follows at RM16,674 and the Perodua Myvi at RM16,910. The assumptions are 15,000 km a year and subsidised RON95 at RM1.99 a litre.
Is depreciation really the biggest cost of owning a car?
Only on expensive ones. In our figures depreciation is 91% of a Mercedes-Benz E200's five-year bill and 90% of a BMW X5's, but just 48% of a Proton Saga's — where five years of petrol actually costs more than five years of depreciation. The share rises steadily with price, so the usual advice is really advice about the top of the market.
How much does fuel cost per year in Malaysia?
At 15,000 km a year and the subsidised BUDI95 rate of RM1.99 a litre, a Perodua Axia costs about RM1,194 a year in petrol and a BMW X5 about RM2,776. Every car we costed stays inside the 200-litre monthly quota at that mileage — the thirstiest, the X5, uses about 116 litres a month.
Why is insurance not included?
Because it is not comparable between models in a way that would be honest. Since motor insurance was liberalised each insurer prices its own risk, and your premium depends on your no-claim discount, age, location and claims history as much as on the car. Two people insuring identical cars routinely pay very different amounts, so we named the omission rather than invent a figure.
Does servicing change which car is cheapest?
No. Published five-year servicing totals add roughly 5% to 11% to each bill without reordering the table — about RM3,874 for a Honda HR-V, RM4,588 for a Proton X70, and around RM12,600 for a BMW X5 service package. What could change the order is a major out-of-warranty repair, which none of these figures price.
Sources and references
- Carvaly: Understanding your Carvaly valuation
- Carvaly Market Intelligence: Malaysia Used-Car Market Report · July 2026
- JPJ Malaysia: Motor Vehicle Licence Rate Calculation Guide
- data.gov.my: Price of Petroleum and Diesel
- Paul Tan's Automotive News: Budi95: Subsidised RON95 Petrol Quota Maintained at 200 Litres for Now
- Paul Tan's Automotive News: Proton X50 versus X70 and Honda HR-V: Servicing Costs Over Five Years
- Bank Negara Malaysia: Liberalisation of Motor Insurance