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Once a year for the last few years we’ve allowed ourselves the frankly rather indulgent opportunity of simply listing our 50 favourite cars on sale.
Last time we kept it to cars costing less than £50,000, but today the list is once more open to all-comers.
Deliciously, at least for us, there are no rules here nor even any guidelines as to what should qualify. If there are fewer than 49 other cars on sale we prefer, it's in. If not, it's out. It's a list governed by the gut feeling of the road test team and the editor, and that really is it. We start at number 50 and work our way up to the best car we reckon you can buy right now - enjoy the journey:
Slideshow story - click the right hand arrow above to continue.
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50: Volvo XC90
Given the brilliance of much of what has come since, it’s easy to forget that the renaissance – scratch that – transformation of Volvo started right here. And the stylish, spacious XC90 with its effortlessly cool and airy interior is still a mighty pleasant way to while away a long journey.
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49: Audi A6 Avant
Not the fastest estate out there, not the most capacious, not the best handling nor even the most comfortable. But average out its abilities and you’ll find that, all-round, the A6 Avant is an admirably capable car and does not all-round ability lie at the very heart of what we want from such cars?
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48: Skoda Octavia vRS
If it would not be right to regard the Octavia vRS as a Volkswagen Golf GTI with a lot more space for a little less money, it would not be far off the mark. It also shows that good design is enduring design: six years and one facelift into its life, to make this list is an achievement in its own right.
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47: Bentley Bentayga
Any car is doing well just to make this list, but were it still available with diesel power the Bentley SUV would be further up even than it is. Despite unprepossessing looks and its odd name, the Bentayga still feels like the best engineered SUV out there and therefore a product to be proud of.
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46: BMW i3
Six years into its life, there’s still nothing quite like the i3 out there. Maybe that’s because it’s not been the runaway sales success BMW hoped for, but even so for the right person an i3 can still make more sense than any other car out there. And it’s fun to drive, not something we’d leap to say about most electric cars.
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45: Mini Cooper S
Mini has made cars in all sorts of sizes and strange shapes since its 2001 rebirth but when it comes to it the Cooper S hatch has been the best of the bunch from first to last. That it also comes closest to realising the original’s vision of a fun, high performance compact car is probably not a coincidence.
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44: Lamborghini Huracan Performante
Always third best behind the efforts of Ferrari and McLaren? Maybe but if so the Performante gets closer than any Lamborghini since the days when Countachs duffed up Testarossas. And if you insist on a normally aspirated engine in your exotic, low-volume, mid-engined supercar, it’s the only act in town.
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43: Land Rover Range Rover Sport
When it came out this was the most broadly capable car ever to call itself a Range Rover. Six years later it’s still a long way off the bottom of this list, thanks to the enduring appeal of its design, seven seat configuration, off road ability and on road civility. A Rangie for all reasons.
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42: Toyota Corolla
Yes, you read that right. The world’s best-selling car is now British built and back on sale, replacing the stunningly unremarkable Auris. And it is so much better. It looks terrific, has a spacious and comfortable cabin, it’s cheap to buy and run and, most surprisingly of all, decent to drive. There’s little not to like here.
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41: Jeep Wrangler
Yes of course it’s brilliant off-road; what Wrangler was not? But that’s not why it’s here. On the contrary, it is the way it blends such undimmed talent and ace looks but loses the spine-snapping ride and adds a more spacious, higher quality interior. The result is a Jeep that’s no longer a mere recreation but a serious all-purpose SUV.
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40: Volkswagen Up
We’d lump the Skoda Citigo and Seat Mii clones in here too as three of the most enduringly excellent urban runabouts of our times. Now as ever the USP is not to feel like budget car built down to a price, but a car of typical Volkswagen quality, realised in pint-sized form.
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39: Kia e-Niro
The novelty of simply being electric is no longer enough, and the e-Niro is here not just because it offers great range, useful performance and excellent refinement, but also because it’s more spacious and practical than any other affordable EV on the market right now. It’s decent to drive too.
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38: Jaguar F-Pace
In time the F-Pace will come to be seen as the saviour of Jaguar, the car that tided it over until the brilliant I-Pace could plot a path to its future. Jaguar’s first SUV is also easily its best conventionally powered car of the modern era – great to look at and no less great to drive. A proper Jag in other words.
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37: Hyundai i30N
OK, so it’s not quite the best hot hatch in its class, but it gets a darn sight closer than most would have bet given this was Korea’s first crack at the category. A touch more finesse and it would be right up there. Think of it as Hyundai’s practice car, and you can see why the establishment should be afraid.
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36: Mercedes-Benz E-class estate
It may no longer be the most capacious estate on sale (take a bow Skoda Superb) but we still love the big Benz wagon. The quality of its interior, its silken ride quality and the fact it’ll still swallow more stuff than any rival BMW or Audi still makes it our choice in that class.
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35: Alfa Romeo Giulia (incl Quatrofoglio)
A BMW 3 Series sits inside the top five cars on sale, but that the Giulia is the next highest placed compact executive car is quite a feat for Alfa. For some, the Giulia is better to drive even than the BMW – the Quatrofoglio undoubtedly is – but even cooking versions of the Giulia are great fun, with a fine front-engined, rear-drive balance that helps you overlook underwhelming parts of the interior.
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34: Audi e-tron
Although based on the Q5 platform rather than its own electric-biased architecture, the e-tron feels largely a ground-up EV, and has the kind of consistency to the way it drives and the solidity and appeal of the interior that we’ve come to expect from Audis.
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33: Toyota Supra
The Supra is back. And it’s good. There’s quite a lot of BMW beneath the latest Supra but it retains a character of its own, and that character is fun, compliant, quick and refined. It’s a rear-drive sports car that you can have quite a good time in, and yet drive daily with no qualms whatsoever. And if bits of the inside are BMW, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
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31: Lotus Elise
Big things are happening incredibly quickly at Lotus, but at the moment, the best thing about the company remains its little thing. With a lightweight body sitting on top of a lightweight chassis and with a lightweight engine behind the occupants, the Elise is an absolute joy today just as the first version was when it was introduced in 1996.
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30: Honda Civic Type-R
King of the hot hatchbacks, the Civic Type R is engaging at most speeds but really comes alive when you’re trying to go quickly. Exceptionally rapid for a front-wheel drive car.
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29: Ford Mustang
The Mustang wasn’t made for small roads like ours, but it works on them remarkably well. It's available with a four-cylinder engine but, honestly, when you can have a V8, why wouldn’t you?
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28: Range Rover Evoque
The latest Evoque picks up from where the last one left off, in terms of its style and its ethos, but now comes with a vastly improved set of abilities off-road and, more importantly, on it. Relaxing to drive, plush to sit in.
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27: Dacia Duster
If you want a small SUV on a budget, Dacia is your friend. The mechanicals are largely rehashed from Renaults and things are clearly built to a price, but that is, in a way, part of the charm. And it’s surprisingly good off road.
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26: Porsche Macan
Years ago we became used to the idea that Porsche is no longer just a sports car manufacturer, but still the company imbues all of its models with a consistent feel and finesse. It’s a theme that makes the Macan the best compact executive SUV to drive.
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25: Mazda MX-5
Consistently the best small roadster on the planet, since its introduction three decades ago. The latest-generation comes in at around a tonne in its lightest spec, which is an exceptional feat, although we prefer the more powerful 2.0 and optional lowered suspension.
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24: Tesla Model 3
That the entry point to the Tesla range is the company’s best car to date shouldn’t be a surprise, given the relative newness of the all-electric carmaker. But the 3 is so good that it easily stands comparison with both EV and old-school powered alternatives. And Tesla’s contribution to the charge network shouldn’t be underestimated.
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23: BMW i8
Arguably the most interesting car on sale, until the Polestar 1 arrives anyway, the BMW i8 is a hard car to pin down but an easy car to like immensely. Is it a sports car? Not in the conventional sense. Is it a GT car? Closer. Is it a seductive coupe with brilliantly-integrated a plug-in powertrain and a pleasure to spend any amount of time in? Absolutely.
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22: Caterham Seven
There are more modern sports cars, but few more relevant sports cars, even today. Caterham is the master of the ancient art of making a car fun, but it has carefully and respectfully updated the Seven so that it’s as great as it has ever been. Medium-power, skinnier wheels and a limited-slip differential are our essentials.
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21: Mercedes-Benz S-class
Perennially the best luxury car money can buy. Mercedes makes a vast array of different models these days, of varying consistency, but the S-Class is the one it throws everything at and the one it always, but always, gets right. A class leader in comfort, refinement and integration of safety and convenience technology.
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20: Bentley Continental GT
Choice has now come to Bentley’s latest grand touring Continental model range. Having been launched in 2018 in twelve-cylinder, closed-roof form only, the Continental now comes as a ‘GTC’ convertible if you’d prefer – or with a 542bhp turbo V8- or 626bhp turbo W12 engines. The good news? There isn’t a bad car amongst them.
The current Continental combines luxuriant richness and immaculate cruising manners with big-hitting, refined performance like almost nothing else on the road. Our favourite version of the crop would be a GT V8 coupe – which offers sharpened handling and more accessible torque.
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19: Ford Focus
The days of the mass-market, all-dominating, volume-branded family hatchback may be an increasingly dim memory – but, thanks to a new model platform and a fine dynamic execution, you don’t need to remember the late 1990s to have known the Ford Focus at its greatest. The current version, introduced only last year, represents the car back to the height of its powers.
Both better packaged and better equipped than its predecessor, the fourth-generation Focus also weaves its old magic with keen engines, a taut, fluent chassis and incisive steering. It’s back at the very top of our family hatchback charts for very good reasons.
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18: Aston Martin DB11 AMR
Want an Aston DB11 with a twelve-cylinder engine? We wouldn’t blame you. And now that Gaydon’s rolled the suspension and steering improvements introduced on the DB11 V8 out onto this version of the car – the DB11 AMR – you can have the best of both worlds.
The 630bhp motor is a dream, while the car’s ride is more elastic and insulating than was the original V12s – but with closer body control, too.
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17: Volvo XC40
The sheer ubiquity of the premium-branded compact SUV makes most of them all-but invisible on UK roads – but not this one. Volvo’s equally chunkily- and cheerily-styled XC40 is approaching two years old, but remains as fresh a sight today as it always has been.
Combining a genuinely small-feeling footprint with an unmistakable and convenient SUV driving position, it’s got a fairly roomy and very pleasant cabin, and is easy and obliging to drive.
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16: Volkswagen Golf (incl GTI and R)
The Volkswagen Golf will pass its 50th anniversary in its next, eighth-generation model cycle, which is due later this year. And the really amazing thing, given the rise of Volkswagen’s corporate fortunes and the variety of cars that it offers, is that it’s been so consistently its leviathan maker’s best-selling model.
The current version is compact yet roomy, refined and polished to drive and, even on the eve of its replacement, still as ageless as it is classless. Both GTI- and all-paw R-branded performance derivatives are excellent in their own differing ways.
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15: Jaguar I-Pace
Jaguar was a struggling car-maker with it all to lose when it took a considerable risk with its first electric car, breaking down design norms and making waves in the process. The I-Pace beat most of its EV SUV rivals to market, and is still making them look staid and conservative today. It’s a true Jaguar on driver appeal, and imaginative and advanced, too, in its cabin appointments. A tour de force.
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14: Porsche 718 Cayman
The current Porsche Cayman has a four-cylinder turbocharged engine. You may have read about this before. It’s the reason the car has been quite unreasonably rounded upon by the critics and singled out for ridicule, when it deserves anything but. Is either flat-four in the 718 range a particular selling point?
No, not really. But that doesn’t change the fact that this car still has chassis and steering as sweet as they come, and uncommonly good usability.
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13: BMW 5 Series
Having perhaps been distracted by expansion into other segments, Munich is back on truly world-beating form with its traditional executive saloons. The 5 Series is so good that it leads its rivals from Mercedes and Audi even in ways you wouldn’t expect: cabin space, mechanical refinement, driver assistance technology and more. It’s also typically sharp and rewarding to drive for its size, and offers real strength of performance across the engine range.
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12: McLaren 720S
It became Autocar’s benchmark supercar when it was launched in 2017 – and, limited-series track specials aside, it remains unbeaten at the very top of its class.
The 720S would give up very little on outright performance to any other car on the road. It has absolutely outstanding dynamism and track poise, but works just as well on the road, where its exceptionally communicative steering, its intuitive, precise handling and its pliant ride make it enjoyable in an everyday sense.
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11: Ariel Atom 4
Having swapped its memorably waspish supercharged engine for turbocharged Honda power derived from the Civic Type R, the latest Atom has taken some gigantic strides on speed. It is now once again what it once was: a pint-sized supercar slayer on outright acceleration.
But an even greater and wider-reaching overhaul has sharpened, refined and reformed the car’s ride and handling, while retaining all of what makes it so special to drive. Still utterly brilliant.
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10: Rolls-Royce Phantom
Little surpasses the perfectly constructed, pillowy sense of rolling opulence, or the grandness of sense-of-occasion, of the Rolls-Royce to trump them all. From a V12 engine so whisper quiet that it doesn’t even need a starter-generator to make you think it must have stopped at the traffic lights, to performance strong enough to wave serenely goodbye to a hot hatchback, the Phantom seems every inch like a car engineered without a second thought for the cost. And so it should.
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9: Mercedes-AMG GT Four Door
Mercedes-AMG may never quite emerge from the shadow cast by its all-dominating German sports car-making neighbour Porsche. But perhaps it doesn’t need to; because, for the first time, it’s proved capable of beating Weissach at its own game.
The four-door GT63 S has the measure of a Panamera Turbo on outright performance, handling balance and driver appeal. On all three respects, it could almost be a super-sports car rather than a four-door pseudo-saloon.
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8: Aston Martin DBS Superleggera
Right now, this big, front-engined V12 super-coupe feels like everything an Aston Martin should aspire to be. In another five years, after the Valkyrie, Valhalla, DBX and lord knows what else, perhaps our taste for it will fade; but we hope not.
The DBS Superleggera has monumental, torque-laden pace; long-striding, mile-ravaging, curve-cavorting ride and handling; an equally comfortable and exotic interior. It’s the complete grand touring icon.
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7: Seat Ibiza
Unless you happen to be the kind of dyed-in-the-wool keen driver who reads and loves Autocar, the Seat Ibiza should be second-to-nothing at the top of your supermini shopping list. Frankly, it'd probably be acclaimed as the best car of its kind even by some who would claim to have petrol in their veins - because besides being better-packaged, better-looking and better-furnished than almost any other small car, the Ibiza's also a fine-handling, strong-performing car in its own right.
The Ibiza's engines combine strength, smoothness and economy, its cabin has all the style and digital features you'd ever want, and it's surprisingly spacious. Grown up, too, while still able to feel like good fun at times.
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6: Ferrari 488 Pista
Supercars seldom combine qualitative brilliance with its quantitative relation quite like this Modenese firecracker. In a context where sub-3.5sec 0-60mph performance is now the price of admission, the 2.9sec Pista feels sensational and absurd in its outright pace, and finds new ways to astound you with every upshift.
It grips the track like some deranged dragster on a glue-covered strip – and yet hits sublime, flattering handling delicacy as that grip finally ebbs. Unsurprisingly, it’s perhaps a bit much to enjoy on the road. And yet wherever you drive it, it’ll leave you frazzled and amazed.
And so to the Top Five cars – we took them to some fine roads in Wales to make a final judgement:
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5: BMW 320D
Some of us are old enough to remember successive generations of early 3-series, and their position as weapon au choix among those in need of a compact saloon but liked to drive was nothing less than inviolable. OK, we're not so ancient as to have been doing this job when the E21 was on the market, but the E30, E36 and E46 ruled that particular roost with impregnable authority.
But the E90 and F30, while more rounded products, were also less distinct and cars concerned with all their occupants, not just the driver. But now with the G20, the balance has swung decisively back the other way.
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5: BMW 320D
It’s the car’s handling that does it, the way it wolfs down a great road with such authority and precision you might be tempted to look over your shoulder to make sure this really is four door family car, and not some hunkered down sports coupe. The result is a 3 Series with a character we’ve not seen for nigh on 15 years and it’s great to have it back. It may not look it, but it is in many ways the most surprising car here.
Price: £38,825 - Engine: 4 cyls, 1995cc, turbocharged, diesel - Power: 187bhp at 4000rpm - Torque: 295lb ft at 1750rpm - Gearbox: 8-spd automatic - Kerb weight: 1615kg - 0-62mph: 6.9sec - Top speed: 145mph - Economy: 51.4mpg (WLTP) - CO2: No available WLTP data
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4: Porsche 911
Porsche’s guiding principle of steady evolution has ensured this new 992-generation of 911 is the same as the 991 it succeeds. Only better. Unlike some of the other cars in our top five, the 911 is a car that invites you to take it for granted. This is not a car for the theatrical raising of the garage doors to reveal the slumbering beast beyond.
It’s a car for leaving outside in the rain, covered in road grime and really not thinking much about most of the time. For being taken for granted is always what 911s have done best, and there’s none better than this. Like a favourite piece of furniture, it moulds itself to you, fits instantly and perfectly into your life.
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4: Porsche 911
For a while you can’t think what like was like before it turned up then, shortly, thereafter, you stop thinking of it at all. Until, that is, someone takes it away and you see the gaping void it has left behind.
The 992 is the most brilliantly realised example of this art to date: a superlative long distance tourer, capable commuter, awesomely rapid, utterly engaging and always reassuring sports car all wrapped up in one inimitable shape.
Porsche 911 Carrera S - Price: £93,110 - Engine: 6 cyls, 2981cc, turbocharged, petrol - Power: 444bhp at 6500rpm - Torque: 391lb ft at 2300rpm - Gearbox: 8-spd paddle shift - Kerb weight: 1590kg - 0-62mph: 3.9sec - Top speed: 191mph - Economy: 28.5mpg (WLTP) - CO2: no WLTP data
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3: Ford Fiesta ST
Haring across Wales in the ST, seeing how easily it keeps up with the pokier members of our happy band is instructive, not to mention highly entertaining. If you did the same journey back in 1981 in the first fast Fiesta, the original XR2, you’d see that in character if very little else, not much has changed.
There’s an infectious cheerfulness about this car, a willingness to be wrung out, hurled, flung and booted from place to place.
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3: Ford Fiesta ST
More than any other here, it’s a car you drive on its throttle pedal because none is more inclined to adjust its attitude according to its opening. And to us, that’s pretty much the definition of fun.
Get the car into the corner by keeping off the gas, let the back go loose if that’s what it wants to do, because the moment you’re at the apex and on the power, it all falls beautifully back in line and you rocket away, grinning like a loon.
Price: £20,700 - Engine: 3 cyls, 1497cc, turbocharged, petrol - Power: 197bhp at 6000rpm - Torque: 214lb ft at 1600rpm - Gearbox: 6-spd manual - Kerb weight: 1262kg - 0-62mph: 6.5sec - Top speed: 144mph - Economy: 40.4mpg (WLTP) - CO2: No available WLTP data
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2: McLaren 600LT Spider
Driving this car fast on Welsh mountain roads is not just a completely different experience to doing the same in the others, it’s a completely different discipline too. You absolutely, positively cannot just let rip. You have to hold back, pick your moments very carefully and exercise saintly restraint the rest of the time. It can be frustrating.
But those moments make up for it. A lot of the time it actually feels like a quite extraordinarily grown up Alpine A110. For all its ridiculous speed, the LT is never about speed for the sake of it.
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2: McLaren 600LT Spider
It is about the sensation of driving, an ultimately immersive automotive experience where the feel of the steering will always count for more than the power of the engine. This is a car for connoisseurs and the fact that it’s most easily enjoyed on a race track and not the environment we’ve chosen for it should not mark it down here.
Because even driven quite modestly compared to its capabilities it is still sublime, because feel is feel and poise is poise whatever the pace.
Price: £201,500 - Engine: 7 cyls, 3799cc, turbocharged, petrol - Power: 492bhp at 7500rpm - Torque: 457lb ft at 5500rpm - Gearbox: 7-spd paddle shift - Kerb weight: 1404kg - 0-62mph: 2.8sec - Top speed: 201mph - Economy: 23.2mpg (WLTP) - CO2: 276g/km
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1: Alpine A110 Légende
What more can we add to the ocean of purple prose already expended upon this remarkable, game-changing little sports car? Only this: despite it all, despite the fact it is as familiar to me as an old pair of slippers after having driven plenty and living with one as a daily driver for a few months, surprising it remains.
There is so much about this car that flies in the face of the purist’s handbook – it only has four cylinders, it’s turbocharged, it’s a third down on the requisite pedal count and so on – that if you spend any time away from it and then return, it is with the sense that it simply can’t be as good as your memory suggests.
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1: Alpine A110 Légende
Yes, it’s light and compact, but your brain is trying to kid you there’s an experience in there to rival that of driving some of the finest supercars, and that clearly can’t be right; not with the running gear of a Renault Megane it can’t. Can it?
Believe it. The extraordinary thing about returning to an A110 is that it is actually and always even better than your memory recalls. You’ll hear the fizzy rasp of the engine as you open it up for the first time, the always surprising shove in the back to remind you how light this car really is and then you’ll swoop down into a arcing curve, feel the sublime deftness of that chassis and if you have blood in your arteries you will start to giggle. Make no mistake, this car is a landmark.
Price: £50,810 - Engine: 4 cyls, 1798cc, turbocharged, petrol - Power: 248bhp at 6000rpm - Torque: 234lb ft at 2000rpm - Gearbox: 7-spd paddle shift - Kerb weight: 1123kg - 0-62mph: 4.5sec - Top speed: 155mph - Economy: 46.3mpg (WLTP) - CO2: 138g/km (WLTP)
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Best of the rest
A large number of manufacturers didn’t make it into the top 50. So here are some of the more major ones and the cars of theirs we like the most:
Citroën
If you count the van-derived Berlingo, that by a mile. Failing that we do have something of a soft spot for the spacious, comfortable C4 Spacetourer (pictured) with its improved dynamics.
Fiat
We know the 500 hatch continues to be the darling of the urban chic set, but for us it can’t approach the charm of the perennially back to basics Panda. A good, honest, small car, just like all the best Fiats down the ages.
Lexus
The LC Coupe got really close to the list. Hard to justify objectively, but the big V8 is a car for which we have a lot of genuine affection. Great looking and with echoes of the iconic LFA.
Maserati
Sadly there’s nothing from the once great Italian brand that troubled the short list. The Levante SUV came closest which at least looks great and, in Trofeo form, now has proper Maserati performance.
Nissan
Lots to choose from here from the Micra to the GT-R, but it’s the new Leaf with its far more engaging drivetrain and enticing appearance that would probably come closest to making the grade.
Peugeot
Lots of near misses here, the closest of all being the still quite new 508. Large four door saloons are as fashionable as flares these days, but there’s no escaping this one’s good looks and high quality interior.
Renault
We were shocked no Renault made it onto the list. If there’d been one, it would have been the Megane RS 300 Trophy.
Vauxhall
It’s a toss up between the Insignia and the Astra and we’d probably go with the latter, which bodes well given there is a new one on the way. Hopefully it will grab that chance to elevate itself from its position as perpetual bridesmaid.
Story by: Andrew Frankel, Matt Prior, Matt Saunders, Steve Cropley. Top Five photos by: Will Williams, Luc Lacey
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