The global off-the-road tyre business is growing, but not for the reasons most people assume.
It is not a single mining boom or a single construction supercycle pushing the numbers up.
It is a more complicated mix of replacement cycles, data centre construction, critical minerals policy, and cautious fleet owners stretching every tyre for as long as possible.
Depending on which research house you ask, the global OTR tyre market was worth somewhere between USD 3.3 billion and USD 26.3 billion in 2025, with forecasts running out to 2035 at compound annual growth rates of between 3% and 8%.
The wide spread reflects how differently analysts define “OTR” — some count only construction and mining tyres, others fold in agricultural and industrial tyres too.
What the estimates agree on is direction: steady, unspectacular growth, led less by new equipment sales and more by what happens after a machine is already on site.
Replacement, not expansion, is doing the heavy lifting
Ask the people actually selling tyres and a consistent picture emerges: 2026 is a replacement-led market.
“Replacement will continue to be the backbone of the market, as fleets prioritize uptime and cost control regardless of new equipment cycles,” Ydo Doornbos, director of North America for Global Rubber Industries (GRI), said in comments carried by Modern Tire Dealer.
He expects the US market to show “stable to modest growth” in 2026, with construction demand “uneven but supported by infrastructure, utilities and industrial projects.”
That view was echoed almost word for word by rivals. Rob Seibert, president of Off the Road at Bridgestone Americas, said the segment was “poised for modest growth in 2026,” pointing to public construction spending and infrastructure projects moving through the pipeline as key supports.
Paul Hawkins, senior vice president of aftermarket sales at Titan International, put it most bluntly: replacement cycles “have largely normalized after several years of extended use,” and he expects the market to be defined by “measured, disciplined purchasing — not speculation.”
This matters for how the industry should be read.
Strong tyre sales in 2026 are less a signal of new mines opening or new construction sites breaking ground, and more a signal that existing fleets are ageing, wearing through tread, and finally needing replacement — a dynamic Fortune Business Insights projects will see the aftermarket segment account for roughly 61% of total OTR tyre sales by 2026, outpacing original equipment fitment.
Mining and construction are pulling in different directions
The two biggest end markets for OTR tyres — mining and construction — are not moving in lockstep, and that divergence is one of the more interesting stories in the sector right now.
On the mining side, demand has stayed comparatively resilient. Loic Ravasio, president of Yokohama OTR, described underground mining as “the growth engine” of the mining tyre segment, driven by the shift toward metals and minerals needed for electric vehicles and renewable energy.
Joaquin Gonzalez, president of Tire Group International, said mining tyre demand “is tied directly to operating activity and can’t be easily deferred without impacting production,” meaning it tends to hold up even when broader economic sentiment softens.
Construction has told a messier story. Cara Junkins, director of OTR and agriculture at CMA, noted that the segment is “contending with high interest rates and inflationary pressures which have slowed residential construction and private sector investments,” even as public infrastructure work provides a floor.
Several executives pointed to an unlikely bright spot: data centres. Matt Futrelle, head of Americas commercial specialty tyre at Continental, said “data center sites are popping up all over,” helping offset weakness in housing starts, while Seibert credited “new work tied to AI-related data center projects” for supporting tyre demand through 2025.
The upshot is a market where mining tyre demand tracks commodity cycles and electrification, while construction tyre demand increasingly tracks interest rates, public infrastructure budgets, and now, the physical build-out of artificial intelligence infrastructure — a driver almost nobody would have named three years ago.
Where the growth is geographically
Regionally, the centre of gravity is shifting east and south. Asia Pacific is projected to be the fastest-growing OTR tyre region through 2035, with India, Indonesia and Thailand cited as the biggest contributors on the back of infrastructure spending, urbanisation and mineral extraction.
China alone is projected to be worth USD 5.6 billion in 2026, dwarfing most single-country markets.
Africa’s role in this story is smaller in dollar terms but structurally important. The continent’s mining industry — spanning South Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zambia and Ghana — is described by market researchers as a major consumer of OTR tyres, with operations frequently located far from ports and service centres, which raises the stakes on tyre reliability and makes logistics and retreading infrastructure a genuine competitive factor rather than an afterthought.
South Africa in particular, sitting on the world’s largest platinum and manganese reserves alongside significant gold, coal and chrome deposits, is flagged as a key growth market for OTR tyres through the rest of the decade.
That dependence on imports cuts both ways for African buyers.
It gives global manufacturers an incentive to build out local distribution and service — Bridgestone Southern Africa’s acquisition of OTR tyre management specialist OTRACO Southern Africa was an early example — but it also means African mining and construction operators remain more exposed to global shipping costs, currency swings and tariff disruption than operators in markets with domestic tyre manufacturing.
Manufacturers are placing their bets
The capital allocation decisions of the major tyre makers tell their own story about where they expect demand to come from.
Yokohama Rubber’s roughly USD 905 million acquisition of Goodyear’s entire OTR tyre division, completed in February 2025, was the clearest signal yet that global players see scale in this segment as worth paying for.
BKT, the Indian manufacturer that has become one of the fastest-growing OTR suppliers globally, is investing between INR 11 billion and INR 12 billion in its 2026 financial year, including a 35,000 tonne expansion of its OTR range.
“With this development plan, we are setting a clear and ambitious vision for BKT’s future,” said Rajiv Poddar, joint managing director of BKT, describing a strategy built on “solid foundations, modularity, and organic growth.”
BKT has specifically flagged mining as a growth pillar, backed by proprietary all-steel radial technology in sizes up to 57 inches — tyres built for the haul trucks and loaders that define large-scale open-pit operations of the kind found across southern and central Africa.
Technology is quietly working against volume growth
One trend cuts against the simple “more machines, more tyres” logic: smart tyre monitoring.
Sensor-based systems such as Goodyear’s Proactive Solutions TPMS, Bridgestone’s B-TAG and Michelin’s MEMS Evolution3 are reportedly extending tyre life by 10–15% and reducing failures through predictive maintenance.
That is good news for fleet operators managing cost-per-hour, but it is a headwind for tyre manufacturers, since better-monitored tyres get replaced less often.
Ben Brown, global vice president of OEM sales and marketing at OTR Engineered Solutions, captured the tension directly, noting that improved dealer inventory and cautious fleet spending mean “only those machines that are in poor condition are likely to be replaced” in the current cycle.
Sustainability is adding a second layer of change. Manufacturers including Bridgestone, Michelin and Nokian are experimenting with recycled and bio-based materials — dandelion rubber and rice husk silica among them — alongside retreading programmes designed to extend tyre life and cut waste.
For African operators already contending with long import lead times, retreading capability is likely to matter as much as raw tyre pricing.
What it means for Africa’s fleets
Put together, the picture for 2026 is one of moderate, replacement-driven global growth, with mining tyre demand anchored by electrification-linked metals and construction demand increasingly tied to data centre build-outs and public infrastructure spending rather than housing.
For African mining houses and construction contractors, the practical takeaways are straightforward: budget for replacement cycles rather than expansion-driven purchasing, treat tyre reliability and retreading access as part of the total cost of ownership given the continent’s reliance on imports, and expect global manufacturers to keep investing in local service capacity as they compete for a mining sector that remains, in the words of market researchers, one of the more resilient demand pools left in the industry.
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