What are kei cars?

Out of difficult circumstances can come brilliant things – and few things illustrate that better than the Japanese kei car.

Short for keijidōsha, meaning 'light automobile' in Japanese, the kei car is Japan's smallest class of car – something akin to, but often even smaller than, our 'city car' class containing the likes of the Fiat 500 and Panda, VW Up!, Ford Ka, Peugeot 108 and others.

Kei cars are Japan's smallest highway-legal passenger cars – and, often, minor packaging miracles. Let’s look at their history – and revisit some outstanding examples of these triumphs of miniaturisation.

Many kei cars now qualify for classic status. If you have one of these mini miracles, the specialists at Lancaster can help you protect it. Get a quick quote for classic car insurance today.

Origins: getting Japan moving again

Kei cars were introduced into Japan in the years after World War Two. War had been hard on the Japanese economy, and most post-war Japanese families could not afford a full-sized car. Keen to resuscitate the national car industry, and to get small delivery businesses on the move, the government introduced a new, low tax band for the very smallest cars. These baby models would also benefit from lower insurance premiums. Limits were drawn up regarding the new class' maximum permissible length, width, height, and engine size: a power limit, interestingly, came only much later, in 1990.

When the new kei class was first created in 1949, cars that qualified were limited to engines of just 150cc, although the rules were relaxed several times over the next few years.

As well as making cars affordable for families and small businesses, and jump-starting the Japanese car sector, kei cars were well suited to the nation's narrow and crowded streets. It also suited the many drivers who, in Japan's densely populated cities, did not have their own off-street parking. In short, in a country with a high population density, dozens of large, crowded cities, a still relatively poor population and a struggling motor industry, the need for compact small cars must have been self-evident.

Those initial rules were stringent: alongside the 150cc maximum engine size, cars needed to be no longer than 2.8 metres, and no wider than one metre, to make the cut. From 1951, however, the width limit was relaxed to 1.3 metres, while the maximum permitted engine capacity took a quantum leap to 360cc.

Light as a feather: the earliest kei cars

The first kei car was the Suzuki Suzulight of 1955. Having started out manufacturing motorcycles, Suzuki were well placed to enter the small car market. Other early successes included the Subaru 360, the first mass-produced vehicle in this class, which as its name suggests made use of the 360cc upper limit, yet weighed just 454kg (for comparison, the lightest version of today's Fiat 500 tops the scales at 865kg). You could even (just about) get two people in the back. The car was produced from 1958-1970 and was a big sales success in Japan, selling around 392,000.

The crazy thing is that it wasn't even the lightest car in its class at the time – that honour probably went to the Mazda R360 (1960-66), which weighed in at just 380kg (and, again, managed to accommodate four passengers, although room for the rear two wasn't exactly cavernous). Weight-saving tricks here included a Plexiglass rear windscreen. The 356cc engine could produce 12bhp and whisk its passengers around Japan's narrow roads at a hair-raising maximum speed of 56mph.

Small cars, big market share

The population density issue has never gone away, space has continued to be at a premium and, even though average incomes have gone up significantly, kei cars have always remained a popular automobile sector in Japan. In fact, they reached a peak 40% market share as recently as 2013.

Things dropped off a little after that, as the Japanese government raised the tax burden for kei cars by 50% in 2014. Why? Well, aware that kei cars didn't make great exports to the rest of the world (there isn't the same appetite for these diminutive wonders outside Japan), it wanted to encourage more export-friendly models in order to boost growth, and so penalised the kei class.

However, kei cars have remained popular ever since. In 2018, for example, the top ten list of Japan's best-selling domestic models featured seven kei cars – including all of the top four, a series of box-shaped mini MPVs by Honda (the N-Box), Suzuki (Spacia), Nissan (Dayz) and Daihatsu (Tanto).

These uniquely Japanese creations haven't generally fared quite as well abroad, although there have been exceptions such as the Suzuki Alto (and its sister car, the Nissan Pixo) – as well as the same company's Jimny mini-SUV, all of whose four generations have had kei-compliant versions for the domestic market, alongside slightly higher engine displacements for export markets. Earlier versions of the Jimny could now be considered classics – if you're the lucky owner of one of these early pint-sized off-roaders, we'd recommend a swift call to your favoured classic car insurance provider.

In fact, quite a few kei cars were adapted for use abroad – Honda's first model, the N360, got a compliant 354cc engine for the home market, while versions overseas were usually supplied with 402cc or 598cc engines.

Elsewhere, the US has been a large market for imported second-hand kei trucks, used by farmers, hunters and others for their small size – perfect for rural roads – and easy-loading flatbeds.

Oddities have crept in down the years – such as the Honda Vamos (1970-73), a two-door jeep and rough equivalent to other 70s 'leisure vehicles' like the Citroen Mehari and Mini Moke.

Sales of kei cars dipped, in fact, in the 1970s, with cars and owners alike chafing under the still-stringent restrictions – but picked up in the latter half of the decade as the government relaxed regulations, allowing increases to both the kei class dimensions and engine displacement – from 3 x 1.3m wide to 3.2 x 1.4m, and more significantly from 360cc to 550cc.

Soon afterwards, economic growth during the 1980s meant that Japanese customers had a little more spending power, and as a consequence kei cars started to feel a little less utilitarian. Now, comforts such as four-wheel drive, turbochargers and air-conditioning were filtering down even into the kei class.

The regulations on dimensions, engine size and power output have also been further relaxed over time, and modern kei cars are allowed a total length of up to 3.4 metres, as well as a width of 1.48 metres. Permitted engine capacity, meanwhile, has climbed to the (still miniature) 660cc.

Nearly all Japan's kei cars have been designed and manufactured at home, although Smart made a kei-compliant version of their (already very compact) FourTwo for the Japanese market, and our own super-lightweight Caterham 7 160 sports car also creeps in under the kei barrier.

The 1990s: kei cars get sporty

Later on, in the early 1990s, kei cars started acquiring a distinctly sporty bent – think mini roadsters, or three-quarter size supercars. Built by Suzuki, the Autozam AZ-1 came with gullwing doors and a turbocharged 657cc engine driving its rear wheels. The only thing counting against it, in fact, was its appearance in 1992, during a recession – which meant that a mere 4,392 AZ-1s were made.

Elsewhere, 1991's Honda Beat, abandoned all pretence at boxy functionality – styled by Italy's brilliant Pininfarina studio, the Beat had a convertible top and a range of eye-catching colour options, making it look more like a baby supercar than a sensible, box-ticking tax-saver.

Innovation was everywhere – not only in the designs, but in the engineering, too. For example, just a couple of years after the first-generation Toyota Prius and Honda Insight, the kei class got its own hybrid car – the cute-looking Suzuki Twin, which came out in 2003.

A uniquely Japanese phenomenon?

So, are kei cars a purely Japanese thing? Well, yes and no. Postwar Europe went through its own obsession with what were called 'microcars' – examples included the SMZ S-1L (1952-58) from Russia's SeAZ company, which looked a little like a diminutive, curvier Reliant Robin three-wheeler, with one bulbous front headlight right in the centre of the bonnet. Elsewhere, the Messerschmitt KR200, or Kabinenroller ('cabin scooter'), was a three-wheeled bubble car designed by an aircraft engineer and produced by the German aeroplane manufacturer Messerschmitt from 1955 to 1964.

Then there was the extraordinary, egg-shaped Isetta, designed in Italy and made under licence in several European nations. In 1955, BMW's version of the Isetta became the first mass-production car to manage a fuel consumption of 3 L/100 km (or 94 mpg). It was also (albeit in a not especially crowded field) the world's top-selling single-cylinder car, shifting 161,728 units.

Like the Japanese kei car initiative, many of these machines emerged into national economies still impoverished by the ravages of war, and yet keen to get their automotive industries up and running by supplying affordable motoring to the masses.

Here in the UK, we produced licence-built, right-hand-drive versions of the Isetta – and of its fellow bubble car, the Heinkel Kabine. Like Messerschmitt, Heinkel was a German aircraft manufacturer, and it had produced bombers for the Luftwaffe during the war. The company built its Kabine from 1956 to 1958, and licensed it to Britain's Trojan Cars Ltd, of Croydon, from 1960-1966. The British version was known as the Trojan 200.

Our version of the Isetta, meanwhile, featured just one rear wheel instead of the model's usual pair. This was to benefit from UK laws around three-wheel vehicles, which were classed as three-wheeled motorcycles and thus avoided car legislation and tax – and could be driven with a motorcycle licence.

After the privations of postwar Europe, microcars received another boost from the rise in fuel prices brought about by the 1956 Suez Crisis. Suddenly, tiny, fuel-sipping cars made a strong case for themselves.

The microcar boom lasted until the late 1950s, when larger cars came roaring back: it's odd to think of it now, but the 1959 Mini was actually something of a giant compared to some of these vehicles. By the end of the 1960s, unlike their Japanese counterparts, Europe's microcars were fading from the scene, ousted by the likes of the Mini, Fiat 500, Citroen 2CV, and Renault 4.

Undersized… and over here?

So, did Japan's kei cars make much impact here in the UK? Well, it's true that a few kei cars have made modest waves in this country.

First mention must go to the Suzuki Wagon-R which, back home, enjoyed six years (2003-08) as Japan's best-selling kei car, and also became reasonably popular here.

Daihatsu's oddball Copen mini-cabriolet also fared moderately well here – it was supplied here with a 1.3-litre four-cylinder engine, rather than the 659cc three-cylinder unit built for the domestic market. The database How Many Left suggests that there are around 1,300 Copens left on British roads – and they're now around the age where they become contenders for classic car insurance.

Something a little more innovative reached these shores in the shape of the Mitsubishi I, another 659cc effort that arrived here in 2006 and would later be developed into the successful i-MiEV electric car (so successful, in fact, that Citroen and Peugeot released their own badge-engineered versions).

Then there was the Suzuki Cappuccino. OK, let's just get the name out of the way first: a nod to smart city lifestyles of the early 1990s, it was nonetheless probably one of the sillier car names we've witnessed. With its lightweight aluminium panels and 63bhp on tap, the Cappuccino could go all the way to 93mph. It had a pop-out roof, too, for those wind-in-your-hair thrills. The UK was a relatively happy hunting ground for the Cappuccino: some 1,1000 made it here, compared to just 72 for all of continental Europe.

Mighty classic car insurance for small cars

So there we have the kei car story: a class of car born out of necessity in a crowded country struggling to get back on its feet, which has slowly but surely become absolutely essential to Japanese motoring culture, and has even made a few modest waves abroad. And who knows, with concerns about both emissions and overcrowding on Britain's roads, could it be a time for a mini revolution here, too?

Japan's kei cars are a fascinating piece of the global automotive jigsaw, and one which has influenced the way we conceive small cars to this day. Perhaps you're the proud keeper of your own little slice of motoring history – a classic car that vividly represents a certain automotive era.

We know you'll want to protect your classic, and at Lancaster we are well equipped to help you do that.

Benefits of classic car insurance for Japanese imports through Lancaster can include:

• Historic rally cover
• Static show cover
• Limited mileage discounts
• Choice of repairer
• 24-hour claims helpline

Give your classic the protection it deserves and contact us for a quote today.

Policy benefits, features and discounts offered may very between insurance schemes or cover selected and are subject to underwriting criteria. Information contained within this article is accurate at the time of publishing but may be subject to change.