Since mid-December, the 23rd Panzer Division had sustained multiple Soviet attacks along an east-west line anchored in separate strongpoints and hamlets in the puszta. In the morning, the Soviet 41st Guards Rifle Division attacked the railway station and the southwestern edge of Szabadbattyán while, on the other side of the canal, the 252nd and the 84th Rifle Divisions advanced. The weak German battalion pulled back into the woods northeast of Szabadbattyán, allowing strong Soviet forces to infiltrate across the railway line and insert themselves between two other German battalions. An armored group and a halftrack-mounted battalion dispatched from the 1st Panzer-Division arrived to re-establish the defensive line.

Soviet tactics called for assault parties to avoid any fighting with the German strongpoints and preferred bypassing them instead. That forced the Germans to try to close the gaps in their line by sending strong reinforcements. A platoon of Panthers showed up from 23rd Panzer Division, and 1st Panzer Division sent its armored Battle Group Philipp. Philipp’s counterattack failed completely in the face of vastly numerically superior Soviet forces. These Soviet forces, supported by 20 AFVs, breached the main combat line and pushed forward to the road fork 4 kilometers to the north-east and also to the southern shore of Lake Sós, just south of Székesfehérvár. At noon, Soviet tanks (probably from 366th Heavy Self-Propelled Artillery Regiment) and infantry (252nd Rifle Division) entered the industrial area of Székesfehérvár on the northwest side of the city. The situation of the German forces still fighting in the southern outskirts of the city became increasingly precarious under the threat of encirclement.