26 Car Brands That Start With D (Origins, Owners & History)

Car brands that start with D include the company that was briefly the largest carmaker in the world, and the one that built 9,000 cars and became immortal because of a film. Dodge, Dacia, Daihatsu, Daimler, DS and Datsun cover the volume end — alongside Duesenberg, DeLorean and De Tomaso.

This guide covers 26 car brands beginning with D, with country of origin, founding year, current ownership and what each is known for.

Car Brands Starting With D: Complete List

Current Manufacturers

Dodge

Founded by brothers John and Horace Dodge in 1900, initially supplying parts to Ford before building complete cars from 1914. Both brothers died in 1920 within months of each other. Dodge became the muscle-car arm of Chrysler and now sits within Stellantis, where it has pushed the internal-combustion muscle formula about as far as it can go — the supercharged Hellcat engines produced outputs that would have been supercar territory a decade earlier.

Dacia

A Romanian manufacturer founded in 1966 that built licensed Renault designs under communism, and was acquired outright by Renault Group in 1999. Its modern strategy is unusual and has worked extremely well: strip out complexity, use proven Renault parts a generation old, and sell at a price nobody else matches. The Duster and Sandero regularly outsell far more expensive rivals in Europe.

Daihatsu

Japan’s oldest car manufacturer, founded in 1907, and now a wholly owned Toyota subsidiary. It specialises in kei cars — vehicles built to Japan’s strict size and engine-capacity limits, which get tax and parking advantages. Kei cars are a category with essentially no equivalent elsewhere, and Daihatsu is one of its defining makers.

DS Automobiles

Created in 2014 when Citroën split its premium models into a separate brand, taking the name of the 1955 Citroën DS — one of the most technically radical cars ever mass-produced. It sits within Stellantis and is positioned against Audi and BMW, with mixed commercial results outside France.

Daimler

A British marque, and one of the most persistently confused names in motoring. Daimler of Coventry licensed Gottlieb Daimler’s patents in 1896 but is a separate company from the German Daimler that became Mercedes-Benz. It was the British royal family’s car of choice for decades, and the name now belongs to Tata Motors through Jaguar Land Rover.

Denza

Founded in 2010 as a joint venture between BYD and Daimler, aimed at premium electric vehicles for the Chinese market. Ownership has shifted decisively: Mercedes-Benz reduced its stake to 10% in 2021 and then transferred its remaining shareholding to BYD in September 2024, ending the partnership after 13 years. Denza is now wholly owned by BYD and functions as its premium sub-brand.

Dongfeng

One of China’s largest state-owned automakers, founded in 1969 as Second Automobile Works during a period when heavy industry was deliberately dispersed inland for strategic reasons. It has operated long-standing joint ventures with Nissan, Honda and PSA, and now sells its own brands domestically and increasingly for export.

Donkervoort

A Dutch manufacturer building extremely light, extremely rigid sports cars derived from the Lotus Seven concept, using Audi five-cylinder turbo engines. Its cars generate exceptional lateral grip — the company quotes cornering figures well beyond most road cars — because the weight is so low rather than because the power is high.

Discontinued and Absorbed Marques

Datsun

Nissan’s export brand for decades, and the name under which Japanese cars first became credible in America — the 240Z in particular reset expectations for what a Japanese sports car could be. Nissan phased the name out by 1986 in favour of its own, then revived Datsun in 2013 as a budget marque for emerging markets. That second attempt struggled and Nissan discontinued the brand again in April 2022.

Daewoo

A South Korean conglomerate that entered cars in the 1980s and expanded aggressively before the 1997 Asian financial crisis brought the group down. General Motors acquired the car division in 2002, and the Daewoo name was progressively replaced — most Daewoo models were rebadged as Chevrolets, and the operation became GM Korea.

DeLorean

Built roughly 9,000 cars in Northern Ireland between 1981 and 1982 before collapsing, and would be a footnote were it not for Back to the Future. The DMC-12’s stainless-steel panels were unpainted, which looks striking and shows every fingerprint. Its 130 bhp V6 made it far slower than it looked. The name has since been revived by a separate company.

Duesenberg

The high point of American luxury engineering. A Duesenberg Model J produced around 265 bhp in 1928, when most cars managed a fraction of that, and the chassis was sold to be bodied by coachbuilders for buyers including Hollywood stars and heads of state. “It’s a Duesy” entered the language. The Depression destroyed the market and the company ended in 1937.

De Dion-Bouton

Briefly the largest car manufacturer in the world around 1900, producing more vehicles than anyone else and licensing its engines so widely that dozens of early manufacturers were effectively built on De Dion designs. The De Dion tube rear suspension it developed is still referenced by name in chassis engineering today. It faded after the First World War.

Delahaye

A French maker whose 1930s cars carried some of the most extravagant coachbuilt bodies ever fitted to a chassis — the Figoni et Falaschi-bodied examples are still shown at Pebble Beach and Villa d’Este. That level of excess did not survive post-war austerity, and the company merged and closed in 1954.

Delage

A French marque with a serious Grand Prix record in the 1920s, including a dominant 1927 season. The name was revived in 2019 for the Delage D12, a hypercar with a tandem seating layout, which is an unusual case of a genuinely historic racing name returning rather than a badge being sold.

DKW

One of the four companies whose merger in 1932 created Auto Union — the four rings on the Audi badge represent DKW, Horch, Wanderer and Audi. DKW specialised in two-stroke engines and front-wheel drive, and was for a time the largest motorcycle manufacturer in the world. The marque did not survive the shift to four-strokes.

Detroit Electric

Sold electric cars from 1907, with a range of around 80 miles and a clientele that included Clara Ford — Henry Ford’s wife drove an electric rather than one of her husband’s cars. Electric vehicles were a serious contender until the electric starter removed the main disadvantage of petrol. The name has since been revived.

DAF

A Dutch company that invented the Variomatic, a rubber-belt continuously variable transmission, and fitted it to small cars from 1958 — decades before CVTs became common. A quirk of the design was that DAF cars could theoretically travel as fast in reverse as forwards, which led to reverse-driving races. The car division went to Volvo; DAF continues as a truck maker under PACCAR.

Specialists and Low-Volume Builders

De Tomaso

Founded by Argentine racing driver Alejandro de Tomaso in Italy in 1959, and best known for the Pantera — an Italian mid-engined body around a Ford Cleveland V8, sold through Lincoln-Mercury dealers in America. That combination made it far easier to own and service than most exotics, and around 7,000 were built. The name has since been revived for the P72.

Dauer

A German firm that took the Porsche 962 Group C racing car and made it road-legal — then entered the road-going version back into Le Mans in 1994, where it won outright. It is one of the more audacious exploits of regulation in motorsport history.

David Brown Automotive

Named after the industrialist who owned Aston Martin and whose initials give the DB in DB5. The modern company, founded in 2013 and unconnected to him, built retro-styled cars on modern Jaguar underpinnings. It entered administration in 2022.

Devel Motors

A UAE company that announced the Devel Sixteen with claimed outputs of several thousand horsepower from a quad-turbo V16. Claims of that magnitude attract scepticism, and independently verified performance has never matched the initial announcements.

Diatto

An Italian company dating to 1835 as a railway-carriage builder, later making cars. Its significance is largely genealogical: the Maserati brothers worked on Diatto racing cars, and when Diatto withdrew from racing they took the project on themselves — which is effectively how Maserati began.

Other Marques in This Group

Devin Enterprises

Devin Enterprises, an American business that Bill Devin founded in 1955, has achieved international recognition for creating bodies from an avant-garde polymer based on fiberglass. The business also produced and offered completed autos at the same time. The Devin Panhard, based on the Panhard chassis, was the company’s most well-known vehicle, onto which Devin’s custom body was “dressed.” A 1957 Devin MG powered by a Chevrolet V8. Alfas, MGs, Triumphs, and Healys with a rework from the brand were particularly well-liked automobiles. The Devin D, Devin SS, and Devin C were among the models created prior to 1964. Devin Sports Cars LLC of Glendale, California, USA, purchased the name in 2011.

Devon Motorworks

To develop and produce high-end vehicles, Scott Devon established Devon Motorworks in 2008 in Los Angeles, California, in the United States. The goal of the brand was to produce aesthetically pleasing technology. The first Devon GTX supercar entered production in 2010. However, the crisis halted operations. The company was the sole bidder for the Chrysler Dodge Viper platform. However, the deal did not go through. With only two cars produced, it was shut down in 2013.

Frequently Asked Questions

What car brands start with the letter D?

Twenty-six are covered here, including Dodge, Dacia, Daihatsu, Daimler, Datsun, DS Automobiles, Denza, Dongfeng, Daewoo, DeLorean, Duesenberg, Delage, Delahaye, De Dion-Bouton, De Tomaso, Donkervoort, DAF, DKW, Detroit Electric, Dauer, Devel, Diatto, Devin, Devon Motorworks and David Brown Automotive.

Who owns Dodge now?

Stellantis, the group formed in 2021 by the merger of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and France’s PSA Group. Stellantis holds fourteen car brands in total.

Is Datsun still made?

No. Nissan phased the name out by 1986, revived it in 2013 as a budget brand for emerging markets, and discontinued it again in April 2022. The second attempt never achieved the volumes Nissan needed.

Is British Daimler the same as Mercedes’ Daimler?

No, and this is a common confusion. Daimler of Coventry licensed Gottlieb Daimler’s patents in 1896 but was always a separate British company. The German Daimler became Mercedes-Benz. The British name now sits with Tata Motors through Jaguar Land Rover.

Who owns Denza?

BYD, outright. It began in 2010 as a BYD–Daimler joint venture, but Mercedes-Benz cut its stake to 10% in 2021 and transferred the remainder to BYD in September 2024, ending the partnership.

How many DeLoreans were built?

Roughly 9,000, between 1981 and 1982, before the company collapsed. Its fame rests almost entirely on Back to the Future rather than on its commercial or dynamic performance — the car was considerably slower than its styling suggested.

Sources

Stellantis brand portfolio: Stellantis corporate information. Datsun discontinuation timeline and Denza ownership transfer (Mercedes-Benz to BYD, September 2024): manufacturer announcements and automotive trade reporting. Founding dates follow manufacturer corporate histories and marque records.

Ownership in the motor industry changes frequently — check current corporate filings before relying on any ownership detail for business purposes.

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