Supercar vs. Hypercar: What Do These Terms Even Mean Anymore?
Is something like the Corvette ZR1 really a hypercar? And if not, why not?
There’s nothing controversial about asserting the following: The Mazda Miata is a sports car, the Porsche 911 is a supercar, and the Bugatti Chiron is a hypercar. Walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it’s obviously some sort of duck. The thing is that the lines are blurred today more than ever before. Sometimes they’re blurred for impure reasons.
For example, executive editor Mac Morrison recently drove the Aston Martin Valhalla, a hypercar by any other definition, and poked fun at Aston’s own claim that its mid-engine, funny-doored, 1,064-horsepower monster is not in fact a hypercar but rather is just a lowly supercar. Why would Aston say something so obviously untrue? Because it wants to say the Valhalla is the company’s “first ever supercar,” thereby not stepping on its other, even more extreme existing hypercar, the Valkyrie. And probably to avoid irritating all its Valkyrie owners. But come on. Likewise, General Motors was hella quick to market its 1,250-hp Chevrolet Corvette ZR1X (and even the standard ZR1) as “America’s hypercar.” But are the beastiest ’Vettes really just incredibly powerful supercars?
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I think we can figure out this nomenclature. The exact creation of the term “sports car” is lost to the winds of time, but the general etymology ain’t hard to figure out. Not to be confused with a race car, a sports car is a street car that’s intended from the factory to be driven in a sporting manner. This is different from a rental car, which while often driven quite sportingly indeed (eternal fist bump to writer P.J. O’Rourke), well, that wasn’t the engineers’ original intent.
Defining the Term “Hypercar”
We do, however, know where and when and by whom the word “supercar”—or at least its modern meaning—originated. Legendary British auto scribe L.J.K. Setright coined it while looking at the Lamborghini Miura prototype at the 1966 Geneva Motor Show. As for “hypercar,” it’s a less well-known tale, but MotorTrend’s own Angus Mackenzie invented it. Why?
“I recall thinking about the term hypercar in 2004, when we had the Enzo Ferrari, Porsche Carrera GT, and McLaren SLR come out in quick succession, and cars like the Bugatti Veyron were on the horizon,” he says. “Beginning in the 1960s, L.J.K. Setright had used the term supercar to describe any sports car capable of more than 160 mph. It was a select group in those days. But by the early 21st century it was clear 200 mph was the new big boy number. And I thought we better come up with a new descriptor. What’s higher up the food chain than super? Hyper. … Of course, since then we’ve had Dodge Chargers that’ll do 200 mph. That’s the trouble with superlatives.”
Sticking with the Bugatti Veyron 16.4, because I don’t think anyone on Earth that will argue it’s not a hypercar, let’s break down its standout attributes and see if they can lead us to a clear definition.
Horsepower is first and foremost. Look, say what you want about the Veyron, but it’s a historic fact that Chairman Ferdinand Piëch’s fever dream is the first production car to produce four-figure horsepower. A fact that can be slightly argued with, as officially the Veyron’s monstrous 8.0-liter quad-turbo W-16 made 1,001 PS. Of course, PS stands for Pferdestärke, German for horsepower, but it actually means metric horsepower, which also means the Veyron only made 987 American ponies.
Do not fret, because when this fact was pointed out to Bugatti back in the day, the official response was that all Veyron powerplants in fact make more power than advertised, and the weakest one was putting out 1,020 hp. For the sake of this discussion, let’s just believe the mighty Volkswagen Automotive Group and stipulate that one defining attribute of any hypercar is 1,000 or more horsepower.
The Bugatti Veyron also cost €1,000,000, the equivalent of $1,250,000 back in 2005. There’s a common misconception that the McLaren F1 was the first seven-figure production car, but reviewing the tape shows that when new in 1992, the F1 would set you back just short of $800K. As gross and odious as the next thing I’m going to type sounds, I think price is indeed part of what defines a hypercar. Got to be at least a million bucks. And there’s a very good reason to include the price tag as a bullet point.
That reason is a bespoke chassis. This is something else that’s true about the Veyron: Its carbon-fiber tub was not shared with any other vehicle, save for subsequent variants. This is where the real money goes when we’re talking hypercars, especially these days, as electrification has radically lowered the cost of horsepower. Roughly 60 percent of the cost of engineering a vehicle goes into the area between the front axle and firewall (this is shaped slightly different for mid-engine cars, obviously), which is why platform sharing is so beloved by automakers. Not to put too fine a point on it, but the Audi A4, A5, A6, A7, A8, Q5, Q7, Q8, and Q8 e-tron; Bentley Bentayga; Porsche Cayenne; Volkswagen Touareg and (China-only) Phaeton; and Lamborghini Urus are all built on Volkswagen’s Modularer Längsbaukasten Evo, better known as MLB Evo. The point is that when a vehicle has its own unique platform, it’s kind of a big deal. Plus, it becomes freakishly expensive.
Exclusivity also matters. Part of the thinking that goes into buying a hypercar is that your friends and neighbors won’t. Just how limited? Let’s say less than 1,000 copies, as this will get the aforementioned Valhalla in (by the skin of its teeth, keep reading), as well as the Ferrari F80, limited to 799.
A hypercar also has to be a two-passenger, two-door coupe, though of course cars with no roofs are welcome. Not that any exist, though the Lucid Air Sapphire comes close in some respects, but a hyper sedan or hyper SUV would be something else entirely and need their own definitions. Anything else? Maybe an outrageous, impossible-to-hit-on-public-roads top speed? Say 225 mph? However, that would exclude the Aston Martin Valkyrie, which is supposedly limited to 220 mph because of tire wear. So yeah, maybe not that. Now comes the fun part.
