With only a handful of exceptions, each new generation of a car tends to be larger than the one before it. It’s been going on for decades, accelerated in part by stricter safety regulations. Cramming more technology is also making vehicles fatter and fatter. This neverending growth has brought a significant weight penalty, so even once small and nimble sports cars are now carrying substantially more heft.
Porsche is aware of this worrying trend but admits its hands are pretty much tied at the moment. Speaking with the Australian magazine Drive, design boss Michael Mauer explained that legislation surrounding safety and other requirements has contributed to the 911’s extra thickness. Adding power to Zuffenhausen’s sports car forced the engineers to fit larger wheels and brakes to handle the engine’s extra oomph.
“It is, as well, very much driven by [government regulations] and the [car’s] performance. Whenever, if you go back in 20, 30 years ago, how much horsepower the 911 had and how much it has today, that drives the size of the wheels, the size of the brakes, all this stuff.”
Ideally, Porsche would like to introduce a smaller 911, but this isn’t feasible in the current era of combustion engines. Mauer suggests that it might become technically possible further down the line as EV technology matures. Once energy density improves, allowing battery packs to be downsized, the 911 could potentially be smaller. However, the company has ruled out launching a fully electric 911 this decade. Whether the car will be as appealing without a combustion engine remains to be seen.
In a perfect world, Mauer would like the 911 to be “as compact as possible,” returning to its roots as a “very compact little sports car.” However, packaging constraints are currently preventing Porsche from realizing this vision of a downsized version of its iconic model. It’s a problem affecting nearly all types of cars, not just the sporty ones.
We’ll remind you that the recently launched 992.2-generation 911 has put on even more weight. The Carrera GTS is now a hybrid and the extra electric bits along with more standard equipment have added 103 pounds. It weighs 3,536 lbs in rear-wheel-drive guise and 3,635 lbs for the AWD equivalent.
To put that into perspective, a 1972 911 Carrera RS 2.7 tipped the scales at 2,116 lbs. You can still get a sports car in 2024 that weighs only a little bit more by buying a Mazda MX-5 but the Miata is far from being a direct rival. Even the Japanese roadster will have to be electrified to meet stricter emissions regulations, so it too will likely get heavier.
Porsche’s smaller sports car, the 718 Boxster/Cayman, is on its way out. Well, the one we all know and love with gas power. The mid-engined duo will be discontinued in 2025 to make room for a pair of sporty EVs. It’s hard to say whether the electric models will be smaller than the outgoing gas cars. For what it’s worth, the prototypes spotted thus far didn’t appear to be more compact. A lower curb weight seems highly unlikely; in fact, the opposite is more probable.