Welcome back to the 1990s! You’ve come back to a time when bold colors and jazzy patterns are in, shows like Saved By The Bell and Star Trek: Voyager are plastered across glass screens across America, and James Cameron’s Titanic is about to set box office records. The 1990s were a different time. There wasn’t a TSA telling you to take your shoes off at the airport, and you, like me, probably heard “You’ve Got Mail!” every time you fired up that dial-up Internet. This was the era of the rise of the personal computer and when people jammed out to tunes on their CD players.
The automotive industry was perhaps equally as optimistic and produced some real forward-thinking designs. What car best symbolizes the 1990s?
The 1990s were a fascinating time in the car world. What we now identify as the “Malaise Era” was firmly in the rearview mirror and cars had evolved away from the wedge designs of the 1980s to more streamlined aesthetics. Car technology also took leaps and bounds as most were now on board with composite headlight housings and flush glazing. The period also saw minimized grilles, the proliferation of car phones, rad three-spoke wheels, and multi-disc CD changers. At the same time, the 1990s helped bring an end to older tech like carburetors in cars, opening quarter windows, and the unpopular automatic seatbelt.
So, a lot was going on here! But what car represents it best? There were some awesome examples of 1990s optimism, such as the exploding popularity of sport utility vehicles like the Ford Explorer and the ascension of the neo-retro era in the Dodge Viper, Plymouth Prowler, Volkswagen New Beetle, and more. Enthusiasts practically drooled over icons like the McLaren F1 and the Acura NSX. Also, who can forget promising oddballs like the GM EV1 and hybrids like the Toyota Prius?
If I had to choose a car to represent the 1990s, it would be the Toyota RAV4, specifically the three-door model. Early crossovers were magical. Nobody quite knew the correct formula yet, so automakers were experimenting. The original RAV4 three-door was a compact, top-down, coastal drive-friendly fun car. It came with funky wheel styles, dazzling interior fabrics, and “Recreational” was right in its name. It was even available with a manual transmission!
Yet, look past the original’s weirdness and you see the future begin to take shape. The original RAV4 had the kinds of cladding that crossovers adore nowadays, and the RAV4 featured a unibody chassis with car origins. Likewise, while the three-door RAV4 might have been the cute enthusiast car, the five-door was the volume model. Early crossovers taught automakers that people will buy tons of five-door crossovers. Now, the market is dominated by them.
So, if I had to choose just one car to represent the 1990s, it would be the Toyota RAV4. It was fun, quirky, and the sort of car that you could see a college kid driving, but it also helped pave the way to the present day. Here’s where I turn things over to you. What car do you think represents the 1990s best?
My top picks?
My mom had a Taurus wagon of that era. I so wanted to hate it but it was so weird and unique that I kept loving it. Years later, my spouse and I inherited a manual Contour with similarly rounded body language (we affectionately called it The Bean) and it was like meeting a long lost cousin. The manual made it more fun to drive as well! Wow, never thought I’d miss that car, but I do…
I would say the Mitsubishi Eclipse GSX. One of the most iconic 1990s car segments was the sporty compact coupe, and the Eclipse GSX had all the newest tech you could get in the 90s for a still-affordable price: AWD, a turbo, dual airbags, ABS, a stereo with equalizer and an AUX jack, power driver’s seat, and (I think) automatic climate control. To me, that’s the ultimate expression of the 90s that was still attainable (unlike the sportier 3000GT VR-4 and all the cars that competed with).
Although if I had to drive a RAV4, that first-gen 2-door with the soft top and the tri-spoke wheels would be my choice. But in purple.
This was the first thing I thought of too
Based on my firsthand experience of living through the 90s, the most typical cars of me and my peers were the leftover junk from the 80s, with far too many subwoofers, window tint, and Eagle/Ultra wheels. They were surprisingly janky for cars that were only 10 years old.
The parking lot at my high school was saturated with 1st and 2nd gen Ford Escorts, Chrysler minivans, and for the lucky kids, a Jeep or a Foxbody Mustang. Many, including myself, were guilty of the offensive stereos you mention – rattling the windows as you drove by was a point of pride.
I did this in 2006 whilst piloting my 1992 Chevy Beretta. Killed an alternator in the process, too.
I helped a friend build a 7000 watt system for his Monte Carlo SS with a pair of 15″ MTX Subs. I still haven’t had bass hit that hard in my chest.
My rearview mirror fell into my lap all the time in the 90’s. Headlights in the side mirrors traced figure 8s.
My brother’s rear view mirror wouldn’t stay attached due to the box of subs in the trunk. We both have the hearing loss to remember those fine days of youthful stupidity.
My hearing is garbage.
On the other hand, my world is more peaceful than everyone else’s.
Agreed- “what was on sale” and “what people were driving” are definitely circles with variable overlap depending where you were in life.
I was a high-schooler driving the beater 80s hatchback my dad got for me with old bookshelf speakers wedged in the trunk (’cause I was poor), my folks were driving mid-80s wagons and late-70s pickup trucks. But basically ALL of my friends had some kind of subwoofer box in the back of whatever clapped-out piece of garbage they owned.
Chevy Astros had a place in my 90s brain since that was the go-to van for getting all the youth group kids
I don’t think I can state just how bad these cars were. I was an auto-shop kid in high school, we drug in a Citation for an engine swap, and the donor had so much strut tower rust in front that the hood was supporting the front suspension.
We ripped the engine out of one Regal for another because the donor car’s frame had disintegrated past the rear axle and there was nothing structural to hold the trunk lid down.
Oakley sticker if you lived near the coast or snow.
No Fear stickers here in the Midwest.
How else would you get proper thermonuclear protection? Extra points if you also had one of those colorful shiny Oakley jackets, which I now realize were definitely counterfeits sold at beach side t-shirt shops.
If you put that jacket on over your color-changing Hypercolor t-shirt with some stone or acid-washed jeans, you would be fighting off the tall-haired young ladies at the mall food court.
In neon green on your aggressively brown early ’80s Chevette.
That brings me back… simpler times.
I remember people being pumped about if they got a “real” looking pair of Oakleys (FOakleys) off Canal street.
We weren’t too far from the days in the early 80s where cars often never used the 6th odometer digit.
I remember, probably ’81 or 82, the neigbors coming over to look at Dad’s odometer because his Corolla rolled 100,000 miles and they couldn’t believe it had lasted that long.
Nothing’ll kill a Toyota from that era except road salt.
Pretty much. His was a ’71 if I remember right, and had no rust because it spent almost all its time in New Mexico. But the desert sun did a number on its paint, and rotted away the shift boot so you could watch the road going by under the shifter, which I thought was a fun game and my mom thought would definitely get us killed.
Had a 1971 Corolla. Close to 300K miles in 1984. Never needed anything except water pump, radiator.
Impossible to kill.
Until the rust took over.
RIP.
A four-door Ford Explorer – most likely a dark green one with a saddle interior – that represents what nearly every car in the parking lot would be by the end of the decade.
eddie bauer edition.
This is a good call! Extremely accurate.
And defective tires.
My dad did well with those Firestones. Not only did my mom have an Explorer that had the worn Firestones replaced for free but he bought a Ranger with a blown motor that happened to have them as well. Turned them in for a free set of tires that more than paid for the Ranger.
Thus the nickname “Ford Exploder,” which is what my parents’ mechanic called my mom’s Explorer.
The color combo is absolutely correct.
They sold so many green Explorers it was kinda crazy.
They sold my mom one in 1999.
I always associate the 90s with all the great cars the Japanese brands developed and so many interesting experiments. You mention the NSX, which is a great example. Of course I think of the Supra as well. The Nissan 300z should get a mention.
But for me I think it is the Mitsubishi 3000GT that rightly encapsulates what they were going for in that era of pushing boundaries and over-engineering the competition.
Geo Storm GSi in teal of course
Came here to say the same!
Ditto
That RAV4 is my top choice, so I’m going to have to list what I remember my friends and their parents driving.
No matter what make and model of car you choose to best represent 1990s motoring, it was probably either dark forest green or teal.
Ford explorer, ushered in the SUV. I can’t think of anything introduced in the 90s that had more impact overall.
Honorable mentions
NSX
Second Gen ram
McLaren f1
Ford Explorer is the answer. Especially when you consider it was rolled out in the Jurassic Park movie which was huge.
4th gen Camaro / Firebird, SN95 Mustang.
Any car without air conditioning.
All my high school friends and I were still driving 80’s shitboxes with broken R12 air conditioners. R12 had been banned and the price went from $1 a can to $100+ a can, which none of could afford. Most of these cars couldn’t be upgraded to R134a, so I didn’t have a car with AC until I was 26. This was in Virginia where you NEED air conditioning.
My 1990 Pontiac Sunbird lost its R12 system by 2016 and the original owner, a very meticulous elderly lady, paid upwards of $1,500 to have the entire system taken out and converted to R134a. I paid $1,800 for the entire car in 2018. And the A/C is cold enough to fog up my glasses in the summer. Lucky me!
I grew up in Vermont, none of those ’80s cars were optioned with air conditioning in the first place. Pure hell two months a year, the rest of the time a good heater was and is more important.
I remember that was the common recomendation back then. Now we know it’s not true. The older cars AC works just fine on R134 at about 80-90% of the R12 capacity.
Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t. If the rubber parts can handle it and you can adjust the cut off pressure, then it usually worked.
Fortunately I didn’t know back then that propane is a drop-in replacement for R12.
So it was thought then that the r134a would leak through the rubber hoses. But as it turns out, so much refrigerant oil is soaked into the used hoses, they really don’t leak. You must use less refrigerant, about 85% or so of the R12 charge and the pressures work out ok. Propane works until you uave a leak… Back then some companies were actually canning propane in the 1 lb cans and calling it silly made up names like freeze ’em all out etc. It was super dangerous.
93 Ford Escort GT with a 5 speed in cayman green with the matching blades
In Teal for sure
White would be a close second but here in MN anything white was stained rusty in like five years. I don’t remember the exact color choices but I think it could have been just white, red and teal.
Or an Escort LX in that slightly purplish metallic red Ford loved so much, with red interior.
This is exactly the first car that came to mind!
Geo Tracker.
It seemed like everybody had one. I still vividly remember riding around in a bright green one listening to A Touch of Class.
Yep, that was my first thought, or it’s Suzuki Sidekick sibling. My mom had the Geo version in pink with a white soft top.
The Ford Taurus
By the mid 1980s, interest rates on car loans were dropping from the 15-18% they’d been a few years earlier. More people were able to buy brand new cars, including young people (or their parents were willing to sign and pay). And the Geo Tracker was available for people who didn’t need really practical vehicles.Teal, as others have said, or that wild raspberry pink/purple.
My girlfriend in ’94 or ’95 had one in that color and nearly rolled over in it. With me onboard thinking of that thin layer of canvas overhead. She was a half-German Army brat, imagine David Tracy but with zero mechanical sympathy, and was only just getting her license at age 21 since it was beyond her to do so to German standards. I really hope she’s driving something sedan-height now.
Honda Del Sol SiR TransTop in Samba Green. The 90s were about fun and funky designs and weird technology. Cars were still commonplace and hadn’t been completely drowned out by gigantic trucks and SUVs. Swoopy designs were en vogue. Turbos weren’t in everything yet, so you had to wait for VTEC to kick in, yo.
Came here to say Del Sol! We’ll never a delightfully weird yet not-weird car like that again.
It’s a “sporty” 2-seater, an economy car, a coupe, a convertible, a hardtop, and with that giant trunk it is also a mini truck… It’s everything!
Teal Geo Tracker, white top, pink/white fast food cup stripe down the side.
I liked the RAV answer, but those were pretty rare(ish).
As I read the story I kept thinking “Geo Tracker in Teal with graphics” and glad to see it’s been covered.
It WAS the 90s stereotype come to life, and they were everywhere.
Props to Fuzzyweis who beat us to it, and quickly!
Had the same thought reading it, I tried to think of others like maybe Saturn or Ford Ranger Splash but brain immediately went to Geo Tracker, in the teal with graphics, extra points if they put the aftermarket wipers in neon pink on them too.
‘Aftermarket neon accessories’ really should just be a category of its own. I proudly rocked a set of neon green ones on my crapbox Plymouth Horizon in the late 90s.
Now, only the Jeep people do it.
Double-bladed, of course.
Wow, I had forgotten about those.
They actually have some double bladed ones at Ollies in our area (Charlotte, NC) I snagged a pair for my 2000 Ranger for special occasions like Radwood, not Neon but there’s always Krylon for that 😀
I don’t know if it’s better if these are new or old stock, but well done, Ollies!
Dodge Stratus
It was cab forward after all.
Lamborghini Diablo. It was a poster car for so many of us.
It has to be teal in color, for sure
It should be of the era and no longer available
Needs to be fun but not actually exciting
I’m going with Geo Storm
Probably the then-new Subaru Outback with Paul Hogan – Crocodile Dundee himself – reading the ad copy.
as a kid I though Subaru was an Australian brand because of those ads
First generation Ford Explorer. Eddie Bauer edition.
For me it would be a 1991 Eagle Talon TSi AWD in black over silver since that’s what I was driving and that’s still the car I miss the most. For the rest of America it would probably be a 2nd gen Ford Taurus since those things were absolutely everywhere in the 90s.
I hate that I never sprung for a 1G when they were cheap and plentiful.
I also owned a ’97. The 2G brought many improvements but the 1G was the overall better car.
A beige/gold Toyota Camry.
I like it, but I’m gonna say the green Camries with the gold badging were the most common-yet-attractive car of the era.
Green for sure. I was going for ubiquity.
Nice choice of a RAV4, I’d go similar with the OG, a teal Geo Tracker with the pink graphics on the side, or possibly a purple Tracker with teal graphics. Teal was definitely the color of the time.
I so want one of those Trackers. It’s a shame they basically no longer exist in the Midwest, and when they do show up in good condition, they’re always for a crazy price.
Maybe better luck with Suzuki Vitara to import? I also like that in Canadia they were sold as a Pontiac Sunrunner, such a fitting name!
Straight teal, or would you be open to that Mystic color-shifting paint?
Teal/Purple color shifting is a great compromise of both!
Some unholy trinity of a maroon GMT400, a Dodge Grand Caravan, and a New Beetle.