A couple of days ago, Fiat unveiled a host of micromobility solutions with uniquely Italian touches. As well as giving its electric Topolino LSV new colors and partnering with a coffee roaster that would presumably set up shop on Italian street corners using the Fiat TRIS three-wheeler, the company’s social media posts show the Topolino having arrived in the US.
As well as the Dolce Vita sort of laid-back “good life” touch Fiat is eager to apply onto anything it currently builds, the most interesting point in Fiat’s micromobility suite is the Multiplina concept, which brings back the Multipla name and thinking. It’s not quite the replacement for the millennial Multipla, known to be horrendously ugly incredibly cool but more of a throwback to the 1950s original, with its basis on the aforementioned Topolino.
If you haven’t heard of the Topolino, maybe its Citroën Ami sibling is more familiar sounding. It’s a plastic, two-door, two-seater light car that doesn’t necessarily require a driving license to operate on roads, and it’s only available as an EV.
Traditionally, Europeans have gotten around in varyingly terrible plastic boxes in those use cases when they have been the most viable option for unlicensed drivers young and old. The Moroccan-built Topolino and Ami and their Opel-badged Rocks-e sibling come from established car manufacturers, and even if they have a certain amount of built-in flimsiness, they are perhaps closer to cars than some other offerings. Especially as they aren’t propelled by shaky, rattly diesels but smooth electric power, all six kilowatts of it. The battery is 5.5 kWh in size.
Because they are about as wide as they are long, with the front end looking the same as the back, the Topolino and especially the Ami look like garden sheds with wheels.
Despite being optimized for European streets, the Topolino started its journey across the Atlantic, towards American consumers. Late last year, Fiat’s CEO, Olivier Francois (above), stated that there have been plans to bring the Topolino to the United States:
“The Fiat Topolino, our small, joyful, colorful car that is now everywhere in Europe, has made several appearances in the U.S. over the past year, including last month at the LA Auto Show, where it’s creating tremendous excitement among consumers. So much so that I’m happy to share that we’ll be bringing the Fiat Topolino to the U.S., with more details to come next year.”
In Fiat’s Instagram post shared a day ago, blurry Topolinos are rolling off the boat. No prices have yet been mentioned, or when the tiny cars will actually be available to be bought, but they’re there.
View this post on Instagram
In addition to the Topolino material, Fiat released a single image of the Multiplina concept car, which shows a longer-wheelbase monobox vehicle with narrow tires in the corners and a look that’s again derived from the classic 500.
Fiat has been eager to put the same face on various cars, yet it works well here, especially with the warm mango yellow hue of the two-tone bodywork. The top part is cream white, with a roll-up top to let the Italian sun inside.
The Multiplina, which uses a diminutive form of the word Multipla for a name, is in Fiat’s view yet another step towards a real car from the quadricycle standpoint. Cutting through the blurb, which features phrasing such as “maximizing space-efficiency through an intelligent, human-centric architecture,” the message is about fitting more people inside the same basic structure as with the smaller Topolino.
Let’s Post Some Photos Of The Fiat Multipla
The Fiat Multipla has never been known for being especially beautiful. The 1998-introduced six-seater MPV prioritized interior space over everything else, which gave it very bizarre looks. The design appeared to be modular, with the passenger compartment its own bulging space, with straight sides and a separate front. A while ago, Adrian analyzed the 1998 Multipla’s polarizing design in this great article.
In recent years, the Multipla has become a meme and a phenomenon due to its polarizing looks, which Fiat even ruined back in the day with a smoothing facelift. The Multipla name came from the Fiat 600’s egg-shaped multi-purpose version, which was a sort of proto-minivan.
The Fiat 600 Multipla
The absolutely original Fiat Multipla took its platform and basics from the 1955 Fiat 600, but added seats for up to six people. Since the engine was in the back, there was enough space to move the front bench atop the front wheels. The front seat was accessed via rear-hinged “suicide” doors, with large side doors providing access to the passenger seat rows. In other words, maximizing space-efficiency through an intelligent, human-centric architecture.
The layout and packaging are quite daring, especially as the front passenger also had the spare wheel next to their knees. Consider also that the engines were still the same as in the original 600, meaning a power output of 21hp at first and a 1960 power boost to 25 horsepower, and we’re talking about a plate that’s pretty full. At least if you hit something with it, you wouldn’t have had that much speed when you arrived to the accident.
The design is also very odd, as it has a more vertical front end and a sloping 600-shaped rear. As a result, it looks like a reversing egg.
Fiat built the 600 Multipla for a little over ten years, and it was replaced by the Fiat 850 Familiare in the late ‘60s. The Familiare kind of looks like a shrunken Corvair Greenbriar, and also had the same layout.
The replacement for the 1990s-2000s Fiat Multipla also dropped the Multipla name, as it was again a 500-based and 500-faced blob called the 500L. Again built for ten years, it never achieved the cult status that the Multipla did, and the seating arrangement was more normal, with no three-wide front seat. You could get it as a seven-seater version with a longer rear section. Currently, Fiat makes the 600 again, which is styled after the – you guessed it – the classic Fiat 500 and 600 of the 1950s, but it’s on the same platform as the Jeep Avenger and the Peugeot 2008. The recent introduction of the Fiat (Grande) Panda is a welcome break from putting the same front-end design on all the cars.
If it makes sense for Fiat to bring the plastic Topolino to America, it would make sense for it to introduce the Multiplina later on, as it will be bigger and feature more interior space. Let’s hope all the Multipla memes in the world convince the manufacturer to do it.
All images and top graphic: Fiat
Aww, it’s cute! Looks better than a golf cart too.
Will this fit in the back of my lifted 4×4 F950?
This is the Smart Car all over again. It’s too small for America, it won’t sell, the Honda Fit would be a better car for 99.999999999% of Americans. It shouldn’t exist here.
Just because it’s not for you doesn’t mean it’s not for anyone.
This isn’t a main car. It’s something for an elderly person to get to the shops in a small neighborhood. It’s for people at the lake to zip around. It’s a car for toodling and jaunting.
It’s just a cheap and fun little car. It has a limited use case, but we don’t need every car to do every thing. Let a silly little car exist and bring people joy.
But is it cheap?
Honestly, in a world where nothing is under $30k, $15k is cheap.
I love it, but the $15K price is going to be the reason it fails here. When a Kia Seltos is $25K, an enclosed golf cart for $15K isn’t going to sell now matter how adorable it looks.
$15k is completely in line with what people spend on these sorts of vehicles already, its well priced for its market
Nobody, not a single soul, is cross shopping a Kia Seltos with a Topolino.
They ARE cross shopping with enclosed golf carts. And this makes a credible case against them (and looks more fun).
Elderly people do not like micro cars, they don’t like having to go down into the seat and have issues getting up out of them. They buy taller vehicles.
This isn’t actually that low, and it’s popular in that niche in Italy and France.
“Elderly people do not like micro cars…”
Are you sure about that? Retirement communities in Florida are full of golf carts and small electric cars. The elderly folks in the car forums I’m in are stoked for this thing.
The average age of a Smart buyer in America (not “Smart Car”) was 55 to 60. Many of those people kept their cars, which makes them pretty elderly nowadays. Shoot, Jason’s Changli was originally marketed as an elderly people car. lol
Golf carts are an exception, but that’s primarily because of the ‘communities’. I had to help ParCar develop a NEV in like 2013 or so. Fun project.
Are there buyers for this? Sure, you can sell a few of pretty much anything in a country as big and varied as the US. Are there enough buyers to support a proper sales and support organization in a country the size of the US? I very much doubt it. But as I said in another post, I can see them being a minor success here in Florida. People already spend $10K+ on fancy golf carts to drive around the “communities”.
I mean, it doesn’t have to? It’ll be sold out of dealers for other Stellantis brands. This isn’t the only product they would be selling.
Are they smart enough to do that? That isn’t how they rolled out Fiat in the first place. Which would have been the RIGHT way to do it, rather than requiring dealers to build those silly little dedicated Fiat “Studios”. To support initially one car, that while I adore them, the average American could not have cared less about. Huge investment to sell handfuls of cars, and many of them are shut. The closest one to me here in FL is now a used car lot.
Generally, when it comes to Stellantis, whenever you ask “are they smart enough” the answer is “surprisingly, no,” but maybe they’ve learned something.
But they’re definitely able to sell them through existing stores. It would actually be very smart to sell them through Ram dealers and go “hey, here’s something for toodling around the lake” whenever a buyer gets a truck for towing a boat or camper.
But it IS Stellantis.
The current FIAT franchise deals may well prevent them being sold elsewhere – and MANY of those are not CJD dealers. Time will tell.
Look at how much use and joy Torch got out of the Changli!
These are practially the same!
Its an NEV, EZ Go. Clubcar, GEM, etc already sell loads of them per year, its entering an existing, established market segment in the US, not attempting to create a whole new one like Smart
The Smart is at least a car. This is not quite a car.
Smart Car can do highway speeds last I checked, this can’t.
This won’t even be allowed on many roads in the places that allow them to be on the road at all. Maine and Florida both limit them to 35mph roads or less. And while I am generally the last person to worry about such things, imagine getting hit by a Canyonero in one even at that speed. Even if it’s as stout as a Smart, you will get the experience of a ball getting hit by a bat. Certainly better than a golf cart though – I have seen the result of one of those getting clobbered here – it wasn’t pretty, one lady died.
Maybe more like an egg being hit by a bat.
Smart cars are *incredibly* stout in terms of the passenger impact structure. They basically have a full roll cage surrounding you. The problem is that only helps if you hit something soft, as there isn’t much crumple space. So you won’t get crushed, but you are going to see a lot more G’s than in a more traditional car if you run into a Canyonero. Ball off a bat…
I would love one for commuting to work just like I loved my Smart. And I’m definitely not a 0.000000001% minority.
As long as it can do 45mph comfortably it should work for anyone who commutes without having to use a highway.
Yeah, I’d consider one. I work like two miles from home and drive through neighborhoods to get there, plus I also have a regular car for regular car things!
eBike is what you want.
That would be great for the two months of summer that we have here.
Where are you at? I use mine from April through November.
That side-window graphic on the Multiplina encapsulates perfectly its raison d’etre of getting four people to the clubhouse in time for happy hour.
That Multiplina would be perfect for my Real Estate business.
It seems so wasteful to bring out the big Mercedes for short jaunts around town showing houses and meeting with clients.
I’m gonna need a longer extension cord from my apartment to the garage tho.
I’m “on the list” at a local dealer for one of these. 2 Variants, effectively Doors or No Doors. $14,999 for either variant.
I’m in Metro Detroit so its use is fairly limited, but I think it would be a hoot for driving to Starbucks or during the Dream Cruise. I’m a little disappointed these werent closer to 10k, but I’ll see how much I actually like it after a test drive.
$15K?!
I paid $21.5K for my brand new 25 Nissan Leaf S
Which will never be a hoot during the dream cruise.
Mine has an 2 way Helical LSD in it, so you’d be wrong
The problem is that a used Spark EV or Fiat 500e is so much more useful.
Never underestimate the power of the new car smell.
intriguing, and at least a little more attractive than the MiEV from a decade ago, but they will likely only ever make it to the Beach rental places that otherwise would offer a slingshot or multiple mopeds. Even for just 12K it would be hard to fathom a daily driver use case for one. Maybe it could replace some of the Bird Scooters though. I suppose I would at least try one then.
Yeah with only 2 seats these are probably gonna lose out in the Us market to golf carts and side by sides. Maybe with the multipla 4 it could theoretically be competitive?
I look forward to the Topolino vs. Chang Li vs. Otto on a bike comparo.
You do mean drag race, right?
Torch and Otto can wear whatever makes them happy.
“Otto on a bike”
So an…Otto cycle? Ha ha
If they’re actually highway legal here, the Topolino will be awesome and successful.
Also, the Multipla isn’t ugly. It looks cool 😀
I’m skeptical these will be popular in the US, but there a surprising number of $12,000+ street legal golf carts on the roads where I live, so maybe there is a market?
I wouldn’t buy one, but if I wanted something to drive around the neighborhood, I would buy a Topolino before a literal golf cart if the prices were similar.
problem is, more and more the side by sides are being allowed for on road use as well. perhaps not as much int he city where this thing will potentially work,
Yeah, I don’t see the Topolino being popular in areas where people already own side by sides. I have only seen on side by side on the roads here, and it was apparently street legal since it had a license plate.
Where I live, most golf carts aren’t used for anything but street transportation (i.e. these aren’t golfers who also drive them on the streets or people who live in neighborhoods with infrastructure specifically built for golf carts). I figure if you are going out of your way to buy something for low-speed transportation that you wouldn’t otherwise buy, it probably makes more sense to buy something enclosed like a Topolino.
I don’t think the Topolino will ever be anything but a very niche vehicle here, but I think there might be enough of a market to justify selling them.
I just came back from France where I saw the Ami all over the place. They are super cute, and could be a decent city car for people that need to get around, but never leave the city or hit high speed roads.
Next up – the microlino???
The Topolino doesn’t really need to be any smaller, it can already park perpendicular to the curb. Anything tinier is Twizy territory.
So when I saw it, I thought the Microlino was smaller, but I checked the sizing, it’s basically the same size.
Also, the parallel parking thing doesn’t make a ton of sense to me. I guess you can fit two in a standard spot for 1, bit that only works places without marked spots.
Based on how people park in some of the big European cities, being able to pull in that way is a big deal. Marked spots are only a suggestion.
March 12 – 1 – Italy 2026 – Yarnallton Pike
“[T]he warm mango yellow hue of the two-tone bodywork” of the Multiplina concept car immediately made me think of Nemo from the movie Finding Nemo. I can’t unsee it now.
What a cheerful little runabout the Multiplina would be!
Fun article about small, less expensive “cars” making their way to the US.
– Any word if they’ll be only be a Neighborhood Electric Vehicle (NEV) and limited to 25mph?
Unfortunately, I can’t imagine anything other than the Multiplina as a NEV.
When I was in Italy last month, I saw lots of these – they’re awesome. but the use case will be limited in US. I can’t wait to see some here.
I feel like this will only serve to further entrench a certain demographic of people into further lifting their Ram HEMIs, stance them further out, and even lower-profile deeper-dish mud tires.
The AAMVA is not going to be happy about this…. Good.
AAMVA is partially why all 50 states are collecting and databasing facial-recognition compatible photos of everyone who gets a drivers’ license or even an ID card in the USA. Even in states where the voters had the practice outlawed, it still goes on anyway and the crooked court system won’t even address it. This information is shared with fusion centers, databrokers, and intelligence agencies, not just law enforcement, when the 4th amendment implies it shouldn’t be collected or shared in the first place. Almost no one even got a vote on this crap, and those who did said they didn’t want it, and got it anyway. Then the courts pretend everyone “voluntarily” provided the information, when if you don’t provide it, you’re locked out of getting a DL or ID.
This information is then weaponized against those who were forced to provide it, by it being used to identify them without their consent at protests or as they go about their lives. Some people have been wrongfully arrested because the algorithm mis-identified them as a criminal and their lives have been destroyed as a result.
Screw AAMVA.
I would love to read a whole article written by you on this topic, I already enjoy Mercedes’ articles where she takes on the AAMVA for kei cars.
It’s not just AAMVA. It’s also the Federal government including but not limited to The Department of Homeland Security, Biometric Identity Management Agency, and the FBI, and also private companies like NEC, 3M Cogent, IDEMIA, Gemalto, and Safran.
A digital control grid is being built up around us, and state-issued drivers’ licenses and photo IDs as well as passports are being used as the enrollment images. The images collected are taken to the ICAO 9303 standards for facial recognition, a global biometric standard.
Notice any FLOCK cameras in your neighborhood lately? Whether the feature is enabled or not, they ARE capable of facial recognition. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were the initial testing grounds for the technology, followed by China with its “Golden Shield” and social credit system. The U.S. has been adopting this system piecemeal for about the last 20 years, and if you’ve gotten an ID or DL in any of the 50 US states since about 2013 or so, 100% probability you’re already in the database.
No one voted for this crap. It was imposed on us by technocrats, corporations, NGOs, and intelligence agencies. They want to have turnkey totalitarianism with unblinking surveillance.
This is just a neighborhood electric vehicle, we’ve had loads of them on the market for decades, AAMVA doesn’t go after GEM or EZ Go, they’re not going to care about this. NEVs are fancy golf carts with a few extra features to make them legal to drive on very low speed limit roads, you’re not likely to encounter many of them outside, say, The Villages or Old Town Key West
AAMVA will be very happy about this, actually. It’s coming through an official channel and will comply with LSV rules. It’s not even fast enough to drive on a regular road.
Antti, love the article, honest and greatly written.
Also any Multipla content is a win.
I thought they were trying to ban Kei cars in the United States.
Come on, Fiat!
It’s an NEV
Close enough for argument support.
We give lots of exemptions to low speed EVs that we would never consider for small ICE vehicles
Then that should be part of the angle.
If the orange menace finds out it’s “fresh off the boat”, he’ll assume it’s an immigrant, (which of course it is), and he’ll deport it…
These are vehicles, as long as they are imported legally it’s fine. If not they are crushed which has been going on for decades. The EPA, NHSTA and CBP do not mess around when it comes to imports.
I WANT Fiat to succeed in the US, but I don’t see how their lineup of *checks notes* one tiny car and then a soon to be announced even tinier car can pull that off in the US.
The 500E starts at $33K and is less practical than the Slate. I once bombed around Italy in a 500 and it was fun and practical, even on the long haul from Rome to Turin and back, but I’m sacrificing a lot, including being able to fit my family in it. So it’s a runabout, and at a price rivaling a Civic that’s just never going to work for me; as I can do all that and fit my family and some groceries in the Civic.
This little thing is adorable, but I don’t see it working outside of the coasts with high population density cities, or retirement communities where people want something nicer than a golf cart. That ignores the other 90% of the country, not sure how that really works out for them.
Adding this to my comment, the 500e has a starting price higher than the starting price of a Civic Si. Let that sink in.
The 500e was a big mistake and they hastily adapted the 1 litre MHEV and six speed manual from the Panda to try to make it slightly better.
For Europe, yes. It’s still EV only in the US. Only way they get a legalized version of a gasser in the hillbilly states is if they somehow shoehorn the Cherokee’s 1.6T hybrid set-up in it.
Love it. I don’t care about Fiat’s bottom line or business motivation. Give me both of them and I’ll figure out how to use them.
Is this meant to be a replacement for a golf cart in those communities? I’m assuming it’s not highway legal.
That is one of the things that puzzles me. There are specific regulations for quadricycles in Europe, but how does that fit US regs?
Legality and definition varies from state to state. Here’s mine, which is a “bicycle”:
https://i.imgur.com/Jpc9dQq.jpg
Weighing in at about 90 lbs, it can do 82 mph on flat ground and 0-60 mph in under 9 seconds. I usually cruise around 30-35 mph while pedaling with the motors contributing the rest of the power needed. I plan to make it much faster.
The US has a category for Neighborhood Electric Vehicles (NEVs), sometimes called Low Speed Electric Vehicles (LSEVs), they are essentially golf carts that are required to have their speed governed to 25mph and are only legal to drive on roads with speed limits up to 35mph. They’re exempt from most of FMVSS, but still need basic stuff like seat belts, horn, and lighting
Its a market that’s existed for decades, pre-Stellantis/pre-FCA, Chrysler was one of the biggest players in it when they owned Global Electric Motorcars (GEM)
This thing looks cool and would probably be a decent neighborhood runabout, if you need that sort of thing. One would hope it has air conditioning, because most places in the US where it would be useful are pretty hot in the not winter. Other than that, I am struggling to see a strong business case for bringing this to the US.
Same I really am trying to understand the point of this? Top speed of less then 30mph I am sure real world range is probably 30miles. I guess retirement communities/lake house communities/golf communities and so on. But depending on the price you could get a nice golf cart or utility vehicle with A/C.
Well quick search shows these might start at 12k so actually not really a bad price for a community/city (if even allowed on city roads) put put around vehicle.
I was expecting it to be closer to $20K. At $12K it’s not as bad a value proposition as I expected.
Car and Driver is saying $15k.
I love the look of this, but all the specs say “golf cart” to me. Not even viable on a lot of city roads, just neighborhood streets.
These are going to be permitted on any road with a speed limit of 35mph or less, like all similar vehicles already sold here, including those Mini Moke replicas
Reminds me of a VW microbus, but I bet it doesn’t have enough room to take rips of the “time travel device” found in a lot of microbuses.