These words all denote various types of passenger cars. A sedan , the most common and popular model of car, is a closed vehicle having two or four doors and a front and back seat. Depending upon its size, it may hold from four to six passengers including the driver. A two-door sedan has two forward-folding bucket seats in the front and a full rear seat. Saloon , the British word for a sedan , it sometimes used in Australia and New Zealand.

A convertible is a car with a fabric top that may be folded down in good weather. It is usually the same size as the large sedan and holds the same number of passengers. Convertibles differ in body structure from sedans in that they lack the vertical posts between the sides of the body and the roof.

A station wagon or station sedan , often known in New Zealand as an estate wagon or estate sedan , is a four-door car which has also a tailgate at the rear. It has two, and in some cases three, rows of seats and may accommodate as many as eight or nine passengers. The station wagon differs from the sedan and the convertible in that the seats behind the driver may be removed or folded flat to make a large level area for carrying luggage or other bulky articles.

The limousine is a large, luxurious car, originally having a closed compartment for from three to five passengers (two of whom sit on folding seats with their backs to the driver) and an open driver’s seat with or without a projecting roof. Modern limousines now house both driver and passengers under the same roof, although the passengers are separated from the driver by sliding glass panels. Limousines , although maintained by some wealthy people who employ chauffeurs to drive them, are more frequently used to carry government official, people in funeral cortèges, etc. Popularly, a limousine is any large, shiny, expensive car, generally black.

A sports car is a low, rakish vehicle, usually seating two persons and built for high speed and manoeuvrability. It is a car perhaps more intended for pleasure driving than for the business of getting from one place to another. Sports cars are often brightly painted, e.g., in red or green, and usually have a fold-down fabric top.

Hardtop is an American term for a type of convertible whose roof is not of foldable fabric but of metal or fibreglass, sometimes detachable. In Australia and New Zealand, hardtop applies to a kind of sports car which has a similarly rigid roof. In some models this roof may be removed bodily, thus converting the vehicle into an open sports car. An increasingly popular version of the sports car is the two-plus-two , which has normal accommodation in the front for two people, plus two small seats in the rear that are suitable for children ?or even adults, provided the journey is a short one.

Roadster and coupé refer to two models of cars no longer manufactured in their original form. The roadster was an early type of sports car with a folding top and one seat, generally wide enough for only two passengers. Some roadsters could accommodate two extra passengers in a dickey sea which folded down into the boot. The coupé was a single-seat similar to the roadster except that it had a metal top. Today the coupé is undergoing a revival of popularity in the form of a closed, two-door vehicle, known in America as a fastback, which seats two or three passengers including the driver, and which has a space for luggage either directly behind the seat or in a separate compartment in the rear.