The most famous supercharged cars

A supercharger is an air compressor that increases the density of air supplied to an engine. Every time the engine cycles more oxygen than a normal operation is supplied, burning more fuel but delivering more power. Power for the supercharger is usually provided via a belt, gear, shaft, or chain connected to the engine's crankshaft.

Here’s a list of some of the best, and not so good, cars to use supercharging. They are arranged in alphabetical order:

Ariel’s flyweight Atom has always relied on its low mass to deliver supreme handling and performance. However, it’s never hurt the latter to add a dollop of added boost with help from a supercharger and Ariel has used this form of forced induction from as early as the Atom II that was launched in 2003, with the supercharged model pitching up in 2004.

With a Jackson Racing supercharger fixed to the 2.0-litre Honda K20A engine, the Atom II boasted 275bhp to begin with and could see off 0-60mph in 3.4 seconds. This later swelled to 300bhp in 2005, while the Atom 3 arrived in 2007 with the new Honda K20Z 2.0-litre engine and an identical 300bhp in supercharged form. The 2013 Atom 3.5 increased this to 315bhp before the Atom 4 switch to a turbocharged Civic Type R motor.

Aston Martin’s V8 Vantage V550 was the company’s most powerful production model when it was launched in 1993, complete with twin Eaton superchargers. The ante was upped in 1998 when Aston offered a factory upgrade to V600 specification, taking the engine to 600bhp and 600lb ft. This improved the performance so Aston could finally claim a 200mph top speed and 0-60mph dropped to 3.9 seconds from the V550’s claimed 4.6 seconds.

To cope with the V600’s power, Aston also added grooved brake discs with AP Racing callipers, Eibach springs, Koni dampers and stiffer anti-roll bars. In the end, 81 customers brought their Vantages back for the V600 upgrade, which added a hefty £43,000 to the standard £185,000 of a V550. It’s also still possible to uprate a V550 to V600 spec through Aston Martin’s Works department.

Given Audi’s heritage with turbocharging its performance models, the choice of a supercharger for the 2009 S4 and its S5 Sportback and Cabriolet siblings was unusual. It was made ever stranger by the S5 Coupe retaining a 4.2-litre V8 rather than the 3.0-litre V6 with compressor. The supercharged V6 produced 328bhp, which was good enough to see the S4 saloon from 0-62mph in 5.0 seconds.

Despite its smaller capacity than the S5 Coupe’s V8 motor, the supercharged V6 offered instant throttle response and always felt quick thanks to the instant torque of supercharging. However, this V6 could also deliver sub-20mpg economy when the driver made full use of its power and this prompted Audi to return to turbocharging for the next generation of S4 and S5 in 2017.

For a car that has become synonymous with the company, Bentley had nothing to do with the development of the 4.5-Litre Blower. Instead, it was brought about independently by Sir Tim Birkin to answer his desire for a lighter, more powerful Bentley when the factory refused his request. With engineering input from Amherst Villiers, the car used a Roots-type supercharger that was easily spotted poking out of the front of the grille.

The benefits of the Blower model were immediately obvious, increasing power from 110- to 175bhp in roadgoing trim and up to 240bhp in full race versions. Bentley conceded the Blower was necessary and the company built the required 50 cars for it to compete at Le Mans. Bentley has produced a limited run of 12 continuation Blowers using original chassis numbers and the 1929 Team car as the datum point. They cost from £1.5 million to make them a snip compared to the value of an original.

Supercharging has been a popular route to big power in the USA ever since hot rods were first imagined, and Cadillac kept the flame alive with its CTS-V. The first supercharged CTS-V arrived in 2008 with a 6.2-litre V8 based on the Corvette ZR1’s motor. It produced a healthy 556bhp to put the CTS-V in the hunt alongside the BMW M5 and Mercedes E63.

The CTS-V could go from rest to 60mph in 3.9 seconds, yet it cost less than $60,000 in 2008 to make it a bargain next to its European rivals. You could also have the Cadillac in Coupe or Sport Wagon estate bodies. The next generation CTS-V launched in 2016 pushed its supercharged V8 to 640bhp and turned it into a 200mph saloon that lived on until 2019.

The entry-level Chevrolet Camaro has a turbocharged 2.0-litre engine, but who cares when you can have a 650bhp supercharged ZL1? This is a factory-fresh hot rod that deals with 0-60mph in 3.5 seconds and will carry on to 198mph. You have the choice of a six-speed manual gearbox, but the 10-speed auto is quicker off the mark.

The heart of all this performance is the supercharged 6.2-litre small block V8. As well as 650bhp, it provides 650lb ft of torque, which means the ZL1 is able to take on and beat rivals from Dodge and Ford that have more power and higher list prices.

Normally, 717bhp would the pinnacle of a performance car range, but then the Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat is far from normal. That power output is base camp for the mountain of power provided by the supercharged 6.2-litre Hemi V8. It’s enough to make the Hellcat competitive on the drag strip right out of the showroom. Dodge even provides two keys, with the black one limiting power to a mere 500bhp and the red one unleashing the full flow.

However, you can also opt for the Redeye model with 797bhp and an 11.1-second quarter mile drag strip time. It has 3.5-inch wide wheelarch extensions to cover the fatter tyres and a rear spoiler to keep this Challenger stable at its 203mph top speed. Or, you could take the Super Stock version with 807bhp form the supercharged V8 to deliver quarter mile times of 10.5 seconds. The Super Stock even comes as standard with road-legal drag tyres.

Jaguar has considerable pedigree with supercharging and the F-type SVR became the ultimate expression of this with 567bhp from its 5.0-litre V8. That was 25bhp up on the standard 5.0 R model thanks to Jag’s Special Vehicle Operations’ involvement. Part of the upgrades included an exhaust made from titanium and Inconel to give a sharper note and save 16kg in weight.

Jaguar claimed 0-60mph in 3.5 seconds and a top speed of 200mph for the SVR, though the acceleration figure was reckoned to be on the conservative side. Regardless of this, the supercharged V8 remains one of the most aurally addictive, whipcrack-sounding engines ever produced.

The very first Jaguar XJR launched in 1988 made do with a mild 251bhp. When the next XJR arrived in 1994 with a supercharged 4.0-litre six-cylinder engine with 321bhp, the world sat up and took notice. An Eaton supercharger was responsible for the boost in power and meant this luxury saloon could hustle from rest to 60mph in 5.9 seconds, and on to 155mph.

The switch to V8 engines for the XJ in 1997 meant more power, with the V8 XJR now giving 370bhp for 0-60mph in 5.3 seconds. In true Jag fashion, it also undercut the opposition on price, with an XJR about £8000 cheaper than a BMW M5. This formula was repeated with the all-aluminium 2003 XJR with 390bhp 4.2-litre V8, which delivered 0-60mph in 5.0 seconds, and again with the 2013 model. This last XJR used a 5.0-litre V8 and Roots-type twin vortex supercharger to give 542bhp, 0-60 in 4.4 seconds and a 174mph top speed.

The Lancia Beta may have fatally damaged the Italian firm’s reputation for rust-resistance, but it also showed the company was still capable of engineering innovation. As well as the pretty Beta Coupe and Spyder models, Lancia offered the HPE as a sports estate in the same mould as the Reliant Scimitar. These three models were given a supercharged 2.0-litre version of the Beta’s twin-cam engine in 1983, offering punchy performance. Sadly, this Volumex model was too little, too late to save the Beta and it went off sale in 1985.

However, Lancia experiment with supercharging was not over and the Delta S4 Group B rally car used twincharging to extract 483bhp from its 1.8-litre engine. Using a turbocharger for power at high revs, the supercharger took care of performance at lower engine speeds. This proved a successful combination and the S4 won five World Rally Championship rounds before the Group B category was banned.

There’s only so far you can strip weight out of a car to increase performance so, in 2008, Lotus unveiled the Elise SC. The initials stood for ‘Super Charged’ and the compressor added to the Toyota-sourced 1.8-litre engine upped power to 217bhp from the normally aspirated version’s 189bhp. This was sufficient to give 0-60mph in 4.4 seconds and a 150mph top speed.

Lotus had already dabbled with supercharging with the limited run Exige 240R, using the same Toyota engine. However, the Elise didn’t have enough room under its engine cover for the Exige’s intercooler, so did without and made do with less power. At £32,550, the Elise SC was £4000 more than the Elise R with the 189bhp version of the common engine and this cheaper model proved much more popular.

While the world was still gawping at how pretty the 2001 R230 generation SL was, Mercedes delivered a sucker punch with the SL55 AMG. It 5.4-litre V8 used a supercharger to offer 516lb ft of torque at just 2600rpm. Along with 476bhp, it’s no wonder the sleek SL55 could shift from 0-60mph in 4.5 seconds and was rumoured to be capable of 200mph if the electronic speed limiter was disabled from it 155mph sticking point.

Just as impressive as the speed was the noise from this supercharged V8 motor, which was distinctly unlike any other SL. Even with a £93,535 asking price at launch, the SL55 was an instant hit, which is more than can be said of its distant relative, the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren that used a 626bhp version of the Lysholm-supercharged V8 motor.

Mercedes is the most prolific exponent of supercharging in the modern age and it helped elevate the original SLK roadster in image and performance. Referred to as a Kompressor in Merc-speak, supercharging was used on all but the basic 200 model and the 3.2-litre V6. The 200K gave 161bhp, but it was the 190bhp 230K that proved the big hit with buyers.

The SLK 32 AMG with its twin-screw supercharger delivered 349bhp, but remained a rarity with only 4333 built out of a total of 311,222 of all models of this first generation of SLK. Incidentally, the ‘K’ in SLK was not for Kompressor but ‘kurz’, which is German for ‘short’ as this was a more compact roadster than the full-scale SL.

Tuning Minis has been a popular pastime since the very first appeared in 1959. BMW didn’t wait long to offer its own hotted-up Cooper S a year after the 2001 launch of its retro-styled New Mini. There was no missing this hot hatch version thanks to its twin exhausts and a bonnet scoop to feed the supercharger’s intercooler.

An Eaton M45 Roots-type blower is used in the R53 Cooper S and this design explains why it makes the trademark whine under hard acceleration that sounds reminiscent of the original Mini’s A Series engine. In this modern Mini, though, performance is leagues ahead of the classic model’s thanks to 163bhp and 0-62 in 7.4 seconds. The John Cooper Works model improved on that with help from a modified supercharger pulley that increased power to 197bhp, while the GP model boasted 215bhp.

It seemed an unusual choice for Nissan to supercharge its fourth generation Micra. However, the clever bit was the Micra DIG-S (Direct Injection Gasoline-Supercharged) had a blower that could be decoupled at low revs when a supercharger normally uses more engine power than it boosts. At higher revs, the compressor would engage to offer peak power of 79bhp for the 1.2-litre three-cylinder motor. Nissan also offered a 98bhp version of this unit in the Note.

Sadly, even supercharging this generation of Micra was not enough to redeem it from mediocrity. Nor was performance that saw it heave itself from 0-62mph in 11.3 seconds, though sub-100g/km carbon dioxide emissions and claimed 68.9mpg combined economy were more useful attributes.

Land Rover made sure the Range Rover Sport lived up to its name right from the get-go with a supercharged V8 model to crown the line-up. The first used a 4.2-litre V8 borrowed from the Jaguar XJR that produced 385bhp, which was enough for 0-62mph in 7.2 seconds. However, this required you to accept combined economy of 17.7mpg. The later 503bhp 5.0-litre model romped from rest to 60mph in 5.9 seconds while offering a more modest 19.0mpg.

When the second-generation Sport arrived in 2014, again Land Rover weighed in with a supercharged version. This started with the same 503bhp as the previous car, but soon swelled to as much as 575bhp in the SVR models. There was also a supercharged 3.0-litre V6 petrol engine with 335bhp, which should have been a sweet spot but failed to impress next to more frugal diesels and faster petrols.

Who’d have thought the Skoda Fabia vRS, the sensible choice among hot hatches, would be the one to pack a supercharged secret? In fact, the Skoda comes with both super- and turbocharging for its 1.4-litre TSI engine, giving it 178bhp and 184lb ft of torque. This was enough to propel the 2010 vRS model from 0-62mph in 7.3 seconds and on to 139mph.

The twincharged vRS came with a seven-speed DSG twin-clutch gearbox as standard, which proved to be its Achilles Heel due to patchy reliability. However, the vRS was always fun to drive and its engine punched well above its size.

European buyers always seemed to be short-changed on the rarer Toyota MR2 models. This was certainly the case with Super Charged version of the Mk1 MR2 that was only offered in Japan and the USA when the car was current. Adding a Roots-type blower boosted power of the 1.6-litre engine to 145bhp and delivered 0-60mph in 6.5 seconds.

Toyota used an electromagnetic clutch to disconnect the supercharger’s drivebelt from the engine at lower engine speeds. This allowed the MR2 to retain decent fuel economy, though the Super Charged model was heavier due to the weight of the compressor and a stronger gearbox needed to cope with the added power.

Volkswagen introduced its Twincharger petrol engines in 2005, using both super- and turbocharging to cancel out the usual drawbacks of each type of forced induction. The Roots-type supercharger was driven directly off the crankshaft with two counter-rotating lobes that delivered a fixed amount of air for every rotation. It was first offered in the Golf, but also made appearances in the Polo.

The two chargers did not always work in tandem, so the turbo could operate on its own and the supercharger was then engaged using an electromagnetic clutch and control valve. This meant the supercharger only operated at engines speeds up to 2400rpm, at which point it would disengage and let the turbo carry on. However, all of this complexity eventually led VW to drop the Twincharger engine as model lines were updated from 2011.