See Just How Big Cars Are Getting With This Incredible Tool

Cars are getting bigger all the time. Trucks keep getting taller and longer, EVs keep getting heavier, and wheels seem to add another inch every time we turn our back. Now, it’s possible to see just how big vehicles have gotten over time with a useful online tool.

The tagline of Carsized.com is “Bringing car spotting into perspective.” The site does that well, enabling us to quantify statements like “that’s a big car!” or “wow, you could fit that thing in the bed of my truck!” This is because it has a rich database of modern vehicles, and it can display them next to each other in accurate scale.

The tool will allow two vehicles to be compared front-on, side-0n, and from the rear. Vehicles can be lined up by their front bumpers, front tires, or at their mid-points, depending on the comparison you’re looking for. The site also provides useful statistics for comparison.

For example, here we have a 2008 Fiat 500 stacked up next to a GMC Yukon XL from 2020, in long-wheelbase trim. The site tells us that the Fiat is 206.3 cm shorter in length (6.75 feet) and 45.8 cm shorter in height (1.5 feet) than the hefty American SUV. We’re also instructed that it has 15 cm less ground clearance (6 inches), and 86% less cargo space. While few would cross-shop these two vehicles, the numbers are nonetheless useful if you’re looking to determine which truck or SUV will best fit your lifestyle and/or garage.

The spatial comparisons it enables are pretty neat. The tool shows us that the roofline of a BMW 7 Series barely crests the top of the bed of a Toyota Tundra. It can show us that the Toyota Corolla maybe hasn’t grown as much as we think over the last three decades, while the Mini Cooper absolutely has. It’s also great to remember that while a lot of cars used to be smaller, that wasn’t the case across the board. Cars like the Pontiac Grand Ville are an excellent example, with the two-door convertible luxury car standing a full 18.8 feet long – that’s over 1.6 feet longer than a Ford Expedition SUV, as pictured up top.

The only drawback is that the collection of vehicles is rather incomplete at this stage. While most cars you’ve ever heard of are in the listings, you’ll struggle to find any record of a 1980s Toyota Camry, or early versions of the Honda Civic, for example.

There are also very few examples of trucks with two-door cabs and full-length beds. This is a disappointment for those eager to figure out which microcars will fit in the back of which trucks. Regardless, we learned that neither an original Mini nor a Smart ForTwo will fit in the back of a crew-cab Ford F-350, unless you leave the tailgate open. There is also enough data to show us why it feels so scary driving a Mazda Miata on the freeway around full-size trucks, given the way the diminutive roadster tends to disappear from sight beyond the hood line. Scary stuff.

It’s a great way to get an intuitive feel for the size differences between different vehicles, particularly across classes. Bloat looks set to continue in the automotive industry for some time yet, particularly as automakers look to stash giant batteries beneath the floors of their latest designs. Tools like these will be useful for mapping out how the vehicles of today differ from the sleeker, lighter designs of years past. If this tool brings you to any startling revelations of your own, don’t hesitate to sound off in the comments.