BMW has been around now for over one hundred years, and it has evolved into one of the world's most famous car brands. Selling millions of units worldwide every single year, it goes without saying that the brand has also created some of the best cars ever.
BMW is well-known for making sporty and stylish drivers' cars, however, over the years the German company has also built some weird and wonderful cars. Some of these weird cars actually sold really well, whilst some were complete flops.
10 Isetta
The BMW Isetta is famous for all the wrong reasons, and it actually wasn't BMW's initial design. The Isetta was originally an Italian-designed microcar that was built by many manufacturers around the world under license, and BMW was one of these manufacturers. It was not one of their normal cars at the time, however, it gave them the sales they needed.
BMW did modify the Isetta slightly by fitting their own one-cylinder four-stroke 247cc motorcycle engine. It was slightly more powerful with 12hp and a crazy 0 to 60 time of never - the Isetta only had a top speed of 53 mph. You could even drive this car with a motorcycle license too. However, we firmly believe it's a car no American should ever drive.
9 Z3 M Coupe
By far the strangest M-car BMW has ever built, but it is extremely sexy. It has such wide hips at the rear which makes this car look special. This car was often referred to as the "bread van" due to its shooting-brake looks, but some people also stated that this car looks more like a clown shoe than a car. The standard Z3 coupe was weird but the Z3 M coupe was even weirder with its wider arches.
The Z3 M coupe had the same engine as the E36 M3. North American models were powered by a 3.2 liter straight-6 with 315hp and 252 lb-ft of torque. The Z3 M coupe was a great car for drifting, and it was amazing to drive. It may not be as good as certain other M-cars, but it's certainly a lot more unique.
8 Z1
The Z1 is a car that truly is weird. It looks like a normal roadster until you see the doors. They literally open and close like car windows as they slide up and down electronically, which is very unique, but also very weird and pointless. The coolest part was that the car could be driven with the doors down.
However, a common fault of the Z1 is that the door mechanism can easily break. This means that you can potentially have a doorless car if things go wrong which isn't exactly ideal for security reasons. It by far has one of the weirdest doors of any car.
7 Z8
The Z8 is a great-looking car, and it's mainly inspired by the beautiful 507 roadster from the 1950s. It was a retro supercar with a meaty 4.9-liter V8 from the e39 M5, and it pushed out around 395hp and 369 lb-ft of torque. It hit 60 in 4.2 seconds and flat out without a limiter it would do 180 mph.
The Z8 was a weird car though. Its rear taillights were neon-tubes that are said to last a lifetime. The interior is very retro and the hood is very long. It also is a handful to drive. The coolest part about the Z8 is that it was featured in a Bond movie.
6 2-Series Active Tourer/Grand Tourer
When you think BMW 2-series you think of the small, sporty, stylish coupe based on the same platform as the 1-series hatchback. However, there are two variants of the two series which are not any of those things. The 2-series Active Tourer and Gran Tourer are both MPVs, and they have nothing in common with the 2-series.
These two cars were both weird as they were so distant from the BMW brand image of fun, and it was certain that these two would never live up to the BMW slogan of "the ultimate driving machine." These MPVs were front-wheel-drive family cars that just looked so out of place in the BMW lineup, and that's probably why they didn't sell many of them. These two cars are a complete disgrace to the brand.
5 I8
The i8 was one weird car. It looked like a UFO inside and out and it was made from carbon fiber. However, it was also weird for the wrong reasons. The BMW i8 looked like a supercar with its sleek shape and butterfly doors, but it was powered by a 1.5L three-cylinder Mini engine, seated four people, and used fake engine noises. However, when it was launched it was revolutionary with its hybrid system.
There are many reasons why we would want an i8, but there are also many reasons why we'd steer clear of it. It certainly did leave behind a pathway for many future cars but everything about the car was just so strange. Maybe it was just too ahead of its time?
4 I3
The i3 was BMW's first electric car and right now it's the worst-selling electric car in America. It was launched back in 2013 and when it was launched it was revolutionary. It had futuristic looks, suicide doors, an MPV style body, and a glass trunk lid. BMW wanted the i3 to look like a car from the future and at the time along with its sibling the i8 it sure did.
The i3 is one seriously ugly car, it's also not very sporty nor particularly fast. For an electric car in 2021, it is quite disappointing.
3 X6
The X6 was launched in 2008, and it essentially created a whole new market and trend. It was the first proper coupe SUV and when it was launched people thought BMW had gone mad. The X6 gets a lot of praise though for its great handling and a great choice of engines. Prior to the X6, nobody ever really needed a coupe-like SUV, but it seemed to work as Mercedes, VW, Audi, etc, all copied BMW.
It should be noted that the X6 was fairly useless as an SUV. It originally only had 4-seats, and it's terrible off-road. It was actually marketed as a "sports activity coupe" which was quite clever as it wouldn't have been as competitive if it was marketed as an SUV.
2 5-Series Gran Turismo
The 5-Series Gran Turismo was launched at the same time as the F10 5-series sedan, and it had more in common with the larger 7-series than it did with the 5-series. It was a large car with a lot of space, and it shared the same engines as the normal 5-series sedan. It did, however, look like a house on wheels.
It was completely pointless since an X5 did the same job for similar money. It also didn't handle too well, and it felt like an MPV. It was not cool at all and the front bumper looked like a beaver.
1 700
The 700 is one of the lesser-known BMWs, although it did somewhat save the brand from bankruptcy. This economy car was powered by a rear-mounted 696cc flat-twin engine with around 30 to 40hp. This car sold over 188,000 times which is insane, and it's exactly what BMW needed to stay afloat. It does look extremely weird though.
The front of the 700 has no famous kidney grille, so it's not easily recognizable. They also did a coupe version and a Cabrio version, both of which looked tiny and really odd. In fact, the 700 is the least BMW looking BMW ever created and that's why it had no successor.