Manufacturers  /  Porsche

Porsche

Stuttgart, Germany · est. 1931

A continuous idea, developed in public.

Models
24
Top value
€18M
Period
1931–
Explore modelsManufacturer profile
Porsche — manufacturer stage

Curated entry points

The essential Porsches

Three cars that explain the manufacturer: its origins, its engineering peak and the shape of its modern ambition.

1972–1973

Carrera RS 2.7

The ducktail original — the most coveted air-cooled 911 of all.

Collectibility
96 / 100
Indicative value
€800k
1969–1971

917

Porsche’s first outright Le Mans winner — the holy grail.

Collectibility
99 / 100
Indicative value
€18M
2003–2006

Carrera GT

A naturally-aspirated racing V10 and a carbon tub — no driver aids.

Collectibility
96 / 100
Indicative value
€1.8M

Complete catalogue

Every Porsche on file

24 models · 4 families

Halo Supercars

4

The cars built to prove a point — each the fastest, most advanced Porsche of its day, made in small numbers and never repeated. The line from the 959 to the 918.

GT & RS

10

The lightweight, harder-edged 911s — from the original Carrera RS 2.7 through the modern GT department’s manual specials. The cars Porsche builds for the people who actually drive them.

Air-cooled Icons

4

The wide-body turbocharged 911s and the air-cooled cars that defined the shape — from the original whale-tail 930 to the last, fastest 993 Turbo S.

Vintage & Racing

6

Where it began and where it was proven — the 356 that founded the company, the open Spyders and the works prototypes that took Porsche to overall victory at Le Mans.

The house

A continuous idea, developed in public.

Where Ferrari sold racing cars to the public, Porsche refined a single idea for sixty years: a flat engine hung behind the rear axle, made faster and more usable with every generation. The 911 is the longest continuous bloodline in the collector world, and the market prices each branch of it precisely.

Air-cooled cars are the blue-chip core — the Carrera RS 2.7, the 964 and 993 specials, the wide-body Turbos. Since 2010 the modern GT department has built a second tier of instant collectibles, manual-gearbox cars deliberately made in numbers smaller than demand.

At the very top sit the sports-racers: the 550, the 904, the 908 and the 917 that finally won Le Mans outright. These trade alongside the best Ferraris of their era, and a documented works history is worth as much as the car itself.

Founded
1931
The business began as a Stuttgart engineering office; the first car bearing the Porsche name followed in 1948.
Homologation output
1,580 Carrera RS 2.7s
Porsche planned 500 cars for Group 4 homologation, but demand carried production to 1,580 by July 1973.
Defining layout
Rear-engined flat-six
The 911 has kept its six-cylinder engine behind the rear axle since the model was presented in 1963.
Documented sale
US$14.08m
Gooding sold 917K chassis 917-024 at Pebble Beach in 2017.

Selected milestones

A bloodline, not a list.

  1. 1931

    The engineering office opens

    Ferdinand Porsche establishes an independent design and engineering business in Stuttgart.

  2. 1948

    The first Porsche-badged car

    The 356 No. 1 Roadster receives its operating permit and begins the marque's production-car history.

  3. 1963

    The 911 line begins

    The six-cylinder 901 is presented at Frankfurt and enters production under the 911 name.

  4. 1970

    Porsche wins Le Mans outright

    The 917 gives Porsche its first overall victory at Le Mans and moves the company beyond class wins.

  5. 1972

    The road-going RS formula

    The Carrera RS 2.7 turns a 500-car homologation plan into a 1,580-car production run and establishes the RS line.

  6. 2003

    Carrera GT production begins

    A carbon-fibre chassis and naturally aspirated V10 bring an abandoned racing programme into a road car.

  7. 2013

    The hybrid flagship enters production

    The 918 Spyder combines a V8 with two electric motors and places hybrid technology at the top of the road-car range.

What defines Porsche

Development over reinvention

Porsche evolves established layouts and model families across generations instead of replacing their central idea.

Competition as development work

Homologation cars and the RS and GT lines carry racing requirements into road-going production.

Specification before badge

Original configuration, production context and documentary history determine where an individual car sits in the collector hierarchy.

The hands

Who drew and built the Porsche files

2 names in the register stand behind this manufacturer. Each has a file of their own, following the work wherever it went.

The whole register of people

The mark

One crest, drawn in 1952.

New York, 1951: importer Max Hoffman asks Ferry Porsche for a seal of quality his American customers can see. The legend says a napkin — the record says a design competition across Germany’s art colleges, and the answer that stuck came from inside the house.

Engineer Franz Xaver Reimspieß — presumed author of Volkswagen’s roundel in 1936 — sketched it in early 1952: Stuttgart’s rearing horse set into the antlers and colours of Württemberg, the city spelled out, PORSCHE as the canopy above. Registered that year, on the steering-wheel hub by winter, on the 356’s bonnet by 1954. It has never left.

Franz Xaver Reimspieß, 1952 · with publicity chief Hermann Lapper

1948–1952

The word alone — block capitals on the first 356s, no badge at all. Shown in today’s cut.

Porsche crest, 1952–1963

1952–1963

Reimspieß’s first crest: horse, antlers, and the city named.

Porsche crest, 1963–1994

1963–1994

Gold ground, sharper base — the 911 wears it from day one.

Porsche crest, 1994–2008

1994–2008

Redrawn flatter and warmer; burgundy replaces the bright red.

Porsche crest, 2008–2023

2008–2023

Polished dimensionality — the crest as jewellery.

Porsche crest, 2023–

2023–

The 75th-anniversary redraw: matte gold, cleaner lines, a quieter horse.