Vehicle Types, Car Body Styles Explained - Car And Driver

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Car and Driver

The term “body style” is an all-encompassing label used to describe the size, shape, and characteristics of a vehicle. For example, sedans and pickup trucks are two popular vehicle body styles in the United States. So far, so easy. At Car and Driver, we separate vehicles into eight primary body styles, making them easier to categorize.

Within those eight broad body styles are a host of different variations that get even more specific — think luxury versus non-luxury, compact versus full-size. Not sure where the car you’re interested in fits? We've broken down all of the main vehicle types and their subcategories to help you understand the body style basics.

SEDAN

Honda

Sedans are what most people picture when they think of a traditional passenger car. Sedans have four doors and incorporate a three-box design (the car-world term for a design with a distinct hood, passenger compartment, and trunk). Sedans come in multiple types and sizes, ranging from fuel-efficient and small compact to luxurious and large full-size options.

Best New Sedans | Sedan vs. Coupe

Subcompact Sedans

Audi

The smallest sedans in the U.S. are subcompact in size. Among non-luxury options, just one remains: the Nissan Versa. The luxury subcompact segment is more flush with options. This includes the Audi A3 [pictured] and Mercedes CLA-class.

Best Subcompact Luxury Cars

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COUPE

Mercedes-Benz

A coupe has historically been considered a two-door car with a trunk and a solid roof. This would include cars like a Ford Mustang or Audi A5—or even two-seat sports cars like the Chevrolet Corvette and Porsche Boxster. Recently, however, car companies have started to apply the word "coupe" to four-door cars or crossovers with low, sleek rooflines that they deem "coupe-like." This includes vehicles as disparate as a Mercedes-Benz CLS sedan and BMW X6 SUV. At Car and Driver, we still consider a coupe to be a two-door car.

Best New Coupes | Coupe vs. Sedan

SPORTS CAR

These are the sportiest, hottest, coolest-looking coupes and convertibles—low to the ground, sleek, and often expensive. They generally are two-seaters, but sometimes have small rear seats as well. Cars like the Porsche 911 and Mazda Miata are typical sports cars, but you can stretch the definition to include muscle cars like the Ford Mustang and Dodge Challenger. Then there are the high-end exotic dream cars with sky-high price tags for the one percent, cars like the Ferrari 488 GTB and Aston Martin Vantage, which stop traffic with their spaceship looks.

Best New Sports Cars

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STATION WAGON

Volvo

Wagons are similar to sedans but have an extended roofline and a hatch door at the rear instead of a trunk. Some, like the Subaru Outback or Audi A4 Allroad, have elevated ground clearance and some rugged body cladding to make them more like a sport-utility vehicle (SUV), but they are nonetheless closely related to sedans. Wagons have fallen from favor during the past few decades and there are relatively few available for sale in the United States.

Best New Station Wagons | Wagons In-Depth

HATCHBACK

Traditionally, the term "hatchback" has meant a compact or subcompact sedan with a squared-off roof and a rear flip-up hatch door that provides access to the vehicle's cargo area instead of a conventional trunk. The Volkswagen Golf and Kia Rio are two typical hatchbacks. More recently, rear hatches have found their way on to some larger cars, like the Audi A7 and Kia Stinger. They look like sedans, but they actually have a steeply raked hatchback that affords easier accessibility to the cargo area and greater carrying capacity than a traditional trunk would.

Best New Hatchbacks | Hatchback vs. Sedan

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CONVERTIBLE

Does the roof retract into the body leaving the passenger cabin open to the elements? If so, it's a convertible. Most convertibles have a fully powered fabric roof that folds down, but a few have to be lowered by hand. There are also a number of models with a retractable hardtop, as well as several unusual quasi-convertibles (called "targa tops") like the Mazda MX-5 Miata RF, Porsche 911 Targa and Corvette; only the forward section of their roofs retracts or can be removed by hand.

Best New Convertibles

SPORT-UTILITY VEHICLE (SUV)

SUVs—often also referred to as crossovers—tend to be taller and boxier than sedans, offer an elevated seating position, and have more ground clearance than a car. They include a station wagon-like cargo area that is accessed through a flip-up rear hatch door, and many offer all-wheel drive. The larger ones have three rows of seats. Sizes start at subcompact (Hyundai Kona, Nissan Kicks), mid-size, and go all the way to full-size (Ford Expedition, Chevrolet Tahoe). Luxury brands offer many SUV models in most of the same size categories.

Best New SUVs | SUV vs. Minivan

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MINIVAN

Minivans are the workhorses of the family-car world, the best at carrying people and cargo in an efficient package. They're called minivans but they are far from "mini." That's because they are tall boxes-on-wheels with sliding side doors for easy access and a rear hatch that opens to a large cargo area. Most minivans have adjustable seats in their second and third rows that often can be removed or even folded into the floor to create a huge open cargo bay. The Honda Odyssey and Chrysler Pacifica are great examples of the breed.

Best New Minivans and Vans

PICKUP TRUCK

A pickup truck has a passenger cab and an open cargo bed in the rear. Virtually all pickups offer some form of all-wheel drive or part-time four-wheel drive—the latter for off-road use only. With one exception—the mid-sized Honda Ridgeline—pickup bodies are cabs mounted to a separate steel frame. The Ridgeline is more like a crossover with the rear section of the roof lopped off to expose a cargo bed. Currently, pickup trucks come in two size categories: full-size and mid-size.

Best New Trucks

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IT DOESN'T STOP THERE

BMW

There's more to it than basic body types. Those 10 types of vehicles are available from dozens of different brands from Acura to Volvo—and in many sizes and at widely varying prices. But there are always a few outliers that don't quite fit neatly into any category, like the BMW X4 "four-door coupe SUV" pictured here.

Austin ParsonsAssociate EditorAustin's car fixation began at a young age and at 1:64 scale. Eventually, Hot Wheels weren't cutting it anymore, so he developed an obsession with his father's full-sized 1965 Ford Mustang instead. Desperate to break into the automotive industry, he bartered his way into a job at a local BMW dealership by promising to stop hurling nerdy technical facts at the salesmen who came into the neighboring coffee shop where he worked. That was also around the time when he started writing automotive reviews, news articles, and technical guides for a number of local and international publications. Now at Car and Driver, Austin brings more than 10 years of experience in the automotive industry and an all-so-common love-hate relationship with German engineering to the table.Watch Next