Key takeaways >- Only 7% of vehicle buyers bought completely online, and 53% completed every step at the dealership (Cox Automotive, 2025 Car Buyer Journey, n=2,300).- But 63% said a mix of online and in-store steps would be ideal. The gap is in the middle of the journey, not at either end.- Buyers want to do more online than dealers let them: 48% want to apply for credit online but only 33% do; 37% want to settle the price online but only 19% do.- 75% of buyers used third-party sites and 59% used dealership sites. Your site competes with marketplaces on the same shopping trip.- The vehicle detail page, not the homepage, is where most shoppers decide whether to contact you.
Car dealership website design has a clear brief in 2026, and the data from Cox Automotive's latest Car Buyer Journey study sets it out. This guide turns those numbers into design decisions for a dealer's own site. For visual inspiration, see our gallery of 20 car dealer websites.
The gap between what buyers want and what dealers allow
Cox Automotive surveyed 2,300 people who bought a vehicle in the previous 12 months. The headline split sets up the whole design problem: 53% did everything at the dealership, 7% did everything online, and 63% said an omnichannel approach would be ideal, compared with 28% who want it all online.
The same study measured what buyers want to do online against what they do:
Step | Want to do online | Did online |
|---|---|---|
Apply for credit | 48% | 33% |
Select finance and insurance (F&I) products | 40% | 16% |
Finalise the purchase price | 37% | 19% |
Each row is a design task. A buyer who wanted to apply for credit online and couldn't either did it at the desk or went to a dealer whose site allowed it. The website's job is to let buyers finish as many of these steps as they choose, then hand them to a person with the work already done.
Rule 1: Treat the vehicle detail page as the real homepage
Shoppers rarely arrive at a dealership homepage. They arrive at a vehicle detail page (VDP) from a search result or a marketplace listing, look at one car, and decide.
A VDP that converts shows, in this order:
- Photos of the actual vehicle, starting with a clean front three-quarter shot
- Price, with what is and isn't included stated next to it
- Mileage, trim, key options and the VIN
- A payment estimate the buyer can adjust
- One primary action: check availability, start the deal, or book a test drive
Put the vehicle history report link and the full feature list lower down. They answer questions the buyer only asks once the first five have been answered.
Rule 2: Make inventory search work like the marketplaces
Buyers visited an average of 4.6 sites while shopping, and 75% used third-party sites. They're comparing your search against the marketplaces in the next tab.
Match the basics they expect:
- Filters: make, model, year, price, mileage, body style, drivetrain and fuel type
- Sorting: price, mileage, year and newest arrivals
- Result cards: photo, price, mileage and one-line trim on each card, without opening the listing
- Saved searches: an alert when a matching car arrives, which is a lead the marketplace can't take from you
If your inventory feed updates daily, say so on the search page. Stale listings are the fastest way to lose a buyer's trust.
Rule 3: Put price and fees in writing
Finalising the price online is the step with the largest want-versus-did gap in proportion: 37% want to, 19% do. Buyers who can't see a full price assume the worst.
Show the advertised price, then list the fees that will be added: documentation fee, registration, dealer-installed add-ons. If a price requires financing through the dealer or excludes a trade-in bonus, state that on the VDP, not in a footnote. A buyer who discovers a condition at the desk remembers it longer than the price.
Rule 4: Let buyers start the credit application from the car
Almost half of buyers want to apply for credit online. Put a “Get pre-qualified” or “Apply for financing” action on every VDP, pre-filled with the vehicle they're looking at. A buyer who has to find a separate finance page and re-enter the car is a buyer you lose.
Keep the first step short. Ask for what you need to return a decision, explain whether it's a soft or hard credit check, and tell them what happens next and when.
Rule 5: Show F&I products before the desk
The biggest proportional gap in the study is F&I: 40% want to choose finance and insurance products online, 16% do. Warranties, service plans and protection packages are easier to consider at home, with time to compare, than across a desk at the end of a long visit.
A short page per product, with what it covers, what it doesn't, and the price range, respects that. It also lets the business manager spend the in-store conversation on questions instead of introductions.
Rule 6: Value the trade-in on the site
Most buyers bring a car. A trade-in estimator on the site gives them a number to plan around and gives you the vehicle details before they arrive. State clearly that the estimate depends on inspection, and say what the inspection checks.
Rule 7: Give the service department its own front door
Fixed operations (service and parts) keep a dealership profitable between sales, and service customers are a different audience with a different task. Put “Book service” in the main navigation, not under a dropdown, and make the booking flow work on a phone in under a minute.
Rule 8: Build for phones, and for heavy photo pages
Car shopping happens on phones, and VDPs are image-heavy. Serve modern image formats, lazy-load gallery photos after the first, and keep the price and primary action visible without scrolling. Test the site on mid-range Android phones over mobile data, not only on the office Wi-Fi.
Rule 9: Plan for AI-assisted shoppers
19% of all buyers and 25% of new-vehicle buyers used AI websites or AI-generated overviews while shopping. Those tools summarise what they can read. Clear, structured data on each VDP (price, mileage, trim, VIN and fees in plain text rather than inside images) makes your listings easier to summarise accurately.
A realistic build order
If you're rebuilding, this order puts the highest-value work first:
- VDP template with price transparency and one primary action
- Inventory search with filters, sorting and saved-search alerts
- Financing pre-qualification linked from every VDP
- Trade-in estimator
- Service booking
- F&I product pages
- Everything else: blog, community pages, events
A template built for automotive gives you the page structure without starting from zero. VAYRON and the rest of our car and auto templates cover inventory, detail pages and booking flows.
Frequently asked questions
What pages does a car dealership website need? Inventory search, vehicle detail pages, financing, trade-in, service booking, and an about and contact page. The VDP matters most, because it's where most shoppers arrive.
Should dealers show prices online? Yes. Finalising the price online is one of the steps buyers most want to do and are least able to: 37% want to, 19% do (Cox Automotive, 2025). Show the price and list the fees that will be added.
Do car buyers purchase entirely online? Few do. 7% bought completely online in the 2025 study, but 63% said a mix of online and in-store steps would be ideal.
How do dealership websites compete with third-party marketplaces? By matching their search and listing quality, then offering what marketplaces can't: financing, trade-in valuation and service booking from the dealer that will sell and maintain the car.
Last updated: 13 September 2026.
Sources: Cox Automotive, 2025 Car Buyer Journey Study (2,300 buyers surveyed in fall 2025), press release via PR Newswire, 13 January 2026, accessed 13 September 2026
