The New Dodge Charger Makes The Mustang Seem Tiny

The Charger's dimensions rival an S-Class, and the Daytona is 1,000 pounds heavier than Ford's electric Mustang Mach-E crossover.

ford mustang driving on a road while a clownishly large charger looms in the background

Christopher Smith

By: Christopher Smith

Mar 7, 2024 at 9:34am ET

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The Chevrolet Camaro is gone. The Dodge Challenger is gone. That leaves the Ford Mustang all alone in the world of Detroit muscle cars. So it's natural for people to label the new Dodge Charger as a Mustang rival. It's available with two doors, essentially replacing the Challenger. Dodge calls it a muscle car, be it as the electric Charger Daytona or the combustion-powered Charger Sixpack coming next year. But if you compare the two side-by-side, you'll understand they're not really competitors.

The new Dodge Charger lives in a completely different zip code from the Mustang. It might even span two zip codes, because it's only two inches shorter than a Mercedes-Benz S-Class. Parked side-by-side, you'd never notice the difference between them. And for the record, these numbers aren't just for the four-door, but the two-door Charger, too. It's huge.

We can't remember the last time an American brand built such a sizable coupe. The Challenger never cracked 200 inches, nor the Chevrolet Monte Carlo when it retired in 2008. Popular 1990s coupes like the Ford Thunderbird and Chevy Lumina get close, as do the boxy 1980s G-body cars (think Oldsmobile Cutlass and Buick Regal) from General Motors, all of which are near or slightly over 200 inches.

1986 Ford LTD Crown Victoria Two Door

Initially, we thought the last American two-door car as big as the new Charger was a Ford Crown Victoria. Though rare, Ford offered the boxy Crown Vic in two-door trim through 1987. A quick check at the Ford Heritage Vault confirms it stretched 211 inches from nose to tail. But, Motor1 readers are awesome, and they remind us that the Lincoln Mark VIII and Buick Riveria both measured around 207 inches during their brief run in the 1990s. Not quite as old as the Vic, but we're still talking 25 years ago.

Here's a quick chart showing how the 2024 Charger Daytona stacks up to the Mustang and other vehicles of interest, both past and present.

Make/Model Length (inches) Width (inches) Weight (pounds) 2024 Dodge Charger Daytona 206.6 84.3 5,838 2024 Ford Mustang Dark Horse 189.7 81.9 3,975 2024 Mercedes-Benz S-Class 208.2 83.0 4,740 2024 Porsche Taycan 195.4 84.5 4,568 2023 Dodge Charger Hellcat Redeye 201.0 78.3 4,586 2023 Dodge Challenger Hellcat Redeye 197.5 78.3 4,415 1987 Ford Crown Victoria 2-Door 211.0 77.5 3,699 1968 Dodge Charger 208.8 76.6 4,035

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If the Charger was a tad smaller, we might be tempted to call it a Mustang rival. But there's also the issue of weight. The Charger Daytona comes it at nearly three tons, or about one and a half Mustangs with a little left over. To be fair, we don't yet know how much the gas-powered Charger Sixpack will weigh. But it still dwarfs the Mustang in a direct size comparison.

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We asked Dodge for some guidance on Charger competitors, but the company declined to comment. An official angle will come closer to the Charger Daytona's on-sale date later this year, but we can tell you the automaker benchmarked the Camaro and Porsche Taycan (among others) during the Charger's development. So while there's a bit of pony car influence baked into the recipe, it's certainly not a Mustang competitor. If anything, we'd say the new Charger is in a class all by itself.