What are the 10 most expensive cars of all time? Before we find out, I should point out a caveat. This article doesn’t include vintage cars that sold at auction for millions of dollars, like the 1998 McLaren F1 that was sold for $13.75 million. Those cars are cars in the same way as a Picasso painting is a wall poster. They are pieces of art that are nice to look at and if you own one of those you can also touch it and maybe lick it (if you are into that sort of thing). So, the cars I included in the list are fairly new and they represent masterpieces of technology and style that can actually be driven and make you feel all tingly inside just by looking at them.
Growing up with the Top Gear show, I absolutely love cars, and when I say love, I mean I like looking at them and reading about them, because spending my entire adult life moving around Europe, I haven’t gotten a chance to actually own a car and I don’t even have a driver’s license, although I am working on that and plan to get some wheels in a couple of months. Writing this article makes me feel excited, but also sad, knowing that the most expensive car I can probably afford is something like a Ford Fiesta.
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Anyway, the transformations that the car industry has gone through over the last couple of years are truly amazing, as more and more companies transform cars from a couple of moving parts into sophisticated machines with computers and electronics that do a lot of things for the driver, improving the safety and experience for the occupants of the vehicle, and for people in other cars or on the streets. Just look at what Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) has done. It entered the car manufacturing industry as a high tech company and revolutionized it with its fully-electric long-range vehicles that can also drive themselves.
Despite the fact that it doesn’t have a scale of production comparable to auto giants like Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) or General Motors Company (NYSE:GM) and delivers a lot less cars, which cost a lot of money, Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) has managed to overcome a lot of struggles and recently became the most valuable publicly-traded car company on the U.S stock market. So, in a way, Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) showed the world that the future of cars is in electricity and is currently trying to solve the problem of generating more green energy to power these cars.
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General Motors Company (NYSE:GM), Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F), Volkswagen, BMW, Mercedes, and other car companies are also embracing electricity and are either already producing or plan to produce cars that will have some sort of electric powertrain. And it makes sense, since aside from being safer for the environment, electric or hybrid cars are more dynamic, as they generate instant torque from the moment you press the accelerator.
So, if you think that one of the top 10 luxury car brands in the world, like Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA)’s Model S and Model X cars are expensive, take a look at our list of the 10 most expensive cars of all time. To make it more fun, we included cars that are not road legal, but can be driven on tracks and cars that were released in limited editions, so you are unlikely to seem them even if you live in Monaco or Dubai.
10. Ferrari LaFerrari
Price: $1.40 million
If a 458 or a California is a Ferrari, LaFerrari is the Ferrari, because its name actually translates from Italian as “Ferrari the Ferrari”. The $1.40 million hybrid hypercar is the most expensive of the so-called hypercar “holy trinity”, which also includes the McLaren P1 and the Porsche 918. The car has a 6.30 liter engine and an electric motor that constantly work together (as opposed to the other two hypercars, which can be driven on electric power only) to generate over 940 hp. And, Gordon Ramsay has one of these. And now, let’s see what else we have in our list of most expensive cars of all time.
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9. Koenigsegg Agera
Price: $1.70 million
Swedish company Koenigsegg is one of the most notorious makers of so-called “boutique” cars, which are extremely rare (the company makes around 15 cars a year). The Agera is the successor to the CCX and has a 5.0 liter V8 twin-turbocharged engine that generates between 950 and 1,200 hp.
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8. Lamborghini Centenario
Price: $1.90 million
Whether its a Gallardo, or a newer Aventador or Huracan, Lamborghini cars have something devilish in the way they look. The Centenario is a limited edition car built on the basis of the Aventador to celebrate the 100th birthday of the company’s founder, Ferruccio Lamborghini. The car has the same 6.5 liter V12 engine as the Aventador, which produces 759 hp. Only 40 cars were made, all of which have been sold.
7. Koenigsegg One:1
Price: $2.0 million
Up next in our list of most expensive cars of all time is Koenigsegg One:1, that is built on the same platform as the Agera and has the same 5.0-liter V8 twin-turbocharged engine. However, it produces 1,360 hp. Only seven cars were made and all were sold. What makes it special is that it represents perfection in the car industry, as it has a weight of 1,360 kilograms, so the power-to-weight ratio is one-to-one (hence the vehicle’s name).
6. Koenigsegg Regera
Price: $2.0 million
If you think that hybrid supercars like the LaFerrari, the McLaren P1, or the Porsche 918 are awesome, the Koenigsegg Regera that’s up next in our list of most expensive cars of all time is absolutely bonkers. It uses three electric motors aside from a 5.0-liter twin-turbo V8 and the whole ensemble generates 1,800 hp. Only 80 cars are expected to be made, with 40 already having been sold.
5. Lamborghini Sesto Elemento
Price: $2.20 million
The Sesto Elemento that ranks 5th in our list of most expensive cars of all time is not just a cool name for a car, but it is also a reference to the atomic number of carbon, which in this car is present wherever possible. The car, introduced in 2010, has a 5.2-liter V10 engine from the Lamborghini Gallardo and generates 570 hp. It may not be a lot, but taking into account that the car weighs slightly under a ton, it definitely doesn’t lack power. The company produced only 20 cars, which are not road legal.
4. Bugatti Chiron
Price: $2.50 million
Back in 2001, Volkswagen, which had bought the Bugatti brand a couple of years earlier, decided to do something that seemed impossible at the time: to make a car that would have over 1,000 hp. That’s how the Veyron was born. The car had a price tag of over $1.0 million, but it actually cost the company over $4.0 million in losses per car. However, VW learned its lesson and the Veyron’s successor, the Chiron, is expected to actually generate some bottom-line. The car has the same 8-liter quad-turbocharged engine as the Veyron, although it was significantly improved to generate 1,470 bhp. There will be 500 made, so you are more likely to see one next time you vacation in the Middle East.
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3, Pagani Huayra
Price: $2.60 million
Lamborghini and Ferrari have shown us that Italians know how to make good-looking fast cars and Pagani is another company that cements Italy’s place in automotive history. It is a small company that uses a lot of carbon fiber and engines from the Mercedes’ AMG division. The Huayra is the replacement to the Pagani Zonda and it has a 6.0-liter V12 twin-turbo engine that produces 720 hp.
2. W Motors Lykan Hypersport
Price: $3.40 million
W Motors is a UAE-based company that manufactures hypercars with the collaboration of Lebanese, French, and Italian engineers. The Lykan Hypersport ranks second in our list of most expensive cars of all time. It is the first car that will be produced by W Motors and there will be only seven units. The car is powered by a 3.7-liter twin-turbocharged flat-six engine, which is nothing special, probably. However, the car has special headlights with embedded diamonds and buyers can also opt for rubies, sapphires, or yellow diamonds so the headlights combine better with the car’s color.
1. Lamborghini Veneno
Price: $4.50 million
The Veneno is another limited edition car based on the Lamborghini Aventador that celebrates the company’s 50th anniversary. The company announced the car in 2013, with a price tag of $4.50 million. Only five were built and only three were available for customers.
That completes our list of the 10 most expensive cars of all time. We excluded some iterations of cars like the Bugatti Veyron Grand Vitesse, or the Bugatti Veyron Mansory Viviere, or the Koenigsegg CCXR Trevita to include more car companies. We also didn’t include the Maybach Exelero, which costs $8.0 million, but is only one car that was built on request.
Disclosure: None
