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This is not a compilation of the super-luxury cars of 2023, and it’s not about the most expensive cars, either. It’s about some of the best models in automotive history with an enduring – even timeless, luxurious appeal. We’ve attached the prices for these cars merely for reference purposes, and not as a yardstick for their premium quality.
Here, we’re more about what truly defines a luxury car; strong pedigree, incredible engineering, and the finest appointments. Of course, luxury and premium prices go hand in hand, which is why a $600,000 Mercedes Maybach shares this space with a $28 million Rolls-Royce. We also have British icons like Aston Martin and Bentley sitting side by side with French and Italian status symbols like Bugatti and Maserati.
Luxury cars, thanks to their higher levels of engineering and spectacular design, are a thing of beauty, but some models seem to have the anointing for eternal grandeur. Below, we take a celebratory look at ten luxury cars that inarguably perfected the formula for enduring splendor, making their mark on automotive history – forever.
10 2020 BMW Alpina B7 – $144,195
We’ll believe it right away if the German automaker told us they don’t look forward to upgrading the 7 Series. We don’t imagine it’s an easy task improving an embodiment of perfection – or just to be on the safe side – near-perfect German engineering.
In any case, the Bavaria-based Alpina (now a BMW AG sub-brand) took it upon itself to do just the thing. The result is the Alpina B7 up there in the picture. It wasn’t a walk in the park, of course. The tuning house, famous for rolling out high-performance versions of BMW cars, spent years perfecting the already luxurious and powerful BMW 7 Series. When they concluded, the 7 Series B7 is not only more elegant, but also blindingly quick.
9 2020 Aston Martin Rapide – $338,580
The Rapide showed a side of Aston Martin we haven’t exactly been familiar with over the years. The British marque has always been synonymous with power, speed, and everything else that encapsulates the pleasures of British GT. That is, until the Rapide came along and upset that apparently unfounded impression.
The Rapide broke Aston Martin’s tradition and offered luxurious accommodation for four passengers without relinquishing the marque’s reputation for performance. The 2020 Aston Martin Rapide delivered a top speed of almost 200 mph and could sprint from zero to 60 mph in 4.2 seconds.
8 2023 Maserati Quattroporte – $106,695
The Italian marque tells of how the brand’s highly successful Quattroporte underwent “discreet” restyling by Pininfarina without altering the “purity and elegance of its original design.”
The Quattroporte’s luxurious design and progressive amenities provide it with the same timeless appeal enjoyed by most Maserati models. There’s very little left to say about one of the most well-known luxury car brands in history except to remind everyone that the Quattroporte luxury sports sedan totes a monstrous Ferrari V8 mill under the hood.
7 2022 Audi RS 7 – $119,595
Audi is inarguably one of the world’s leading manufacturers of premium cars. Most people associate the German brand with sporty, high-end vehicles. Take the Audi A7 sedan, for example.
It’s a gorgeous encapsulation of agility and performance. The RS7 succeeded in taking this intoxicating combination and adding a generous dollop of speed to the mix. The RS7 epitomizes the height of Audi Luxury, including a twin-turbo 591-hp V8 and all the utility you can expect from the company’s popular Quattro AWD system.
6 2002-2013 Maybach 57/62 – $366,934
The Maybach 57 (W240) and 62 (V240) aren’t as recent as the RS7 and the others on this list so far, but everyone knows a Maybach in your garage signaled the heights of opulence in the 2000s. The thing is, Maybach sedans possess a timeless appeal that leaves them as impressive today as they were back then. The 57 and 62 were the very first offerings of the Maybach brand since its revival by Mercedes-Benz.
These luxury sedans, based on the W140 S-Class, had luxury features too many to list here, including fully reclining seats, a navigation system with voice recognition, a power rear sunshade, a rear-seat DVD entertainment system, an interior air filter, front/rear seat massage, 21-speaker Bose premium sound system, power tilt/telescopic heated leather-wrapped-wood steering wheel with radio and climate controls, and many more.
5 Mercedes-Benz BRABUS 900 Maybach S650 – $640,000
The Mercedes-Maybach S650 was already a land yacht with the speed of a cheetah, thanks to a V12 mill churning out 621 horsepower and 738 lb-ft of torque. This was enough to send the luxury leviathan barreling from rest to 60 mph in 4.6 seconds. That should have been enough for the S650’s size and opulence, but BRABUS would not let it be.
Apparently, the German high-performance automotive aftermarket tuning house thought it swell to cradle the passengers in beautiful quilted leather seats and then haul them off to a top speed of 220 mph. BRABUS turned the Mercedes-Maybach S650 into a land missile with 900 horsepower on tap, and a massive 1,106 lb-ft of torque.
4 2020 Bentley Mulsanne – $310,800
Bentley designed and built the Mulsanne on the philosophy that the true definition of luxury is a total lack of compromise. Cradling a 6.75-liter V8 producing 505 horsepower and 752 lb-ft of torque, the Mulsanne might very well exceed the driver’s expectation way before the throttle gets flattened to the metal.
The V8 pairs with a ZF 8-speed automatic transmission with steering column-mounted gearshift paddles. 2020 marked the end of the line for Mulsanne. So, the much-improved ride quality, authoritative acceleration, sumptuous handcrafted interior, and extensive range of customization options don’t exactly come as a surprise.
3 Eight-Gen Rolls-Royce Phantom (EWB) – $535,000
The 8th and current generation of the Rolls-Royce Phantom, introduced in 2017, comes in two wheelbase lengths. We chose the elongated wheelbase (EWB) for the purpose of this article. The EWB Phantom is 8.7 inches longer than the standard model but accurately adopts the exterior design of the standard Phantom.
Of course, the longer wheelbase enhances the Phantom’s splendid presence, but the equally enlarged interior is where you feel and experience the difference the most. It has the marque’s iconic “Starlight Headliner,” first introduced in the Phantom Celestial, which uses more than 1500 fiber optics to create an impression of a night sky with stars.
It also has a partition between the front cockpit and the rear cabin, with the rear passenger compartment made soundproof for privacy. They aptly call it the “Privacy Suite.” It’s a wonder we managed to hold on without talking about Rolls-Royce until now. The RR is like George Washington of the luxury segment, and the new Phantom, under BMW ownership, is the marque’s flagship vehicle.
2 Bugatti La Voiture Noire – $16.5 Million
Its name is French for “the black car,” but the Bugatti La Voiture Noire might as well be the black sheep, seeing as it’s a one-off vehicle that set the owner back the Euro equivalent of roughly $16.5 million. Bugatti unveiled the car at the 2019 Geneva Motor Show to celebrate the marque’s rich history as one of the world’s most reputable luxury brands.
With that kind of price tag, though, no one can fault the La Voiture Noire buyer for squirreling the thing away in a climate-controlled garage. Most of us had the rare chance of seeing it in action during last year’s Supercar Owners Circle event in Croatia. And no, it wasn’t Ronaldo or Ferdinand Piëch behind the wheel.
1 Rolls-Royce Boat Tail – $28 Million
If you saw the Rolls-Royce Boat Tail in the picture above or the pages of magazines and thought this must be the most expensive new car in the world, you’re hundred-percent correct. With just three copies to ever see the light of day and each toting a $28 million price tag, the midsize coach-built luxury GT is the most expensive street-legal new car on the planet.
It draws design inspiration from yachts of the 1920s and ‘30s, and shares chassis and engine with the Rolls-Royce Phantom. BMW (Rolls-Royce’s parent company) already patented the Boat Tail Concept with the European Union Intellectual Property Office and the National Institute of Industrial Property Brazil.
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