Bentley Supersports Sheds Its Hybrid and Still Weighs Two Tons

The 2026 Bentley Supersports sends 657 hp to the rear wheels after Crewe pulled the hybrid pack and the driven front axle out of the Continental GT. The company says the two-seat coupe is tracking 1,995 kg, or 4,398 lb, the lightest Bentley road car in 85 years.

All 500 numbered cars are already spoken for, at a U.S. starting price of $486,600, even though the hybrid Speed still makes more power and a higher top speed.

They Took the Hybrid Out on Purpose

The idea landed in September 2024. A small group of engineers asked how a rear-drive Continental GT might behave if it also came in under two tonnes. Approval came for a single mule, which was on a circuit six weeks later. The code name was Project Mildred, after Mildred Mary Petre, a racing driver, powerboat racer and pilot who in 1929 lapped Montlhéry alone for 24 hours in a Bentley 4½ Litre and averaged almost 90 mph.

Dr Frank-Steffen Walliser, Bentley’s chairman and CEO, called it the first project he had seen through from start to finish since he arrived in Crewe. The brief was not more power. It was less car.

The 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 is a new variant of the existing architecture, with a stronger crankcase, uprated cylinder heads, larger single-scroll turbos and a dual-mass flywheel. Output is 666 PS (657 hp) and 800 Nm (590 lb-ft), the highest power density Bentley has published for any of its engines at 166.5 PS per litre. An eight-speed ZF dual-clutch gearbox, reworked with stronger clutches and a sharper shift map, sends that to the rear axle only, through an electronic limited-slip differential and brake-based torque vectoring. The rear track is 16 mm wider than a standard Continental GT.

There is no piped-in cabin soundtrack. The engine breathes through an Akrapovič full-length titanium exhaust that Bentley says is unique to this car.

WHAT CREWE TOOK OUT

• The hybrid pack: The plug-in battery, e-motor and related hardware that define every other current Continental GT are gone.
• The front-drive gear: This is the first series Continental GT to power only the rear wheels, aside from the GT3 race cars.
• The back seats: A carbon-fiber tub with a helmet shelf sits where the rear cabin used to be.
• The rotating screen: The spinning center display was dropped as part of the diet, along with seat massage.
• The armrest: The usual center rest is replaced by a lighter console, with a full rest listed as an option.

Carbon also replaces aluminium in the roof and the mirror caps, which lowers the center of gravity as well as the scales. Some driver-assistance kit that Bentley judged surplus on a two-seat GT was deleted with it.

4,398 Pounds Is Light, for Crewe

Bentley has not certified a final curb figure, and it is careful to say the car will weigh less than 2,000 kg. The working target quoted to launch drivers is 1,995 kg (4,398 lb). That is still a heavy sports coupe by any ordinary measure. It is also more than 1,000 pounds lighter than the current Continental GT Speed, which Bentley lists at 5,421 lb.

The Speed remains the straight-line hammer. Combined hybrid output is 771 hp, 114 hp more than the Supersports, and Bentley rates it to 208 mph. The Supersports, with the optional Pirelli Trofeo RS tyre fitted, is listed at 3.4 seconds to 60 mph, 3.6 seconds to 100 km/h, and 199 mph (320 km/h). An earlier press brief had put the run to 62 mph at 3.7 seconds and top speed at about 192 mph, with verified numbers still to come. The figures on the product page are the ones Bentley is selling now.

SUPERSPORTS VERSUS THE GT SPEED

Lateral speed is the claim Crewe actually wants on the brochure. On Trofeo RS rubber, Bentley says the Supersports can corner about 30 percent quicker than a Speed and pull up to 1.3 g. The carbon splitter, stacked dive planes, side sills, B-shaped fender blades, diffuser and fixed rear wing are rated at more than 300 kg (660 lb) of extra downforce versus the Speed. Static weight distribution starts at 54:46 and is designed to migrate rearward as speed, and downforce, rise.

The chassis is not a strip-out. Air springs, new twin-chamber dampers, all-wheel steering (4.1 degrees at the rear) and Bentley Dynamic Ride stay on the car. The 48-volt anti-roll system can apply 1,300 Nm (960 lb-ft) of reaction torque in 0.3 seconds. Brakes are the largest Bentley will put on a road car: 440 mm (17.3 in) carbon-silicon-carbide discs and 10-piston calipers at the front, 410 mm (16.1 in) discs and four-piston calipers at the rear. Forged 22-inch wheels come from Manthey Racing. Standard rubber is a Pirelli P Zero; the Trofeo RS is the track option.

What Six Laps at Laguna Seca Showed

Only two Supersports existed when the press arrived at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, both pre-production. Drivers got a short run, a passenger in the right seat, and the electronic net left on. That is a thin sample, and it still told a consistent story.

Turn-in is cleaner without a driven front axle using the same tyre for both drive and steering. The car will step the tail on a slow exit if the driver is greedy before the wheel is straight. A lift and a small steering correction catch it. With stability control in its launch setting, the system then cuts the throttle hard enough that several drivers called it a buzzkill rather than a safety net they could lean on. Bentley’s own map offers three ESC states: fully on, a Dynamic mode that permits some slip, and fully off, where the company says the rear axle can be provoked into large, controllable oversteer. Guests did not get that last setting.

The dual-clutch still refuses a downshift that would put the engine near the top of its range, a habit carried over from other Continentals. The V8 note through the titanium system is deep and physical in the cockpit and fades quickly a hundred yards away. Touring mode raises the ride height, softens the dampers and quiets the exhaust so the car can still behave like a Bentley on the road. Bentley mode opens the valves and enables launch control. Sport is the track map.

The aero kit, from some angles, reads closer to a Mustang Dark Horse than to a Flying Spur. That is the point of the diet. Half a tonne removed from a luxury coupe does more for the way it changes direction than another hundred horsepower stacked on a 5,400-pound hybrid would have done. The Speed still wins the drag strip. This car is built for the part of Laguna that is not a straight.

The Super Sports Idea Dates to 1925

Bentley is using the name for only the fourth time, and it is doing so 100 years after the first Super Sports. That original car, based on the 3 Litre, used a shorter, lighter chassis and a hotter engine. The factory guaranteed 100 mph at a time when a Ford Model T struggled to see 40. Bentley built 18 of them between 1925 and 1927. The wheelbase was cut by 9.5 inches (241 mm). One of those cars, YM 4037, known as Smoky, sat in the Laguna paddock as a reminder while the new coupe ran.

The modern name, now one word, came back in 2009 as a two-seat, 204-mph Continental that was 100 kg lighter than the standard car. In 2017 the second revival used the 6.0-litre W12. The 2017 Continental Supersports made 700 bhp (710 PS) and 209 mph, and Bentley built 710 examples to match the power figure. Those cars were still all-wheel-drive GTs on the far side of two and a half tons. The 2026 car is the first time the badge has been hung on less mass rather than more speed.

A CENTURY OF THE NAME

1. 1925: Super Sports launches on the 3 Litre, 18 cars, factory 100 mph guarantee.
2. 2009: The name returns as a two-seat Continental, 100 kg lighter, 204 mph.
3. 2017: W12 peak, 710 PS, 710 cars, 209 mph.
4. September 2024: Project Mildred is proposed; a mule runs six weeks later.
5. November 14, 2025: Crewe unveils the rear-drive, sub-two-tonne coupe, limited to 500.
6. March 2026: Orders open.
7. August 2026: Two pre-production cars run Laguna Seca for the first drives.
8. Q4 2026: Production is scheduled to start at Crewe, with first deliveries in early 2027.

Bugatti once called the old 3 Litre the fastest lorry in the world. The new car is still in that family. It is a heavy, expensive, hand-built GT that has been put on a diet and pointed at a racetrack, not a mid-engined rival for a 12 Cilindri.

Every One of the 500 Is Already Spoken For

Bentley will number each car before it leaves Pyms Lane, and buyers can request a specific figure from 001 to 500. The U.S. list price starts at $486,600 before destination, tax and Mulliner. In Britain the same car opens at £342,900. Launch drivers who sat in the Dragon red-and-black test car, a half-and-half paint fade with a split cabin, said a car specified like that will start with a five and might start with a six.

The core palette is 24 paints and 22 main hides, with 11 secondary hides and nine accent colours, plus a tri-tone split that is unique to this model. Five factory design themes add striping. Mulliner’s own themes use an off-centre racing stripe and a side-to-side paint fade, another first for the company, and they split the cabin so the driver and passenger sit in different colours. A painted 8 on the grille matches the driver’s seat. Blackline dark trim is standard. The numbered badge on the console reads “001 of 500” in the show car language, then whatever slot the buyer locked.

THE RUN AT A GLANCE

• Build limit: 500 individually numbered coupes, handcrafted in Crewe.
• U.S. start: $486,600 before destination, tax and Mulliner work.
• Allocation: Bentley says the full run is already accounted for.
• Markets: UK, EU27 plus Switzerland and Turkey, USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Oman, Bahrain, UAE, Qatar and Kuwait.

That last line is the quiet one. This is not a global halo in the old sense. It is a 500-unit special for a short list of countries, sold as a commission, with production still listed as pre-production on Bentley’s own site. Whether many of those 500 ever see a corkscrew is a question for the people who already paid.

Walliser’s First Car Leaves the Battery Behind

The same week journalists were learning the Supersports at Laguna, Bentley was also talking up the Torcal, its coming battery car, and the Beyond100+ plan that still points the company at an all-electric future. The W12 is already gone. Every volume Continental GT is a plug-in hybrid. The first car Walliser can call his own from first sketch to finished prototype is a non-hybrid V8 that treats that hybrid hardware as optional weight.

The new Supersports is more than just the most driver-focused Bentley yet. It signifies a return to Bentley making more extreme cars, ones that combine extraordinary breadth of ability with true driver engagement, while remaining pieces of automotive artwork unique and bespoke to each customer. Bentley has always thrived when revealing a more daring side, and the new Supersports is a statement of our intent while celebrating 100 years of the name.

Dr Frank-Steffen Walliser, Chairman and CEO, Bentley Motors

The statement is doing two jobs at once. It sells a 500-car special as a return to nerve. It also leaves the hybrid GT, the car most customers will actually buy, as the sensible one that happens to weigh more than 5,400 lb. Crewe can run both stories because the Supersports is too rare to threaten the line, and too expensive to be a volume experiment. The mule took six weeks. The production car takes a waiting list and a Mulliner invoice.

Production is due in the last quarter of 2026, with the first customer cars at the beginning of 2027. The two coupes that ran Laguna will have 498 siblings. The lightest Bentley in 85 years will still ask two tons of Pirelli to do a job most track cars assign to something closer to 3,000 lb, and every one of them already has a name on the build slot.