The 3,300 buyers who managed to snag themselves a <a href="https://www.slashgear.com/2188704/what-dodge-demon-170-cost-price-how-many-were-made/” target=”_blank”>Dodge SRT Demon 170 got an awful lot for their money. Despite the car’s sub-$100,000 price tag, the Demon produces the kind of power that’s been reserved for ultra-exclusive hypercars until relatively recently. With the right fuel in the tank, it churns out 1,025 horsepower; even on regular pump gas, it’s good for 900 horsepower. At its launch in 2023, Dodge called it the most powerful muscle car in the world, and in the years since then, nothing else has come along to take its crown.

As impressive as it may be, it’s far from the first production car to boast a horsepower output in four-figure territory. For starters, by the time the Demon 170 was announced, Tesla’s Model X Plaid and Model S Plaid had already been on sale for 2 years, with both cars making 1,020 horsepower. To return to the time when the 1,000 horsepower barrier was first crossed in a production car, you’ll have to go back a decade and a half further.

However, the answer to which production car was indeed the first to feature over 1,000 horsepower isn’t as straightforward to answer as you might think. The initial candidate is the Bugatti Veyron, which launched in 2005 after years of anticipation and quickly established itself as a new benchmark in the hypercar world. Originally, it produced 1,001 PS (metric horsepower), which is roughly 987 hp (mechanical horsepower). The second candidate is a much less well-remembered car, the SSC Ultimate Aero TT.

If you’re measuring by mechanical horsepower rather than metric horsepower, the Bugatti Veyron officially falls slightly short of the 1,000 hp mark. However, there are no such caveats with its rival, the SSC Ultimate Aero TT.

SSC is a small American manufacturer founded by Jerod Shelby, who, despite their shared surname and interest in extremely fast cars, is not a relative of the legendary Carroll Shelby. The Ultimate Aero TT entered production in late 2006 and initially made 1,180 horsepower, according to the brand’s archived website. By the time SSC set a world speed record with the car in September 2007, that figure had been tweaked slightly to 1,183 horsepower.

The Veyron might have been designed and developed with the backing of VW Group, but its record as world’s fastest production car was nonetheless eclipsed by the upstart Ultimate Aero TT. During a two-way run, the SSC managed an average speed of 256 mph, just ahead of the Bugatti’s 253 mph average.

Both cars were designed to be the fastest in the world, but they were very different in most other aspects. The Bugatti had a W16 engine with four turbochargers, while the SSC was powered by a twin-turbo V8. The interiors of both cars were also worlds apart, with the Bugatti being luxurious and the SSC being bare-bones at best. In a 2007 feature for Classic Driver, one reviewer claimed that the SSC’s interior “falls way short, not just of other hypercars, but of almost all other cars currently on sale.”

As well as their engines and cabins, pricing was also a key differentiator between the two cars. The Bugatti retailed for around $1.2 million at the time of its launch, while SSC charged $550,000 for the Ultimate Aero TT. Today, the difference in value between the two is even more extreme. While the average Veyron sells for around $2 million, interested buyers can pick up an Ultimate Aero TT for under $500,000.

Unfortunately, anyone who’s interested in buying the example that actually beat the Bugatti’s speed record is out of luck. According to The Drive, the record-setting Ultimate Aero TT was crushed at a monster truck event in Washington in 2025, allegedly as a result of its owner being angry with SSC. Speaking to the outlet, Jerod Shelby said that the car had been non-functional for years and was previously in a museum, and added “I can’t imagine why anyone would want to destroy a vehicle of that stature.”

As both a former world speed record holder and the first production car to produce more than 1,000 mechanical horsepower, the Ultimate Aero TT is one of many American cars that arguably deserves a lot more recognition than it gets. Meanwhile, the Veyron remains in high demand with collectors, even if its <a href="https://www.slashgear.com/1913982/cars-most-expensive-oil-change/” target=”_blank”>oil changes alone cost as much as some used cars.