CarBrandLogos archive · Bentley · 2003

BentleyContinental GT

Twelve cylinders, four driven wheels, and the car that turned Crewe into a volume plant.

Photo: Alexandre Prevot from Nancy, France · CC BY-SA 2.0

The story

A defining chapter in Bentley history.

Explore the ideas, engineering and context that shaped the Bentley Continental GT, then continue into its specifications and place in the marque's lineage.

2007-2010 Bentley Continental GT Speed coupe 01

Origins

When Rolls-Royce and Bentley were separated at the end of the 1990s, BMW took the Rolls-Royce name and Volkswagen took Crewe, the Bentley marque and a company building perhaps a thousand cars a year. Ferdinand Piëch's plan required a Bentley that could sell in far greater numbers, and the Continental GT of 2003 was it.

2007-2010 Bentley Continental GT Speed coupe 01 · OSX · Public domain

2007-2010 Bentley Continental GT Speed coupe 02

Design and engineering

It shared its platform and its twin-turbocharged W12 engine with the Volkswagen Phaeton, added four-wheel drive and air suspension, and was priced far beneath the hand-built Continental R it replaced. Dirk van Braeckel's body took the fastback line and round-lamp face of the 1952 R Type Continental and made them work at modern proportions, which is why the car looked like a Bentley to people who could not have explained why.

2007-2010 Bentley Continental GT Speed coupe 02 · OSX · Public domain

2010-2011 Bentley Continental Supersports convertible 01

In production

Enthusiasts of the old coachbuilt cars were unimpressed and it did not matter in the slightest. Buyers arrived in numbers Crewe had never handled, and within a few years the factory's annual output had multiplied roughly tenfold, requiring the plant to be substantially rebuilt around the new car.

2010-2011 Bentley Continental Supersports convertible 01 · OSX · Public domain

Legacy

Three generations have followed the same recipe. A V8 joined the range in 2012 for buyers who wanted less mass over the front axle, a plug-in hybrid arrived more recently, and a rear-wheel-drive Supersports has been added at the top. It remains the car that pays for everything else the company does.

At a glance