A growing number of residents in major mainland cities think the domestic cars are becoming better, but more buyers still intend to purchase a foreign brand, according to a survey conducted in May.

Though 66 percent of respondents to the Guangdong Public Opinion Research Center survey agreed that domestic brand cars are getting better, only 19 percent of residents in three big metropolises said they would buy a Chinese brand. Forty percent prefer to purchase a foreign nameplate.

The first-ever such survey by the center, it included more than 1,500 residents in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, with 95 percent of the respondents urban residents.