Spyker C8 Preliator XXV: 800 hp, yes, manual

Spyker is opening a new chapter in its history with the C8 Preliator XXV Coupé, a hypercar built entirely from scratch that revives many of the Dutch brand’s most distinctive traits: aviation inspired styling, hand worked aluminium bodywork, and a direct, unfiltered relationship between driver and machine.

An 800 hp V8 paired with a genuine manual gearbox

Power comes from a 4.0 litre twin turbo V8 producing 800 hp and 1,000 Nm of torque, good for a top speed beyond 217 mph, roughly 349 km/h. What really sets the Preliator XXV apart from most modern hypercars, though, is what sits behind the engine. Spyker has fitted a genuine manual gearbox, no paddles, no automated transmission dressed up to mimic a traditional shift. Every gear change stays a physical decision made by the driver, clutch, lever and timing all included.

One of the brand’s long standing signatures is leaving the gear linkage visible inside the cabin, and the Preliator XXV keeps that tradition alive, turning it once again into both a functional and decorative element. Digital interfaces are kept to an absolute minimum too. The only real screen in the cabin is a head up display, with everything else handled through physical instruments and controls, a deliberately analogue stance in a segment increasingly dominated by touchscreens and layered digital menus.

Hand formed aluminium instead of carbon fibre

Spyker deliberately chose aluminium over carbon fibre for the body. Panels are hand formed and mounted onto a completely redesigned, in-house developed spaceframe, with the metalwork carried out in partnership with Coventry Prototype Panels in England, a long standing partner of the brand.

Aluminium lets panels be beaten, shaped and polished with a level of craftsmanship that’s genuinely difficult to replicate through more automated processes, and Spyker treats the resulting subtle irregularities as part of the car’s value rather than a flaw, meaning each example can show slight variations tied to its hand finishing. Every Spyker requires roughly 2,100 hours of work to complete, a figure that says a lot about just how hand built the Preliator XXV really is. The steering wheel alone takes around four hours of hand stitching, carried out by a single craftsperson working with two needles simultaneously.

The attention to detail extends to nearly invisible touches too. Screw heads inside the cabin are manually oriented to all face the same direction, and even the chassis number is hand stamped directly onto the aluminium spaceframe, leaving a slightly different imprint on every single car. The dashboard uses turned aluminium, a finishing technique tied back to Spyker’s earliest cars, produced by a workshop that has specialised in finishing automotive components since roughly the same era the brand itself was founded.

Spyker aviation design language, pushed further than ever

Spyker’s relationship with aviation dates back to 1914, when the company merged with the Dutch Aircraft Factory. Aviation inspired elements have gradually worked their way into the brand’s design language ever since, and the Preliator XXV pushes that connection further still through NACA ducts, aircraft inspired surfacing, and a strikingly pronounced tail fin.

That tail fin draws directly from the Spyker C1 Aerocoque of 1919, an echo that had already appeared more subtly on modern models like the 2006 D12 Peking-to-Paris, but becomes a dominant, unmistakable element on the XXV. Lighting plays into the identity too: the headlights graphically incorporate the XXV name, while the taillights are styled to resemble a fighter jet’s afterburners.

Grilles, air intakes, pedals, exhaust mesh and seat trim all carry a geometric pattern known as isogrid, a triangulated structure originally developed in the aerospace industry to create components that are both light and rigid. On the Preliator XXV, that same pattern becomes a purely graphic motif, repeated across different parts of the car.

A relocated fuel tank and a Butterfly opening mechanism

The fuel tank moves away from the sills entirely, relocated to a trapezoidal space behind the seats and ahead of the engine, a solution drawn from Spyker’s experience racing at Le Mans. That repositioning frees up other structural areas and reshapes how components are distributed through the chassis. With the traditional rear boot eliminated, cargo capacity moves to the front instead, freeing the rear for the engine bay and a distinctive body opening mechanism.

At the press of a control, the bodywork opens using what Spyker calls Butterfly mode, a nod to some of the brand’s earliest cars that gives full visual access to the mechanicals underneath. The engine bay itself is finished to the same standard as the exterior surfaces and cabin.

Quail Green and rose gold on the debut car

The car shown at Monterey Car Week wears a metallic Quail Green finish, with subtle rose gold particles running through the paint and echoed in the exterior metal trim. Inside, the cabin uses an orange brown leather Spyker calls Tuscan Saddle.

The example shown at The Quail carries chassis number 270, which Spyker also identifies as the last of the 255 cars built since the brand’s relaunch back in 2000.

From coachbuilder to hypercar maker

Spyker’s story began in the Netherlands in 1880 with brothers Hendrik Jan and Jacobus Spijker, starting out as a coachbuilder before completing its first car in 1898. By 1903, Spyker had built a six cylinder, four wheel drive car, shown between London and Paris.

One of the brand’s most notable sporting moments came during the 1907 Peking to Paris raid, where a Spyker covered roughly 15,000 km to finish second, with the entry sponsored by Louis Vuitton. The modern era began in 2000, when the C8 Spyder, C8 Laviolette and C8 Double12 immediately brought aviation references back to the forefront through air intakes, propeller inspired wheels and cockpit style instruments. The 2009 C8 Aileron pushed that language closer still to jet aesthetics, with turbine styled wheels and intakes.

The C8 Preliator XXV also marks the first step in Spyker’s new industrial chapter following the arrival of Volodymyr Nosov as co-owner. Production will be limited to 25 examples, each individually commissioned and configured directly with its owner, with the car making its world debut at Monterey Car Week 2026.

Spyker C8 Preliator XXV specifications