CAR GENIUS AWARDS 2026: THE WINNERS REVEALED

► CAR’s 2026 Genius Awards 

► These are the best cars, people and ideas of the year 

► The full list of winners revealed 

Introducing the CAR Genius Awards! Welcome to a celebration of the year’s best cars, smartest people and boldest ideas.

We crown everything from small EVs to supercars, moonshot projects to the biggest brains in the business. It’s been a rigorous process, with each winner endlessly judged and debated by CAR’s expert editorial team and its contributors.

Right now, you can grab a copy of issue 770, CAR’s September 2026 edition, and benefit from in-depth features, road tests and more with all our winners. Want to make sure you never miss a future issue? Check out our subscription offers here.

Otherwise, scroll down for our full list of winners. 

Brand of the Year: Ferrari

The obvious choice? Hardly. The all-electric Luce’s exterior design and fundamental design concept continue to draw ire from all corners, the haters keen to see it as proof the world’s most famous car brand has absolutely and categorically lost its way.

We beg to differ. The Luce is challenging, sure. But it’s absolutely a Ferrari. A towering technical achievement engineered entirely in-house, it also sets new standards for EV driving enjoyment. And wherever you look – from the Purosangue ‘SUV’ to the 296 Speciale, the F80 to the Amalfi – Ferrari continues to do what we need it to do: deliver superlative driving machines of which Enzo would rightly be proud.

Ben Miller

Throwback of the Year: Fiat Grande Panda manual

We live in a world of digital bloat, AI-powered fridges, myriad touchscreen menus and so much power and technology that, frankly, it can all be a bit much. Seemingly, Fiat didn’t get the memo with the return of the Panda. It’s kept things simple – and we’re sold.

The original Panda was the size of a biscuit tin. Things have moved on since then, but Fiat hasn’t forgotten the joy of essential motoring with this new one, which launched with hybrid and EV versions – but now gets this back-to-basics iteration with a petrol engine and a manual gearbox. Not only is it a design masterclass, with so many clever details in its shape to draw your eye, but it’s also proof you don’t need a four-digit power figure to put an ear-bothering grin on your face.

In an era obsessed with reinventing the car, Fiat has remembered why people loved them in the first place.

Jake Groves

Small Car of the Year: Renault Twingo

The ‘Renaulution’ continues with what looks, smells and drives like another smash hit in waiting.

Cute French style meets clever design and cost-conscious global engineering in an affordable EV which, crucially, remembers that being cheap alone is not enough. Buyers at every price point demand charm, and the new Twingo has tonnes of the stuff. Comfortable, spacious for a car of its size, light and ridiculously efficient – five miles per kWh without even trying; more than six miles per kWh when you do – the Twingo is the antithesis of the big-money, giant-battery monsters that have mostly dominated the EV landscape to date.

Ben Miller

EV of the Year: BMW iX3

BMW’s Neue Klasse project felt like little more than marketing fluff for years – and then the new iX3 arrived. Whatever you think of the looks (we’re in the ‘it’s a step in the right direction’ camp), what’s inside and what lies beneath the bodywork are genuinely revolutionary.

This relatively accessible family SUV claims one of the longest driving ranges we’ve ever seen, plus it launches with a bunch of technology familiar only to those who work at NASA. It should pave the way for BMW to dominate the EV space for years to come. 

It even costs less than its predecessor. You can’t say that very often about new cars these days, can you? 

Jake Groves

Crossover of the Year: Kia EV2

Kia’s range of electric cars have, more than anything, become known for their impeccable consistency over the years. You know what you get with them, each one competitive in its segment.

But the EV2 offers something greater than that. As well as being impressively spacious and well-built for its size and price, it brings a little class and character to a part of the market that’s not usually known for offering much of either. It’s comfortable, quiet, well-built and oh-so usable day-to-day that it’ll become a very welcome part of daily family life.

Jake Groves

Supercar of the Year: Ferrari F80

Every decade or so, Maranello flexes its unique position as a supercar maker with an in-house F1 team to rewrite the rules of high-performance driving.

These cars – from the 288 GTO through the F40, F50 and Enzo to the LaFerrari – have tended to latch onto a nascent technology too exotic even for Ferrari’s series-production cars and use it to change the game. The F50 did it with an F1-derived V12, the LaFerrari with hybrid technology. The F80? It takes a relative of the brand’s Le Mans-winning V6 hybrid powertrain, dials it way up and throws an evolved, track-ready version of the Purosangue’s physics-defying suspension into the mix. The result, far from feeling anti-climactic with its modest cylinder count, is spectacular.

Ben Miller

Design of the Year: Audi Nuvolari

Audi’s hard reset started with not only its recently appointed CEO, Gernot Döllner, but also its new design director, ex-JLR man Massimo Frascella. After wowing the world with the Concept C, a drastic show car that rewrote the brand’s design direction, the Nuvolari took that mic-drop moment and ramped it up.

Not only does it apply so many of the Concept C’s best elements to a production car, but it acts as a north star for the brand’s future design language; a beacon for the rest of the range to aspire to over the coming years. The Nuvolari is an example of bold, brutalist and technologically progressive thinking – exactly the mindset Audi should always have.

Jake Groves

Family Car of the Year: Mercedes-Benz GLC Electric

After what has felt like a multi-year wobble from Mercedes-Benz when it comes to electric cars, 2026 is the year it’s finally getting into its groove. The electric CLA was the opening salvo; a sleek and comfortable small executive car that feels the part. But now, with this GLC Electric, the brand is back in its rhythm.

While it doesn’t go quite as far on a charge as our EV of the Year, the BMW iX3, the GLC Electric still excels in many areas to make it a top-notch family car. Not only is the ride quality S-Class comfortable, but a very spacious interior is filled to the brim with the latest tech. It’s confident, compelling and right on time for Mercedes-Benz.

Jake Groves

Moonshot of the Year: Renault 5 Turbo 3E

Impossible though it may be to conceive of at the moment, money once flowed like flash-flood rainwater down the streets. In the ’80s, excess cash raged through the world’s economies unchecked, fuelling a decade of excess and hyper-consumption. In fashion, the results were shoulder pads you could serve a three-course meal on. In supercars, we got side strakes and wings bigger than those of some actual aeroplanes. And in the world of hot hatches we got cars like 5 Turbo and 205 T16 – turbocharged mid-engined homologation specials as wide as they were long.

And now the good times are back at Renault, well, it’s at it again. Only a brand absolutely on fire would have the drive and the guts to build the 5 Turbo 3E. What a time to be alive. 

Ben Miller

Powertrain of the Year: Bugatti’s hybrid V16

When a guy synonymous with electric hypercars gets the big job at Bugatti, what happens next looks obvious: he’ll green-light an electric Bugatti, right?

Wrong. Instead, Mate Rimac picked up the phone to Cosworth and thrashed out the spec for an engine the likes of which the world has never seen before – an engine, then, of which Ettore Bugatti would undoubtedly approve. It arrives first in the Tourbillon, its near-1000bhp output bolstered by another 1000bhp or so from a compact, state-of-the-art hybrid system. Where Bugatti goes from here Lord only knows, but if this opening play is anything to go by it’s going to be a wild ride.

Ben Miller

Hatchback of the Year: Volkswagen Golf GTI Edition 50

Even at 50 years old, the Golf GTI hasn’t become shy and retiring. This new version, building on the great base of the Mk8 Golf GTI, not only celebrates five decades of progress but does so without being contrived or a half-baked fan service. 

The Edition 50 brings a real sparkle back to the GTI formula, introducing a welcome friskiness to the traditional VW hot hatch without being too hardcore and, crucially, without losing any of the Golf GTI’s inherent user-friendliness either. It’s fun, fast, a little frenetic, and the best representation of the GTI formula we’ve seen in a long time. 

Jake Groves

Person of the Year: Mate Rimac

Mate Rimac is modern car making’s Leonardo Da Vinci – an ideas man like few others, shot through with a rational, practical streak that means his brainwaves actually happen. An original thinker with a brilliant engineering mind and, crucially, the fund-raising nous to make his daydreams happen, Rimac now finds himself at the helm of perhaps the world’s greatest car brand and free of the last vestiges of VW Group/Porsche involvement. And the guy’s not yet 40.

Ben Miller

SUV of the Year: Aston Martin DBX S

Right first time, the DBX has long been a fine-driving SUV. And since its arrival, Aston Martin’s been busy making it evermore brilliant, with a modern (rather than decidedly un-modern) infotainment system and more power than a moon rocket. Lacking either the Purosangue’s V12 or its next-gen suspension, the DBX S comes together in a more intuitive and equally compelling driving experience. Whisper it, but this SUV might just be the best series-production car Gaydon makes.

Ben Miller

Car of the Year: BMW i3

Saving the best until last. Our inaugural Genius Awards Car of the Year gong goes to the new car that not only redefines what to expect from BMW but what to expect from an electric car.

We’ve had an exclusive chance to drive a near-finished prototype ahead of its official launch and came away astounded at how complete it feels: poised and refined on the move; a quality interior filled with all the technology you could ever want or need; power and range aplenty. But, most crucially, handling to die for.

The new i3 embodies everything BMW stands for. It also has everything that matters: innovative thinking, accessible performance, fabulous handling, everyday usability, and the sparkle to elevate every drive. Car of the Year? 100 per cent.

Jake Groves

2026-08-05T07:11:12Z