Best and worst retro cars
Retro designs are in fashion, and some of them really hit the mark. Our team picks their retro winners
What are the best and worst retro cars ever made? In a car industry where technology seems to move ever onward at a frightening pace, manufacturers often decide to break the cycle and look to the past for inspiration. The resulting retro cars play into the heritage of the car brand, our own sense of nostalgia and often gather a loyal enthusiast following. Below, our team has picked out the retro cars that we think have done the best job, as well as the ones that fell short of the mark.
What is a retro car?
Love it or hate it, retro style has been a common theme throughout the history of car design. It’s inevitable that those imagining new cars are influenced by what’s gone before but most new models emerge with at least the intention of reflecting the modern aesthetic or even establishing new visuals that will help define the future. Most, but not all.
On occasion car designers go completely retro, deliberately and obviously looking back to recreate classic design themes from history. Sometimes the particular car brand has a much-loved model languishing in its back catalogue that it wants to reference, or recreate, for financial gain. There are also long running model lines that have merely passed original design themes down their generations so that the current versions inherit a retro look by default. Other times, designers just design retro cars because lots of people really like them.
Done well, retro is nostalgic, familiar and yet different from the majority of cars that roll off the production lines in a given era. Modern technology overlaid with classic design themes is a formula that’s been revisited time and time again by different cars over the years and our pick of the retro cars are the models on this theme that we think stand out, for better or worse…
The best retro cars
Ford Mustang GT
By Ryan Birch
- Price new: from £55,725
- Price now: from £19,995
- Powertrain: 5.0-litre petrol V8, six-speed manual or 10-speed automatic
- Power: 390bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 5.3 seconds (manual) or 4.9 seconds (automatic)/155mph
Ford knows how to make a muscle car, and the Mustang is a model that has remained fairly true to its roots. A reboot in 2005 saw it take retro lines and contours from the original sixties design, revitalising the look of the modern-day muscle car in the process.
The firm has opted for an evolution of this design ever since, with each generation clearly maintaining its DNA – and the 2024 Mustang GT is the best one yet. Thunderous V8 power and a surprisingly well honed chassis make the Mustang more than a one-trick pony – and strong residuals reflect that.
The Mustang may be a dying breed, but it's a wonderful driver’s car and a refreshing alternative choice in Ford’s current line-up.
Singer Porsche 911
By Ellis Hyde
- Price new: £850,000 plus donor car
- Price now: £850,000
- Powertrain: 3.8-litre 6cyl turbo petrol, six-speed manual
- Power: 510bhp
- 0-62/top speed: N/A
The entire Porsche 911 lineage could have had a spot on this list, but the ultimate retro-styled, modern tributes to the legendary sports car’s forebears are those reimagined by Singer. The Classic Turbo is based on the 964-generation 911 that’s been rebodied in carbon fibre to look almost identical to the 930 Turbo from the seventies and eighties.
Being a Singer, every surface and detail has been subtly refined to accentuate the shape. The same goes for the interior, while the 3.8-litre twin-turbo flat-six produces up to 510bhp. Yet it is still air-cooled like the 911s of old, and that power is sent to the beautifully dished rear wheels via a six-speed gearbox.
Volkswagen ID. Buzz
By Jordan Katsianis
- Price new: from £58,044
- Price now: £55,000
- Powertrain: 86kWh batt, 1x e-motor, single-speed auto
- Power: 282bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 7.9 secs/112mph
Some cars take a while to reach production, but the Volkswagen ID. Buzz’s yawning 22 years between initial concept and showroom-ready road car could be a sign that the company knew it couldn’t afford to get it wrong. The ID. Buzz coincides with a period of financial trouble for the German giant, driven by production delays and software issues that its EVs encountered in the wake of Dieselgate.
That mean the ID. Buzz needed to be pretty much perfect – and it is. The vibrant VW has a design that transcends retro, tapping into the very culture that the brand has created with generations of iconic vans. Just as the New Beetle did at the turn of the century, let’s hope that the ID. Buzz has the same restorative effect on Volkswagen.
Alpine A110
By Alex Ingram
- Price new: £54,490
- Price now: from £17,000
- Powertrain: 1.8-litre 4cyl turbo petrol, seven-speed automatic
- Power: 249bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 4.5 secs/155mph
At a time when cars are growing ever taller, wider and fatter, lightweight sports cars become more appealing with every passing day. At roughly 4.2 metres long, the Alpine A110 is about the same length as a Volkswagen Golf, but at 1.8 metres wide, it’s narrower. These compact dimensions, along with a kerbweight of around 1,100kg, make the Alpine feel tiny on the road, allowing you to make the most of its glorious chassis.
Then there’s the looks. The A110 has taken much of its inspiration from its retro namesake and predecessor, from the four-headlight arrangement at the front to the tapered rear end with slim tail-lights. It’s a fantastic reimagination.
MINI Cooper
By Richard Ingram
- Price new: £11,680
- Price now: from £1,000
- Powertrain: 1.6-litre 4cyl petrol; five-speed manual
- Power: 115bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 8.9 secs/124mph
I don’t care what my colleagues say – the modern MINI Cooper is the best retro remake ever. It shocked the industry when the covers came off at the turn of the millennium and it still looks fresh today.
Yet to me, a good retro reproduction needs to offer more than looks. It has to capture the feel of the original, too – not just in terms of the interior, but also how it drives. The MINI nails both, with a charismatic cabin and go-kart-like handling – sitting in one today you struggle to believe it's the best part of 25 years old. Sure, it’s bigger than its forebear, but it’s dinky compared with today's superminis. If you want one, you’d better act fast, because good ones are becoming harder and harder to find.
Mercedes SLR McLaren Stirling Moss
By Chris Rosamond
- Price new: (circa) £600k
- Price now: £2-3million
- Powertrain: 5.4-litre supercharged V8, six-speed manual
- Power: 640bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 3.0 seconds/217mph
For me, the fifties were the golden years for sports racing machines, and there’s only one contender for the ultimate retro-inspired road car. The Mercedes SLR McLaren Stirling Moss is a wonderful homage, not just to one of our most storied racers, but also to the 300 SLR racing car he used to win the 1955 Mille Miglia.
The Mercedes McLaren SLR coupé it’s based on is a pretty awesome machine in its own right, but given the fifties speedster treatment – with no windscreen, twin roll-over hoops and side-exiting exhausts – it was transformed into a true work of art.
Renault 5
By Paul Barker
- Price now: from £22,995
- Powertrain: 52kWh batt, 1x e-motor, single-speed automatic
- Power: 148bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 8.0 seconds/93mph
An open goal is still a goal, so there’s no shame in picking the very obvious new Renault 5 as the best retro car. The French firm has done a brilliant job of translating the classic R5’s looks and unique design cues into a model fit for modern life, and it certainly teaches other brands a thing or two about successfully trading on their heritage. It’s a design that makes you smile, which is something too few cars do these days, and Renault’s bold colour choices will help an already stand-out car shine even brighter when it arrives here early next year.
Retro isn’t always meant as a compliment, but with the 5 it’s used with the utmost affection – it's a perfectly executed fusion of classic and modern design and I can't wait for it to arrive.
Citroen Dispatch H-van
By Dean Gibson
- Price new: from £38,000
- Price now: from £15,000
- Powertrain: 2.0-litre four-cyl turbodiesel, six-speed manual
- Power: 110bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 12.1 seconds/110mph
The last time you saw a Citroen H van, it was probably parked up at an event or shopping centre with a barista or an artisan baker hanging out the side, peddling their wares. Old vans can be great for businesses like that, but reliability isn’t going to be a strong point.
However, the 2CV Shop based in Warminster, Wiltshire, might just have the answer. It imports conversion kits from Italian firm Caselani that can transform Citroen’s Berlingo, Dispatch and Relay vans into retro homages to the old H, HG, HY and Fourgonnette models, with bug-eyed headlights, a retro grille and corrugated panels that recall the appearance of Citroen's traditional 'tin shed'. They don’t come cheap, but they’re produced under licence from Citroen and are as close as you can get to an official retro modern van today.
Plymouth Prowler
By Shane Wilkinson
- Price new: from £30,000
- Price now: from £28,000
- Powertrain: 3.5-litre V6, four-speed auto
- Power: 214bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 6.0 seconds/118mph
If you’re going to design a retro car, you want it to look the part. While the Plymouth Prowler is actually rather mundane to drive, and filled with cheap and nasty plastics, nobody can deny that it stands out from the crowd.
Those in the know can identify the Prowler straight away, despite the fact that production ended as much as 20 years ago. But even those with no clue what it is will find themselves unable to avert their eyes. Yes, the Plymouth is technically and dynamically a bit on the poor side, but just look at it.
Ford GT
By Alastair Crooks
- Price new: from £120,900
- Price now: £350,000
- Powertrain: 5.5-litre petrol supercharged V8, six-speed manual
- Power: 550bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 3.3 seconds/205mph
Twenty years since the Ford GT's debut, I still have no idea how the firm managed to create something so visually similar to its sixties Le Mans legend. It had all the lines and features of the original racer, yet looked so brilliantly modern in its execution at the same time.
The supercharged 5.5-litre V8 made a terrific noise, and the performance holds up against many of today’s supercars. Its handling even earned the GT a spot in our sister title evo’s Car of the Year shortlist in 2005. Prices have tripled since its launch, but there will never be anything like it again.
The worst retro cars
Chrysler PT Cruiser
By Jordan Katsianis
- Price new: from £12,995 (2001)
- Price now: from £500
- Powertrain: 2.4-litre 4cyl, five-speed manual
- Power: 113bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 9.7 secs/131mph
Chrysler’s dabbling with retro design and hot-rod culture created some almighty clangers, but few were as awful as the PT Cruiser. This hatchback-wagon-van hybrid was the result of the US firm's desperate attempt to find itself a place in the 21st century after decades of uninspired and poorly built models.
The genesis of this new way of thinking was seen in the 1989 Dodge Viper concept, a car that made all the Chrysler Group brands of the era want to make a change of their own. A few years after the success of the Viper, the Plymouth Prowler was introduced with a more overt hod-rod aesthetic, one that was eventually picked up by Chrysler itself for the PT Cruiser – a new compact car that it hoped would sell in vast quantities. And indeed it did, across both America and the rest of the world – but that didn’t stop it from being a wholly wretched and quite tacky pastiche in plastic.
GWM ORA 3 (Funky Cat)
By Richard Ingram
- Price new: £30,495
- Price now: from £15,000
- Powertrain: 45.4kWh batt, 1x e-motor; single-speed auto
- Power: 167bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 8.3 secs/99mph
You might wonder why – when the two cars look ostensibly so similar – I can rate the MINI so highly yet take such objection to the Ora 03 (nee Funky Cat). Well, probably the biggest issue for me is how the Ora tries to mash together so many iconic design into one, without much success.
There’s undoubtedly some essence of the MINI at the front, mixed with bits of VW Beetle or even early Porsche 911. Yet from here it all goes to pot, and with an odd single-piece rear lightbar and a bulbous back end, the overall styling is messy to say the least.
The interior is clumsy, too, with a fiddly infotainment system and compromised packaging. Plus, the EV’s battery range isn’t much to write home about, either. Unfortunately, I suspect the Ora will go down as one of many early Chinese cars that didn’t quite chime with European tastes.
Dodge Kahuna
By Paul Barker
- Price new: N/A
- Price now: N/A
- Powertrain: 2.4-litre 4cyl, four-speed auto
- Power: 212bhp
- 0-62/top speed: N/A
It wasn’t even a production car, but the Dodge Kahuna left a long-lasting impression as a cynical retro-mobile designed with minimal thought other than grabbing a share of the headlines at the 2003 Chicago Motor Show.
It's basically a hark-back surf-wagon with some wood panelling off a seventies US station wagon down the side, but the Kahuna lacked the charm of a Volkswagen Type 2 (or even an ID. Buzz), and just looked like a meek, narrow, doe-eyed oddball. Even the name sounded like a sniggering surfer-jock joke and not a car to be taken seriously. The six-seat interior was borrowed from the Dodge Caravan MPV (sold here as the Chrysler Voyager), and it had a 2.4-litre petrol engine, as seen in various Chrysler models. It never even got close to being built – thankfully.
Lamborghini Countach LPI 800-4
By Dean Gibson
- Price new: £2,000,000
- Price now: £2,000,000-plus
- Powertrain: 6.5-litre V12 mild hybrid; seven-speed auto
- Power: 803bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 2.8 seconds/221mph
If you’re after an ultra-exclusive Lambo, the Italian maker is sure to oblige. It has produced hit after hit over the years, and plenty of limited-run specials. But for me the reimagined Countach is a huge miss.
There's been nothing quite like the original Countach concept that was revealed at the Geneva Motor Show back in 1971, but this 50th anniversary reimagining fails to live up to its beauty. Trying to transpose the first car’s elegant shape to the Aventador/Sian platform created an awkward-looking mess – it doesn’t even have pop-up headlights. Only 112 were built, and despite costing more than £2million apiece, they sold out in less than a week. I guess that proves that money really can’t buy taste.
David Brown Speedback GT
By Ellis Hyde
- Price new: £594,000
- Price now: £275,000
- Powertrain: 5.0-litre V8 petrol, six-speed auto
- Power: 510bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 4.6 secs/155mph
The Aston Martin DB5 is one of the most beautiful cars ever, which makes this gawping, Frankenstein imitation all the more embarrassing.
Created by David Brown Automotive (nothing to do with the former boss of Aston Martin), the Speedback GT tried to blend coachbuilt skills with modern tech. The end result is cringe-inducing. It isn’t even an Aston; it’s based on a Jaguar XKR with awful wheels.
Fiat 500L
By Shane Wilkinson
- Price new: £15,000
- Price now: from £2,000
- Powertrain: 0.9-litre 2cyl petrol, six-speed manual
- Power: 94bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 10.7 seconds/ 117mph
The original Fiat 500 is a tiny city car that oozes classic charm, and the brand managed to recapture this when it launched the first modern iteration in 2007. Unfortunately, five years later, the Italian company then decided that its retro-inspired small car styling would also look good on a chunky MPV.
That was a big mistake – the result was the 500L, a hefty, bulbous machine that wasn’t as practical as its rivals, nor anywhere near as good to drive or as chic as the proper 500.
Volkswagen New Beetle
By Chris Rosamond
- Price new: £11,500
- Price now: from £750
- Powertrain: 2.0-litre 4cyl petrol, five-speed manual
- Power: 113bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 10.6 seconds/115mph
When Volkswagen wheeled out its Concept One homage to the original Beetle back in the mid-nineties, I admit to being caught up in the hype that convinced VW to put the car into production in 1997. But in hindsight
I wish I’d been more critical.
Car design should be innovative and intriguing, but we ended the last century distracted by playschool-level pastiche models that really should have been an offence to good taste.
Fiat 124 Spider
By Alex Ingram
- Price new: £19,545
- Price now: from £7,000
- Powertrain: 1.4-litre, 4cyl turbo petrol, six-speed manual
- Power: 138bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 7.5 secs/134mph
A car based on the Mazda MX-5 with Italian styling. In theory, I can’t think of a formula that is more up my street. That’s why I should adore the Fiat 124 Spider, but unfortunately it has never quite sat right with me. Yes, it’s great to drive, and it has some interesting details, but viewed as a whole it all comes across as a bit half-hearted.
Not enough effort was invested into making the 124 look and feel unique, and as such it ends up resembling a lazy MX-5 conversion, with new front and rear ends grafted on, and Fiat badges thrown into a barely unchanged Mazda interior. I admit calling it the worst retro car ever is a bit harsh – I'd happily own one – but I do feel a bit let down by it.
Hummer H2
By Alastair Crooks
- Price new: N/A (UK)
- Price now: from £20,000
- Powertrain: 6.0-litre V8, four-speed automatic
- Power: 321bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 11 secs/99mph
Although America sometimes nails it when it creates retro-styled cars, it can also occasionally produce a pile of dog’s mess, and that’s exactly what happened when it inflicted the Hummer H2 upon us. The numbers are all wrong for a start: despite having a hulking great V8, the scaled-down Hummvee would lose a traffic-light drag race to a Toyota Prius of the same era. It wouldn’t top 100mph, fuel consumption was in the teens (if not worse) and it cost more than a BMW X5 at the time.
Yes, there’s an eccentric character to the H2 that some would find comical or even endearing these days – Arnold Schwarzenegger was a big fan for a start. But to most of us it’s simply a garish symbol of brash, over-styled American excess.
Chevrolet SSR
By Ryan Birch
- Price new: N/A (UK)
- Price now: from £20,000
- Powertrain: 6.0-litre petrol V8, six-speed manual
- Power: 390bhp
- 0-62/top speed: 5.2 seconds/126mph
In an attempt to cash in on the retro boom, Chevrolet got to work creating the SSR – or Super Sport Roadster.
Sure, America loves a pick-up, and Chevy is no stranger to creating a good one. But a retro truck that was also a convertible hard-top roadster with design inspiration from the forties was a bold move. Plus, despite its Marmite looks, the SSR was marketed via motorsport, becoming the official pace car for the 2003 Indy 500 in a bid to capture the crowd’s imagination. There were decent safety features and in-car kit, but it was expensive and not even GM's LS2 V8 engine could save it from being a flop.
Which cars would you add to these lists? Tell us in the comments section below...
