What a car part costs in the UAE: how to read a price, and where our figures come from

How to read this page

Every figure in this section and the three priced sections below was read off a named UAE retailer's own published page on the date shown beside it. It is what one shop asked for one part on one day. It is not an average, it is not a survey, and it is not what you will be quoted. Use it to sanity-check a quote, then get the quote.

That sounds like a small distinction and it is the whole point. A price list that cannot tell you which shop, which day and which basis is not information, it is decoration. The moment a number on a page is quoted back to you in a workshop, it needs to survive the question that follows it, which is always some version of: says who, and when?

So this page carries three kinds of content and keeps them clearly apart. First, mechanism: what moves a UAE parts price, which is true regardless of the day. Second, a small number of dated observations from named sellers, each with its source and its basis attached. Third, an honest account of the parts where we could not source anything usable, and what to do instead. If you want a number for your own car, the last section tells you the fastest way to get one that is actually about your car.

Which tier you buy changes the number more than which shop you buy from

The same physical function on the same car is sold at four different tiers in the UAE: the carmaker's own boxed part through an agency or dealer, the original equipment supplier's version of that part in its own box, an independent aftermarket brand's version, and a used part pulled from a donor vehicle. People shop for the cheapest shop when the far larger swing is the tier they are buying at.

This page does not re-explain what those tiers are or when each is the right buy, because that is already a full guide of its own on this site and duplicating it would only make both worse. Read it for the substance; read this page for what the choice does to the number.

What the choice does to the number is not the simple ladder most people expect. The assumption is that the carmaker's own part sits at the top and everything else steps down from it. Sometimes that is exactly right, particularly on European cars and on parts the agency has no competition for. Often it is not, and the counterexample below is one we watched happen on a single retailer's shelf on a single day.

A worked example: the same grade, one shop, one day

Engine oil makes the cleanest illustration, because the specification is printed on the bottle and there is nothing to argue about. A 4-litre pack of 5W-30 is a 4-litre pack of 5W-30. If tier pricing worked the way people assume, the carmaker-branded bottles would sit at the top of the list.

They do not. Reading one UAE retailer's engine oil catalogue on 2 September 2026, the carmaker-branded 4-litre packs sat in the middle and the most expensive packs on the shelf were premium independent brands. Toyota 5W-30 in 4 litres was AED 84.00. Mitsubishi 5W-30 in 4 litres was AED 76.00. Nissan 5W-30 in 4 litres was AED 90.00. Castrol Magnatec 5W-30 in the same 4-litre size was AED 140.00, and Castrol EDGE 5W-40 in 4 litres was AED 175.00.

That is not an argument that carmaker oil is better or worse. It is an argument that the tier label does not tell you the price, and that anyone who quotes you a number for a category rather than for a specific product on a specific shelf is guessing. Ask what brand, what pack size, what grade. The answer moves the price by a factor of two on an item where the specification is identical.

Observed at bestautoparts.ae on 2 September 2026. One retailer on one day, not a market survey, and not a quote.

What actually moves a parts price in the UAE

Heat and dust are the reasons UAE prices behave differently from the same catalogue in a temperate market, and they act on demand rather than on the sticker. Rubber, plastic and fluid parts are consumed faster here, so the fast-moving lines are stocked deeply and priced competitively, while a part that rarely fails is often a special order with a lead time and no local competition. The counterintuitive result is that the item you think of as cheap and boring may be sharply priced, and the odd one-off that nobody stocks costs what the one person who has it decides.

Import route is the second lever, and it is the one most people never ask about. The same part can arrive as GCC-specification stock through the agency network, as parallel-imported stock intended for another market, or as a used unit from a Japanese or American donor vehicle. Those routes carry different warranties, different return rights, and sometimes genuinely different parts, because a GCC-specification cooling or air conditioning component is not always identical to the one fitted to the same model elsewhere. A quote that does not tell you which route it came down is not comparable with one that does.

Then there is the agency margin, which is real and is not a scandal. An agency price buys guaranteed fitment, a warranty that survives a dispute, and a parts counter that will tell you which of the four superseded part numbers is the current one. Whether that is worth the difference depends entirely on the part and on how long you intend to keep the car. It is a choice, not a trap, and the reason to know the number is so that you make the choice rather than have it made for you.

Geography inside the country matters more than the small distances suggest. The used and dismantled trade is concentrated in Sharjah and in the industrial zones of the other emirates, the new and aftermarket counter trade sits in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, and inter-emirate delivery between them is routine and same-day. The practical consequence is that where you happen to be standing should not determine the price you pay, and if a supplier tells you it does, they are quoting you convenience rather than the part.

Finally, VAT. The rate is 5% and the only thing that matters is whether the number you were told includes it. Retail listings usually do. Workshop service pricing frequently does not, and both of the Dubai workshops quoted further down this page state in writing that their published prices exclude it. On a large job that is a real number, and it is the single cheapest question you can ask before agreeing to anything.

Fitted or parts only: the reason two honest quotes differ by half

Before comparing any two prices, establish what each one covers. This is the most common reason a reader concludes that one shop is fleecing them when in fact the two quotes describe different transactions.

A fully fitted price is a job. On the tyre retailer we read on 2 September 2026, the published per-tyre price is stated to include VAT, delivery, fitting, balancing, a new rubber valve and disposal of the old tyre. A counter price for the same tyre includes none of those things, and the tyre still has to get onto the car somehow.

A workshop service price is a third thing again: it usually bundles labour with parts of the workshop's choosing, quotes from a starting point rather than for your specific vehicle, and may or may not include VAT. Neither of the two Dubai brake prices below names a car. That is normal for advertised pricing and it is exactly why a starting price is a door rather than a quote.

So the comparison that means something is not price against price. It is scope against scope: what part, whose part, fitted or not, VAT in or out, warranty or none. Get those five straight and the prices become comparable. Skip them and you are comparing two different questions.

Tyres: a category where UAE prices are genuinely published

Tyres are the one part of the car where UAE retail pricing is transparent, because the size is stamped on the sidewall, it is not open to interpretation, and online retailers publish a price per size rather than per vehicle. That makes tyres the best available demonstration of a real price spread, and it also makes them the least useful thing to generalise from, because almost no other part is specified this cleanly.

Two sizes, read on 2 September 2026. In 205/55R16, the common fitment on a mainstream sedan, one retailer listed 46 tyres from AED 205.30 for a Tracmax X Privilo TX5 to AED 662.92 for a Pirelli Cinturato P7, with a Yokohama BluEarth ES32 at AED 339.61, a Michelin Primacy 5 at AED 435.79, a Continental ContiEcoContact 5 MO at AED 476.00 and a Bridgestone Turanza T005 AO at AED 494.48. In 265/65R17, a common large SUV and pickup size, the same retailer listed 45 tyres from AED 393.12 for a Zeetex SU6001 eco to AED 1,081.50 for a BFGoodrich All Terrain T/A KO3, with a Bridgestone Dueler A/T 002 at AED 603.15, a Yokohama Geolandar A/T G015 at AED 692.16 and a Michelin Primacy SUV Plus at AED 795.98.

Two things follow. First, the spread within one size is about three to one, so the honest answer to what a tyre costs is that it depends far more on which tyre than on where you buy it. Second, these are fully fitted prices and include VAT, fitting and disposal, so they are not comparable with a parts-only price. Multiply by four before comparing against a set price, and check whether the other quote includes fitting at all.

Observed at pitstoparabia.com on 2 September 2026. One retailer on one day, not a market survey, and not a quote.

Brake work: what two Dubai workshops publish, and what it does not tell you

Brakes are the most-asked-about job in the workshop trade and the hardest to publish a useful number for, because a brake job is not one thing. Pads alone, pads and discs, one axle or both, a mainstream Japanese sedan or a large German saloon with electronic parking brakes at the rear: these are different jobs with different parts bills that share a name.

What can be attributed is what individual named workshops advertise. On 2 September 2026, one Dubai workshop published brake pad replacement starting from AED 150 per axle and stated that replacing a single set costs AED 150 to 250 depending on model. A second Dubai workshop published brake pad replacement at AED 200. Both state in writing that all prices are quoted excluding 5% VAT, which is added at the time of invoicing.

Read those for what they are. They are advertised entry prices from two named businesses, not a market survey, and neither names a vehicle or says which pads are fitted. They are useful as a floor: a quote far below them is either fitting something you should ask about or omitting a line you will meet later, and a quote far above them should come with a reason you can hear, usually the car, the discs, or genuine parts rather than aftermarket.

We do not publish a general aftermarket brake pad price band. Nothing we could source supports one. The retail brake pad listings available to us on the day were either genuine parts by part number, where different numbers fit wildly different vehicles and the spread is meaningless as a category price, or performance pads for enthusiast cars, which is a different market. A number covering both would be arithmetic, not information.

Observed at golden-horse.ae and car-care.center on 2 September 2026. Two workshops on one day, not a market survey, and not a quote.

The parts we will not price, and why that is the right answer

We do not publish a price range for this part, and here is why. The only UAE retail prices we could source and date are for European and performance vehicles, and they run several times what the same part costs for a mainstream Japanese or Korean car. A range built on them would mislead most of the people reading this. What follows instead is what actually moves the price, and what a fair quote looks like when you get one.

That applies to five parts specifically: alternators, starter motors, radiators, air conditioning compressors and shock absorbers. On 2 September 2026 every listed UAE retail price we could reach for those was a Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Jaguar or Jeep unit, or an aftermarket performance component. Meanwhile the actual questions people ask are about a Tiida radiator, a Pajero shock absorber, a Camry starter motor. Publishing the European numbers as though they described those cars would be wrong by roughly an order of magnitude, and it would be wrong in the direction that frightens people out of a repair they can afford.

So here is the mechanism instead, which is the part that does not go stale. On all five, the first question is new, remanufactured or used. A remanufactured alternator or compressor from a rebuilder is a different product from a new one and from a yard pull, with a different warranty and a different failure profile. The second question is what is actually in the box: a compressor may or may not arrive with its clutch and pulley, a radiator may or may not include the fan assembly and the shrouds, a shock absorber may or may not include the top mount and bump stop, and every one of those inclusions is a line somebody has to pay for.

The third question is what else gets done at the same time. Opening an air conditioning system to replace a compressor is the moment to replace the receiver drier and the expansion valve, because you will not get a second free opening, and a quote that omits them is cheaper today and dearer within the year. Replacing one shock absorber and not its pair across the axle produces a car that handles worse than before. Draining a cooling system for a radiator means the coolant, the thermostat and often the hoses are on the table too. A quote that includes those lines is not padding, and a quote that excludes them is not a saving.

The fourth question is the one that decides the number: which supply route. A Sharjah yard, a Dubai aftermarket counter and an agency parts department will quote the same job at genuinely different prices for genuinely different products, and the right answer depends on the car, its age and how long you plan to keep it. That is a conversation, not a table, which is why the honest end of this page is a way to have the conversation rather than a range we made up.

What a fair quote looks like, and what to ask for

A fair quote is itemised. It separates the parts from the labour, names the brand and the tier of every part, states whether the price includes 5% VAT, and puts a warranty term in writing against both the part and the work. A single bundled figure with no breakdown is not dishonest by itself, but it cannot be compared with anything, and a supplier who will not break it down when asked is telling you something.

Four questions collapse a vague quote into a real one. Which exact part is this, by brand and part number? Is it genuine, original equipment supplier, aftermarket or used, and if used, from what donor and with what warranty? Does the price include fitting, and does it include VAT? And what happens if it fails in a month, in writing, on the invoice.

A suspiciously low quote is usually omitting one of four things, and it is worth knowing which. It may be quoting a lower tier of part than the one you were comparing against. It may be parts-only against a fitted price. It may be excluding VAT against a quote that includes it. Or it may be leaving out an adjacent item that the job genuinely requires, which then appears as a surprise once the car is on the lift and you have no leverage. None of those is necessarily fraud. All of them are reasons to ask.

One habit is worth more than all of this: get more than one quote, and give each supplier exactly the same information. The chassis number, a photograph of the old part, and the same statement of what you want quoted. Suppliers price the question they were asked, and three suppliers asked three different questions will come back with three uncomparable answers no matter how honest they all are.

Where a real number for your own car comes from

Everything above is context. The number you actually need is specific to your vehicle, your part and today, and it comes from suppliers who have the part in front of them. That is the honest end of a page like this, and it is worth saying plainly rather than dressing a general range up as an answer.

This site keeps a hub for each part family, and each one goes considerably deeper than this page does on the part itself: what fails and why, how to tell, what fits what, and how the trade for that part works in the UAE. If you know which part you need, start there. Every hub is linked in the panel beside this article.

If you do not know which part you need, or you want the number rather than the background, send the chassis number and a photograph of the old part and let suppliers quote against the same brief. That is the same discipline as the paragraph above, applied once instead of three times.

Parts sellers we can name

This page will not quote you a price and neither will this list. These are parts sellers from our own directory whose stock we have recorded in some detail — they are here so you can ring for a real number for your own car, which is the only number that means anything.

FAQs

How much do car parts cost in the UAE?

There is no single answer, and any page that gives you one without naming a seller and a date is guessing. The price of a given part is set mainly by the tier you buy at, whether the quote includes fitting, and whether it includes 5% VAT. On this page we publish figures only for the categories we could source and date: tyres, engine oil and advertised brake labour. For everything else the fastest real answer is a quote against your chassis number.

Why do two UAE workshops quote such different prices for the same job?

Usually because they are quoting different transactions. One may be parts-only and the other fitted, one may exclude 5% VAT and the other include it, and they may be fitting parts from different tiers. Establish five things before comparing: which part, whose part, fitted or not, VAT in or out, and what warranty. Once those match, the prices become comparable.

Is a carmaker-branded part always the most expensive option in the UAE?

No. At bestautoparts.ae on 2 September 2026, Toyota 5W-30 engine oil in a 4-litre pack was AED 84.00 while Castrol Magnatec 5W-30 in the same 4-litre size was AED 140.00 and Castrol EDGE 5W-40 in 4 litres was AED 175.00. Observed at bestautoparts.ae on 2 September 2026. One retailer on one day, not a market survey, and not a quote. On European cars and on parts with no aftermarket competition the agency part often is the dearest, but the tier label alone does not tell you the price.

What does a fully fitted tyre price in the UAE include?

On pitstoparabia.com on 2 September 2026 the published per-tyre price was stated to include VAT, delivery, fitting, balancing, a new rubber valve and disposal of the old tyre. In 205/55R16 the listed prices ran from AED 205.30 to AED 662.92 across 46 tyres. Observed at pitstoparabia.com on 2 September 2026. One retailer on one day, not a market survey, and not a quote. A counter price for the same tyre includes none of that, so the two are not comparable.

What does brake pad replacement cost at a Dubai workshop?

Two named Dubai workshops published entry prices on 2 September 2026: Golden Horse Car Repair from AED 150 per axle, with a single set stated at AED 150 to 250 depending on model, and Desert Diamond at AED 200. Both state prices exclude 5% VAT. Observed at golden-horse.ae and car-care.center on 2 September 2026. Two workshops on one day, not a market survey, and not a quote. Neither names a vehicle, so treat these as a floor rather than a quote.

Why does this page not publish a price for alternators, radiators, AC compressors or shock absorbers?

Because every UAE retail price we could source and date for those parts was for a European or performance vehicle, at several times what the same part costs on a mainstream Japanese or Korean car. A range built on those numbers would mislead most readers, so we explain what moves the price instead: new against remanufactured against used, what is actually included in the box, what else has to be done at the same time, and which supply route the part comes down.

Does VAT apply to car parts and repairs in the UAE?

Yes, at 5%. Retail listings normally show a price that includes it; workshop service pricing frequently does not. Both Dubai workshops quoted on this page state in writing that their published prices exclude 5% VAT and that it is added at the time of invoicing. Ask which basis a quote is on before you compare it with another.

How do I get an accurate price for a part for my own car?

Send the chassis number from your registration card together with a clear photograph of the old part, and ask more than one supplier the same question. Suppliers price the question they were asked, so identical briefs are what make the answers comparable. Ask each to state the part brand and tier, whether fitting and VAT are included, and the warranty term.