Strictly speaking, the first Skyline wasn’t a Nissan (or a Datsun) at all; it was made by the Prince Motor Company nearly a decade before Prince merged with Nissan in 1966.

The famous Godzilla nickname originated with the R32 GT-R. Australian journalists penned the name in the 1980s, referring to the car’s dominance on track. Essentially, it destroyed the competition for years; in 1991, it won 29 out of 30 races.

Over thirteen generations, the Skyline has been in production since 1957. The current V37 model was launched in 2014 and is only available in Japan as a four-door saloon. A fourteenth-generation Skyline is currently in development for a proposed launch in 2027.

Top-level performance Skylines have long been associated with the use of straight-six turbocharged engines. When the famous RB engine series ended with the R34, every Skyline ever since 2002 has been equipped with a four-cylinder or V6 engine, often without a turbocharger. The Nissan GT-R (R35) also has a twin-turbocharged V6 engine… although, strictly speaking, that’s not a Skyline.

The first Skyline to sport the legendary GT-R badge was the 1969 KPGC10, and the last was the R34 GT-R. The current top-of-the-range JDM Skylines are the Skyline 400R Limited and the limited edition (to 1,000 cars) Skyline Nismo.

Not all Skylines are performance weapons; there have been plenty of entry-level models over the years, including one or two diesels and even hybrid versions. The Skyline is commonly referred to as the Japanese 3 Series.

The 1980 Skyline GT-EX was the first turbocharged production car made in Japan. It had a 2-litre L20ET engine and put out a respectable 145bhp.

The most powerful factory-tuned Skyline was the 500hp R34 GT-R Nismo Z-tune produced in 2003. These used a strengthened 2.8-litre block based on Nissan’s Le Mans and GT2 race engines and were built to coincide with Nismo’s 20th anniversary over a year after the end of the main R34 production run. All were low-mileage used cars acquired by Nismo specifically for the conversion.

The legendary 3-litre RB30 block used by many famous tuners to increase capacity was never actually made in Japan. It was originally produced in South Africa in the mid-1980s for use in the Nissan Patrol and various Holden saloons. 

The R32 GT-R Nismo was a special homologation edition of the R32 built to enable Nissan to dominate touring car racing. It offered larger turbos, less weight, and a different aero package to the normal GT-R.

Although most Skylines are JDM cars – making most in the UK grey imports – some were officially available outside of Japan. With that said, all GT-R models and high-performance packages were exclusively sold in Japan and can be considered JDMs.

It may have been sold all around the world, but the 2001 V35 Skyline is technically a JDM-only model. All export cars were called the Infiniti G35 instead. It shared a platform with the Z33 Series Fairlady Z, known in Europe as the 350Z.

The twin-turbocharged, 2.6-litre RB26DETT engine fitted to the R32 GT-R, R33 GT-R, and R34 GT-R is arguably the most famous powerplant associated with the Skyline badge, chiefly because of its popularity with tuners and in modified car culture. Although stock power figures ranged from 280 to 330bhp, with the right modifications, it is capable of handling well over 1,000hp.

Aside from ‘Godzilla’, the Skyline has had some interesting nicknames over the years. Because of its shape, the third-generation C10 Skyline (originator of the GT-R badge) is known as the ‘Hakosuka’ or ‘box Skyline’ – ‘hako’ being slang for box and ‘suka’ for Skyline. The fourth-generation C110 Skyline is known as the ‘Kenmeri’ Skyline, named for the young couple – Ken and Mary – featured in the original TV ads.

The rarest road-going Skyline ever produced is attributed to the homologation car for the 1995 GT1 season. Nissan’s GT1 competition cars were based on R33 LM race cars with the all-wheel-drive systems removed. Because the rules stated that the drivetrain had to be similar to the road cars, but didn’t specify how many road cars should be built, Nissan produced just one and stored it at their factory in Zuma. One of the rare cases where there were fewer road cars than race cars.

As of January 2026, around 3,300 Nissan Skylines have been registered in the UK since 2001, with only 589 taxed and still on the road.