Today is National Name Your Car Day … 12 Fun Facts About Naming Cars
About 42% of Americans say they name their vehicles. A 2018 survey found that nearly three-quarters of those people said naming their car made them feel more bonded to it.
Women were slightly more likely than men to name their cars in that survey. The difference was 7 percentage points.
Cars are more often given female names than male names. In the same survey, about 55% of people who named their cars treated the vehicle as female, with “Betsy” and “Betty” among the most popular names.
Many people don’t name their car immediately. The survey found that 43% of people waited at least a month after buying their vehicle before deciding on its name.
A car’s personality actually factors into its name. Fifty-six percent of respondents said things such as the car’s personality, make/model, and color influenced what they called it.
“Lizzie” became a word for an automobile more than 100 years ago. The Oxford-style historical record at Etymonline dates the use of “Lizzie” as slang for a motor car, particularly an early Ford, to around 1913.
The Ford Model T had dozens of nicknames. “Tin Lizzie” was the most famous, but Ford itself notes that the Model T accumulated many different nicknames during its production run.
“Tin Lizzie” may have originated with one specific car. One widely repeated account traces the name to a Model T called “Old Liz,” which competed in a 1922 Pikes Peak race and subsequently helped popularize the nickname for Model Ts generally. The exact origin isn’t certain, though.
Individual car names are actually studied as a form of naming. A 2023 academic paper on unofficial vehicle names distinguishes between names used by a whole community, such as “Tin Lizzie,” and names given to one particular vehicle by its owner or family.
The tradition of giving cars human names is almost as old as mass automobile ownership itself. “Tin Lizzie” was already being used for the Model T in the early 20th century, and the Model T was produced from 1908 to 1927, with more than 15 million eventually built.
The Volkswagen Beetle is one of the most commonly nicknamed cars in history. Its rounded shape inspired names like “Bug,” “Beetle,” and even country-specific nicknames in dozens of languages.
Color is one of the biggest inspirations for car names. Names like “Ruby,” “Pearl,” “Snowball,” “Midnight,” and “Silver Bullet” are popular because the vehicle’s paint essentially provides the nickname for free.
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