What is an "Efini" RX-7?

23 May 2016

You may have seen the RX7 referred to by the name Efini. In case you don’t know what that word means, I thought I’d do a short explanation.

The answer is, unsurprisingly, simple. Efini was essentially a sub-division of Mazda, which operated between 1991 and 1997. It was brought in as a luxury arm of Mazda, alongside other sub brands called Eunos and Autozam. Eunos was meant to be the care-free, fun to drive brand - typified by the Eunos Roadster, a rebadged MX-5 - while Autozam was the entry level brand - the wicked AZ-1 kei car being a good example of that.

In its role as the luxury brand, it included the RX-7, a rebadged 626 called MS-6, a rebadged Sentia called MS-9, and an MPV. The MS-8, above, was the only car unique to the brand. Interestingly, Efini dealerships also sold Citroens to the Japanese market.

Ultimately the Mazda sub-brands were disbanded in the late 90s, largely due to the downturn in the economy. So there you have it. Efini was simply a marketing test from Mazda that didn’t really go anywhere.

Comments

To this day I remember collecting all the Efini RX7s on Gran Turismo, always wondering what it meant…

How I felt with my league of Miatas on GT when I was younger.

Oddly enough out of all the FDs i’ve seen only one had Efini badges,all the others had Mazda badging

Well unless you live in Japan you won’t see an Efini

I got one

[DELETED]

Mines an Efini too. They were all JDM cars as far as I recall.

Sounds like someone with a speech impediment said infinity

Makes sense. I’ve seen the differing badges before and never knew why. Good article!

The way you are posting on this forum makes me think you are buying an RX-7, Darren.

that

Nearly every RX7 I have seen has been an Efini, but I’m fairly sure someone has just put their own Efini badges on them.

For all the grammar nazis out there, it’s pronouced “In-fin-i”

“Efini” doesn’t have an n between the e and the f

which syllable is stressed, though?

I thought eunos was more the luxury brand because of the cosmo

I wouldn’t call the MX-5 ‘luxury’..

Ford is currently trying a very similar thing in germany, replacing “Ford” in a few model-names and trying to make some “high-end” customers chose a Mondeo or so, rather than, say, a Mercedes.