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10 Most Popular Cars of the Year

Meet the top 10 contenders for the Yahoo! Autos Excelerator Award.

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By the Road & Track Staff

Toyota Yaris

2008 Toyota Yaris

While the Prius is a fuel economy champ, the subcompact Yaris is proof that exotic technology is not necessary to achieve stellar efficiency. This cute city car comes in three different body styles, 3- and 5-door liftbacks and a 4-door sedan. The 5-door is the most recent addition to the line. It has the same diminutive footprint as the 3-door liftback, yet the 5-door offers more user-friendly rear-seat access. Both the 3- and 5-door models share the same 96.9-in. wheelbase and measure a scant 150.6 in. overall, while the larger 4-door sedan benefits from a 100.4-in. wheelbase and tapes out at 169.3 in. overall. The hatches have a jaunty style all their own with large headlamps flanking an open grille topped by the Toyota logo. More conservative in appearance, the 4-door Yaris sedan looks like the little brother of the Corolla. All models feature decent interior space along with a quirky dash layout that features a center-mounted instrument cluster. Now everybody in the car can see how fast you’re going, or how much fuel you have left.

All Yaris models are equipped with standard ABS, front seat-mounted airbags and side- curtain airbags. The fuel-stingy 1.5-liter twincam 4-cylinder engine is paired with a 5-speed manual or 4-speed automatic transmission, which in base models provides fuel economy numbers of 29 mpg city/36 mpg highway, the perfect antidote to painful pump prices.

Selecting the S model will get you a number of appearance-enhancing items including a redesigned body kit, unique sport upholstery and a leather-wrapped steering wheel and shift knob. Yaris owners can up the ante with TRD accessories including suspension modifications, sport exhaust and 18-in. alloy wheels.

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