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The best car TV show for a gearhead depends on what you want to watch: road tests and improbable challenges, hands-on repairs, custom fabrication, automotive history, or experiments. This watchlist covers all five, rather than treating very different shows as a single objective ranking. Streaming catalogs and regional rights change, so check your local services for current availability.
Driving, road trips and challenges
1. Top Gear
The UK series is a natural starting point if you like car tests mixed with travel, ambitious challenges, builds and comic set pieces. Its scope is broader than conventional reviews: season guides include road tests, homemade vehicles and long-distance trips. The reinvented format first aired on BBC Two on 20 October 2002, according to TopGear.com’s series guide.
| # | Preview | Product | Price | |
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Top Gear 11 (DVD) | $9.57 | Buy on Amazon |
| 2 |
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Top Gear 20 | $16.83 | Buy on Amazon |
| 3 |
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Top Gear: From A-Z (Ultimate Extended Version) | $13.98 | Buy on Amazon |
| 4 |
![Top Gear - The Challenges 1-4 Collection [DVD]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/510zCbRT40L._SL160_.jpg)
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Top Gear - The Challenges 1-4 Collection [DVD] | $32.39 | Buy on Amazon |
| 5 |
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Top Gear: The Complete Season 17 | $19.99 | Buy on Amazon |
2. Top Gear: The Specials
Choose the specials for longer journeys and a buddy-comedy feel, with unusual vehicles, far-flung settings and challenges. They lean into the travel and adventure side of car television more than a standard test segment. MotorTrend included them in its staff picks of car shows.
Buying, repairing and building
3. Wheeler Dealers
Wheeler Dealers combines enthusiast-car buying with workshop demonstrations. It suits viewers who want to see mechanical work alongside the decisions involved in choosing and improving a car, rather than watching a build purely for spectacle. MotorTrend’s staff-pick description highlights both the demonstrations and classic-car purchasing tips.
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- Runtime: 368 minutes
4. Goblin Works Garage
This custom-shop series is a pick for viewers drawn to European classics and resto-mods, including projects based on less familiar cars rather than only well-known American muscle. Its angle is the transformation of unusual starting points into customized vehicles.
5. American Chopper
Although its subject is motorcycles rather than cars, American Chopper belongs on a gearhead watchlist for its fabrication work and family-centered workshop reality format. It is the clearest choice here if you want to watch parts being made and personalities collide around a shop project.
Rank #2
6. Bitchin’ Rides
Bitchin’ Rides adds another build-oriented option for viewers who enjoy custom vehicles and shop projects. BBC Studios named it among the MotorTrend series in a 2022 catalog announcement; that announcement does not establish its current streaming availability.
7. Iron Resurrection
For a restoration-and-build pick, consider Iron Resurrection. BBC Studios included the title in its 2022 list of MotorTrend series, which supports its place as a historical catalog recommendation but does not confirm where it streams now.
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Texas Metal is another option for viewers looking for custom-car projects. Like Iron Resurrection and Bitchin’ Rides, it appears in BBC Studios’ 2022 MotorTrend catalog announcement; check current listings before setting out to watch it.
9. Fast N’ Loud
Fast N’ Loud is a further recommendation for fans of automotive projects and workshop television. BBC Studios also named it in the 2022 announcement, a historical catalog reference rather than a current availability guarantee.
Rank #4
- Robin Reliant Space Shuttle: Combining cutting edge amateur rocketry, British Grit, and truly intergalactic levels of messing about, Richard and James try to put a Reliant Robin into space.
- Building Amphibious Cars:Can the lads create a vehicle equally at home on land and water Will they even make it across the reservoir without drowning or catching hypothermia
- Building a Limo: The boys are up against it, making their own stretch limos from everyday cars. But the challenge has only just begun. There are some high-profile celebs who need a lift to the Brit Awards...
- Building a Convertible: Attempting to turn a Renault Espace into a fashionable 'drop top', the team prove that trying to make your own convertible is a bit like trying to cut your own hair... you can do it, but you probably shouldn't...
- Parkour vs Peugeot 207:They may wear silly trousers but these parkour (the barmy sport of leaping across rooftops across the city) lads are serious competition for Captain Slow's Peugeot 207 in a race through Liverpool.
10. Roadkill
BBC Studios included Roadkill in the same 2022 MotorTrend catalog announcement. It rounds out the list for viewers exploring car-entertainment series, but the announcement alone cannot tell you whether it is available in your country or on a service today.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How cars are made and how car culture developed
11. How It’s Made: Dream Cars
If you are curious about manufacturing, How It’s Made: Dream Cars takes a process-focused approach, showing cars being assembled by hand or on production lines. It is the most direct match here for viewers who want to see how the finished machine comes together.
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12. James May’s Cars of the People
This documentary-style series looks at automotive history and everyday cars through James May’s perspective. It is a good change of pace from workshop shows: the interest is how ordinary cars and car culture developed, not just what a vehicle can do on the road.
Car experiments and myths
13. Mythbusters Best of Cars
For experiments instead of conventional reviews, this car-centered selection brings together car-related Mythbusters challenges. It works well if you enjoy testing ideas and watching a question become an experiment more than hearing a standard verdict on a vehicle.
Choose by the kind of car show you want
- Driving tests, travel and irreverent challenges: start with Top Gear or Top Gear: The Specials.
- Buying decisions and repair demonstrations: try Wheeler Dealers.
- Custom fabrication and shop projects: consider Goblin Works Garage, American Chopper, Bitchin’ Rides, Iron Resurrection, Texas Metal, Fast N’ Loud or Roadkill.
- Manufacturing or automotive history: choose How It’s Made: Dream Cars or James May’s Cars of the People.
- Car-centered experiments: put on Mythbusters Best of Cars.
The recommendation descriptions for several shop-focused titles are intentionally brief: BBC Studios’ 2022 announcement establishes that they appeared in a historical MotorTrend catalog list, not their current distribution or detailed episode formats. Streaming rights and country availability can change, so check the service catalog where you live.
Quick Recap
Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.
