What do impacts, citations and flat tires have in common? They’re all things we absolutely do not want to happen when driving a car.
And yet, they are all terms automakers have used to name vehicles. (OK, flat tire is not the name of a car, but Reventon is, which translates to flat tire in Spanish). The lapse in foresight and good judgment immediately places these monikers among the worst car names in history.
Unfortunately, these three are far from alone. Throughout automotive history, countless bad names have come and gone. From the bizarre to the truly uninspiring, with a number of simply bad ideas mixed in, here are some of the worst names ever bestowed upon an automobile.
Studebaker Dictator
It’s hard to imagine a period when this name would have ever worked, but Studebaker picked the absolute worst time in history to try to sell the American driving public on the Dictator: the advent of World War II.
Interestingly, the model was originally known as the Standard Six. Studebaker began renaming its cars in the 1920s. Although no one could have predicted the future, the automaker sensed enough trouble in the air to use the name Director in the European market.
Dictator lasted a decade on this side of the pond before it became too tarnished a word for Studebaker, which opted to swap in the name Commander in 1937.
Ferrari LaFerrari
If you’re unfamiliar with the beauty that is the Italian language, this name translates to “Ferrari the Ferrari.” The Italian carmaker was aiming for the contextual interpretation of the “definitive” Ferrari, but the name just sounds awkward and lazy.
Renault LeCar
In competition with LaFerrari for the least original car name is Renault’s entry: The Car.
Mitsubishi Minica Lettuce
Lettuce has many positive attributes: It’s a good source of vitamins A and K, helps strengthen bones and has even been shown to improve your sleep. It also plays an indispensable role in a BLT. Shockingly, none of these facts served as inspiration for Mitsubishi’s naming of the Minica Lettuce.
Developed in partnership with the Japanese supermarket chain Seiyu, the car was designed specifically for loading and unloading groceries. The tiny sedan, which had two doors on the passenger side but just one on the driver side, was small enough to travel on small streets suited more for bicycles and rickshaws.
As for the name, Lettuce was the title of a shopping magazine published by Seiyu, which also sold the car right there in its grocery stores.
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Download NowIsuzu Mysterious Utility Wizard
The Wizard was simply ahead of its time. If it had debuted in the late 1990s instead of the late ’80s, it could have ridden the Harry Potter train broom to success. Instead, the MU Wizard has since been left to compete for worst car name ever.
To make matters worse, there doesn’t appear to be any story behind the name’s origin. It’s like it just appeared out of thin air.
Nissan Friend-ME
The Friend-ME was a concept car Nissan unveiled in 2013 specifically designed to appeal to Chinese 20-somethings. As such, the sedan had a social media-inspired cabin in which all four passengers had access to the same infotainment screens and could share content from their phones onto said screens. An interesting concept, indeed!
While the car’s design highlights the positive attributes of social media, its name reminds us of the worst. It simply reeks of desperation and self-promotion. Nissan even went as far as stylizing it with a capitalized “ME.”
Toyota Deliboy
This was not some sort of traveling sandwich purveyor mobile, just a tiny delivery truck. Its name is supposedly a portmanteau of the words, “delivery” and “boy.” Not only was the moniker a failure, so too was the truck itself. Poorly designed and featuring a woefully underpowered engine, the Deliboy was only in production for a few years.
Subaru BRAT
Like many car names before and since, BRAT is an acronym. In this case, it stands for “Bi-Drive Recreational All-terrain Transporter.” Certainly, Subaru could have gone a different route, but we’re not entirely sure the car maker didn’t choose the name due to, rather than in spite of, its unruly connotations. The BRAT was marketed to younger (dare we say rebellious), off-roading drivers.
Interestingly, the car was quick to live up to its devilish moniker. BRAT models sold in America featured two rear-facing jump seats in the cargo area. This allowed Japan-based Subaru to classify it as a passenger car rather than a light-duty truck, thus eluding a significantly higher import tax.
Honda That’s
Honda, that’s a terrible name for a car. The third-generation of the Honda Life had a head-scratching name that was as grammatically awkward as it was flat-out weird. We’re hoping something got lost in translation from the Japanese automaker and no one truly believed this was going to work.
Kia Pro_cee’d
The Pro_cee’d was the sports version of the Kia Cee’d, giving the South Korean automaker two terrible titles in its portfolio. The company later took the bold step of changing the car’s name to ProCeed.
Know a terrible car name we missed? Let us know in the comments below!
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Nova has to be the worst name for a car. While in English it’s a dying or worse yet, exploding star, In Spanish it means “no go or no move or won’t go”. Definitely not an attribute anyone wants in a car.
I was 19-20, my parents wouldn’t sign for me to buy a Camaro. My dad found an ORANGE AMC Matador owned by the little old lady who only drove it to church on Sunday. Worst. Car. Ev-er.
Ford brouht over a car made in South Korea called the Inspire, it didn’t inspire anybody and was discontinue not long after.
I always thought the name ‘Reliant’ for the Plymouth K-car was a pretty bad name…so what is it reliant on? And such a name makes no claim to it being ‘reliable’.
Then came the K-car’s replacement…not a bad name to start with, but then came the ‘man on the street’ interviewer ad campaign, who would ask regular folks “How did you come to pick your Aspen?” And that may have been the best thing about that car. I knew of plenty that had horrible problems with them stalling out at high speed.
As a former USAF combat pilot, I have always found Killed In Action (KIA) a pretty poor name for any kind of vehicle. I don’t care what it means in Korean, I know what it means here.
Plymouth Reliant
Jeep Renegade
Both names imply that the car will not do what its owner would like it to do.
The Chevy Nova. Nova in Spanish means “not going”. Don’t want a car that doesn’t go!
The VW Toureg always sounded like ‘toe rag’ to me – not appealing
In Japan they have the Nissan Mocco, which means mucus or snot in Spanish!
Nice post! Thanks for sharing.
The most obvious one didn’t make the list…the French
Citroen…literally, the Lemon 🙂
Then there is the car name that is now in the dictionary as a synonym for fiasco: the Ford Edsel.
Not a great name for a car to start with, and it’s failure in the marketplace permanently tainted the name of Edsel Ford, Henry Ford’s son. Edsel is now in the dictionary with the definition:
“a product, project, etc. that fails to gain public acceptance despite high expectations, costly promotional efforts, etc.”
(Webster’s New World College Dictionary, 4th Edition. Copyright © 2010 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.)
The English cars of the 1940’s and 1950’s had many odd names. The one that stands out is the HUMBER. The upgrade models were the HUMBER SNIPE, and the HUMBER SUPER SNIPE !
I was so proud of my first car, the Chevy Nova, ’til I realized it meant “it doesn’t go” in Spanish!
About 10-15 years ago, at the Auto Show, the Chevy display had a new model that was temporarily called the “Beat”. They were trying to convey a music theme. As a Chevy owner, I begged them never to use that name, since there would have been no end to the ridicule. Luckily, they didn’t.
I bought a 2019 Toyota Yaris. I’ve been wondering what Yaris means? I hope that I don’t regret finding out.
But it makes a great palindrome. “Sir, a Yaris, a Toyota, sir, a Yaris!
I wonder if it’s primarily a problem of creating trendy translations into English from vastly different languages like Japanese or Korean. It’s really hard to nail the semantics across such gaps. If anyone in the auto business would be interested, I’d be happy to be paid a few hundred grand to help.
Yes, there are duplicate posts. All the posts are not readable away, and there’s a lag in submitting vs posting.
😎
Oh I forgot! The Edsel.
Porsche gives its beautiful cars the weirdest names. •Cayman…A small snipey-nosed alligator. Or is it a nod to islands where one can hide money?
•Macan…”Cayman” rearranged. Or are they hinting at “makin’ it”?
•Taycan…Toy can? Really?
Saddest name: Yugo. It was so positive: “you GO!” But then the country did, while the car didn’t.
JUKE by Nissan. Sounds like half JOKE and half JUNK. Embarrassing…
In the 1980’s Yugoslavia produced a car that was sold in the United States called the Yugo. There were so many problems with the car that in America the joke was, “You go, the car stays”.
What doesn’t go is people not reading the comments and saying the same thing over and over again.
Toyota’s Venza. In Japan the word for toilet seat is venza or benza.
For me, a retired English teacher, the worst name for a car was the Toyota Cressida. Cressida was a character in Chaucer and Shakespeare and she was the emblem of unreliability and deception. Why would anyone want to name a car after her?
EDSEL. How could miss this one?!
My favorite (imaginary car) that was announced by David Letterman: The Yugo Screw Yourself
Chevy Nova was a great car and hugely popular in much of the world. But in Spanish “No Va” means “doesn’t go” – so it never sold well in Spanish-speaking countries
NOVA loosely translates to No Va meaning No Go in Spanish
For all you foreign language experts, if you DONT separate the word NOVA (as in Chevrolet), it is defined as new, not no-va. Derived from the Latin novus. I had a 1970 Chevy Nova SS and it was a great car (327/350 )4-speed with positraction.
Also nova can mean to be a star showing sudden large increase in brightness. I only refer to no-va in Spanish for BMW’s, Audi’s, and Mercedes. Lets not forget the terrible ratings for British Land Rovers!!!!!!
You ought to include Chevrolet Nova in South America means “not going”
They change the name years later
I’m surprised no one has mentioned that in 2004, just before the disastrous tsunami hit Asia, Toyota named its Canadian Celica the Tsunami. It’s not great to give your product the name of a natural disaster.
Meh. This whole article seemed like a stretch. More like just one person’s opinion. Many names cited were not awful or controversial. And the author fails to see that adding “La” or “Le” just makes the word that follows a definitive as in THE Ferrari or THE Car.
Nissan Armada, given what happened to the Spanish Armada.
I loved my little yellow Gremlin!
AMC Gremlin, and it had many
Citroën is close enough to lemon. And not the designers fault, but the Borgward sounded too much like Backward. I was one of the elite who owned one.
How about car ads that miss the mark?
Toyota Passeo -means I walk.
Escalade— This is the scaling of fortified walls using ladders, as a form of military attack, which we have all seen in the movies. The military action is so dangerous that those who agree to do it are called “Forlorns” and, whoever makes it up the ladder and in and out of the enemy fort alive is made a sergeant.
Well I guess the Ford Edsel doesn’t really qualify – if anyone is old enough to remember it. Edsel was a member of the Ford family. But it doesn’t make a good car name. The Edsel was discontinued after one or two (?) years because it did not sell. It had a distinctive front grill that looked something like squeezed pursed lips.
Model years: 1958, 1959, 1960.
Most of these comments “don’t go” . Doesn’t anybody read the comments before making one?
Chevy Vega, bad car, bad name, but wish I had kept my 1977 Vega, it apparently is a collector’s item and much more valuable than when it was new.
We had one of those. I believe Ralph Nader felt it was one of the worst American cars ever made. Me? I kind of liked it but what did I know?
I had a Chevy Vega that all most incinerated it self in front of my house. The wiring was faulty and went up in flames. I had only got the car a month before this happened.
And what is a “Tiguan” exactly?
That’s tiger-iguana. For people who want a car (half-)named after a lizard.
The Chevy Nova, which in Spanish “no va” translates to “doesn’t go.”
Yeah, surprising that the article missed the Nova. It was pretty widely ridiculed. A very good name in English, but a disaster in the Spanish-speaking market.
Yes, I thought Nova would top the list in this article on worst car names ever.
How did you miss NOVA
The brand name KIA caught me off guard at its inception. That is an acronym for “Killed in action”. Terrible for a product that is predominantly in action with a human contained inside of it. Will never buy one of those!!
We had one of those. I believe Ralph Nader felt it was one of the worst American cars ever made. Me? I kind of liked it but what did I know?
When I read the article I was specifically looking for that one. 👍
Worst name ever Ford PROBE
While the ones brought up in the article definitely have to be the worst, I agree the Probe is right up there!
Probe definitely should have made the list!
How about the Murano — named after an island near Venice that has NO cars!
My first thought and a better one, it was named for fine crystal made there.
Mitsubishi Pajero in english means Masturbator.
I was wondering if Pajero would appear on the list. Probably the biggest goof if all!
Oh Well. Different Strokes for different folks. And so on. And so on. And Scooby dooby dooby.
My BRAT was my favorite car ever! Not only was the name my wife’s initials spelled backwards, it was great for taking to drive-in movies. The rear facing seats in the bed made viewing the screen fantastic!
Gremlin, made by AMC
AMC Matador, which means “killer” in Spanish.
One near miss: Rolls Royce named one car “Silver Mist” until someone pointed out ‘Mist’ in German means rubbish.
Rolls-Royce often names cars after “things” that move about silently. So in English, the only language that counts in UK in fits just fine.
The Fiaro, quickly mimicked as Fiasco. Caught fire every so many Miles.
VW Thing
Gremlin – Why remind people that cars have hidden, hard to fix flaws?
I own a Gremlin, and it always had mechanical problems and started to rust almost immediately. Gremlin was an appropriate description.
Chevrolet’s 1966 electric car was called the “Impact”.
Worst car name? How about Chevy Nova….no va means “no go” in Spanish.
Nova translates into “no go” in Spanish. Chevrolet didn’t sell many in those markets.
This is an urban legend that has been around for years but has been thoroughly debunked, for example by Snopes (a reliable debunking site) here:
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/chevrolet-nova-name-spanish/
As just one of the points they mention, there was a Mexican brand of gasoline named “Nova.” If there was any problem at all using this word, a Mexican petroleum company would have known it.
Snopes as a reliable debunking site —hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha…
Two drunks and a cat
Still doesn’t mean it’s NOT a terrible name for a car. .. it IS.
Chevy changed the name of the Nova to Estrella in Latin America once it realized its mistake.
Of course, what list of poor car names would be complete without the Chevrolet Nova, which translates in Spanish to
the Chevrolet NO GO.
Another worst car name:
Chevrolet Nova.
Nova in Spanish means “no go”.
It was a flop in the Latin American markets.
And ultimately everywhere.
The Chevy NOVA. No – va = No go in Spanish!
FORD PROBE
For those who speak Spanish, how about the “NO VA” (doesn’t go)
Studebaker Lark.
The Mercury Mystique. Sounds like mistake.
How about the I-mark? Isuzu even had an ad making fun of the name! And what’s wrong with Lark?
I had a Lark and still think it was a wonderful car. I was a smoker then and in addition to the mistake of smoking I also made the mistake of trying Lark cigarettes which were awful. But the car was great.