These Non-BMW Cars Still Had BMW I6 Power Under The Hood

The mighty inline-6 (also known as a straight-six or I6) was once a common sight, powering any number of models from around the world. In the last few decades, however, the V6 has more or less replaced it, since it takes up less space. For that matter, turbocharged engines with fewer cylinders altogether really seem to be the direction the industry is moving in. In the long run, with the electrification of the industry, there may not be that many engines at all soon enough.

But BMW never lost faith. A believer in the inline-6 since the 1930s, the Bavarian juggernaut still makes the layout today. The current B58 model, a turbocharged inline-6, is a remarkably versatile piece of machinery, powering everything from the performance-minded M340i hot sedan to the comfort-oriented X7 SUV.

BMW inline-6s have a fantastic blend of fuel efficiency, reliability, and good old-fashioned horsepower. They’re so good that, over the years, a number of other makes have chosen to use it in their models. From Japanese superstars to small Italian badges you’ve never heard of, from track hounds to tough off-roaders, here are cars that had a BMW I6 engine without the BMW badge on the hood.

For 20 years, the Toyota Supra was a halo car — one of those universally beloved sports cars that somehow managed to be both fast and affordable. In particular, its legendary 2JZ engine is often considered one of the best ever made, both stock and, especially, once tuners got their oily hands on it.

Then a funny thing happened: Supras ended production in 2002, and Toyota never made a straight-6 again. So when the Japanese manufacturer delighted their fans by announcing the return of the Supra in 2019, they also had a bombshell to drop. This new Supra would not feature a Toyota-made I6, a successor to the 2JZ. In fact, it would not feature a Toyota-made engine at all. Instead, the modern-day Supra rocks a B58, the same 3.0-liter BMW inline-6 that goes in the M340i.

Why wouldn’t Toyota make a so-called 3JZ? Simply put, it takes a lot of research and development (R&D) money to design an engine. And since Toyota doesn’t make straight-6s at all anymore, it just didn’t make financial sense to spend the company’s budget on one model, particularly a lower-volume enthusiast model like the Supra. So Toyota had to look outside, and these days, if you’re looking for a performance-focused I6, there’s really only one game in town. Therefore, the Supra has a Toyota body filled with BMW muscle, making 382 horsepower.

When a specific model you love goes out of production, there’s nothing to do but remember the good old days — unless you’ve got some serious cash flow, obviously. In 2016, Land Rover announced it would discontinue the long-running Defender in its decades-old form. That caused chemicals magnate and Defender die-hard Sir John Ratcliffe to just build it himself, which by now, has already cost him billions of dollars. He spun up a new automotive division of the conglomerate he ran, Ineos, got a Defender look-alike designed, and then named it after his local pub, the Grenadier.

And so, the world once again has a new hard-edged tough-guy off-roader, meant to tackle rocky terrain in any weather. As you might expect, a brand-new automotive badge from a company with no history in the industry didn’t want to try to design its own engine. So to give the Grenadier the grunt it would need to muscle through the great outdoors, Ineos sought out BMW’s B58, which gave the Grenadier 282 horsepower with 331 pound-feet of torque.

Boldmen is a relatively new sports car manufacturer, so new that it still only makes a single sports car, the CR4. As a two-door convertible roadster with a rather pronounced hood, you might be forgiven for thinking that it was a BMW Z4. Turns out, you’d basically be right. Boldmen essentially took the Bimmer, built an entirely new body around the chassis, and then tuned up all that Bavarian machinery inside.

That includes, naturally, the turbocharged 3-liter inline-6 that goes into the original car, the B58. The bold men of Boldmen have extensively modified that engine, though, so that it develops more horsepower, torque, and smiles while you’re driving it. The retuned engine now makes 408 hp and 450 lb-ft of torque in the base trim. At the higher S trim, it makes a whopping 500 hp with 516 lb-ft of torque. It’s fair to say that this is a track-focused spec, then.

A small manufacturer that still builds all its cars by hand, Morgan produces handsome performance cars that are generally geared more towards being lightweight rather than sporting massive power. The chassis is even made out of ash wood. If there is a brand out there today that still believes in cars as works of art and not of industry, it’s Morgan.

However, Morgan still needs an engine to power its art, and for its Plus Six model, which only just ceased production in 2025, the company used BMW’s turbocharged 3.0-liter inline-6 engine, the B58. The engine is good for 335 hp, which, combined with the two-door roadster’s weight of merely 1.3 tons, gives it a 0-62 miles per hour time of just 4.2 seconds. It’s a front-engine layout, giving that car its signature long hood, while also providing it with class and elegance when it’s passing Cybertrucks on the highway.

A smaller German manufacturer that only produced cars for about 20 years in the ’90s and ’00s, Wiesmann intended to create roadsters that combined class and elegance with speed and power. Its first car in 1993 was the MF30 Roadster, which was considered lightweight thanks to its fiberglass body. To power it, the company struck a partnership with BMW to use its 3.0-liter inline-6 from its M performance division, the M54. That was good for 228 hp, not a beast but not bad for the early ’90s.

The MF30 was later updated into the MF3, which instead sported a 3.2-liter S54 engine with a beefier 343 hp. Both models were good-looking cars that could, as their lizard logo suggested, stick to the road like a gecko to a wall. Sadly, the brand as a whole never did quite catch on, and the company folded in 2013. Though it has been resurrected by a new owner with plans for a revival, the new cars aren’t planned to carry straight-6s.

For a short while in the 1990s, the venerable British stalwart Land Rover was owned by BMW. So while the classic Defender model continued to be a diesel-powered off-roader with an in-house engine, the door was open to start using BMW engines instead if the company wanted to. Land Rover South Africa decided to give it a go with the 2.8-liter inline-6 from BMW’s performance shop M, the M52, available in the region from 1997-2002.

The engine made 190 hp and 207 lb-ft of torque. Critically, it was a gas-powered engine, which was not otherwise available in a Defender at the time. Even with the SUV available in Africa, this engine never made its way to other Land Rovers around the world, making it something of a rarity. After 2000, BMW washed its hands of the whole brand anyway, marking an end to its engines inside the boxy Brits.

As a small Italian make that made a valiant, if ultimately unsuccessful, effort to challenge the SUV market, Rayton-Fissore is more or less known (if you know them at all) for the Magnum – rebranded as the Laforza in the United States. In typical Italian fashion, the manufacturer decided that luxury SUVs weren’t luxurious enough, and so produced a model with gorgeous, leather-clad interior that was meant more for the parking lots of five-star hotels than muddy off-roading.

Over the years and trims, the Magnum was offered with a wide range of different engine sizes and layouts from a number of different manufacturers. However, in 1988 and 1989, the Magnum received the M30, a 3.4-liter inline-6 from BMW. This version of the engine, the M30B35, produced 208 hp and 225 lb-ft of torque. The M30 is a venerable piece of machinery, and the single longest-produced engine that BMW ever made, running from 1968-1995. Unfortunately, it was unable to power the Magnum to huge sales, and Rayton-Fissore essentially remains a footnote in automotive history.

Japanese carmaker Daihatsu never did leave a big footprint in the West, but as one of the nation’s oldest manufacturers, it’s been quietly pumping out trucks, off-roaders, and smaller cars for decades. In the 1980s, they took a shot squarely at Land Rover with their boxy Rugger SUV, meant to be a tough but affordable four-wheel drive that could get you out of the city and into the wilderness.

However, an Italian coachbuilder, Bertone, being Italian, decided it wasn’t fashionable enough. So in 1989, the company built a variant of the Rugger by giving it a makeover, with plusher seats, more leather, and a new grill and roof. It also decided to give it a little more oomph, and to do that, it pulled in a BMW straight-6. Actually, it pulled in two: the turbodiesel 2.4-liter M21 and the 2.0-liter M20.

Bertone tried to sell the off-roader, which they’d renamed the Freeclimber, around Europe. However, it never quite caught on and not many were ever made. Production ceased in 1992 after only a few years.

While Alpina has long been its own manufacturer selling its own models, all its vehicles are based on BMWs. It does so in close connection with the bigger company, making Alpina something of BMW’s little cousin; in fact, BMW acquired Alpina outright in 2022. Current models on sale include the diesel-powered D3 and D4 as well as 98-octane gas options, which include the B3 (based on the BMW 335i) and the  B4 (based on the 435i).

Even though these are Alpina cars, it’s always retained the BMW badge, even before its acquisition, showcasing the tight relationship between the two companies. These models also all retain BMW’s twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter inline-6 engine, the performance-spec S58. Alpina has modded that powerhouse a lot, though, including adding in smaller turbochargers and redesigned intakes and exhausts. That nets out to 495 hp and 538 lb-ft for both the 2023 B3 and B4 models. That makes them more powerful than their newest M cousins who are at 437 hp and 406 lb-ft.