For most of the past decade, the Karma Revero has carried a turbocharged three-cylinder under its long hood. Its final act belongs to a 6.2-liter V-8.
Karma Automotive revealed the Eximius 1 at the Concours at Wynn in Las Vegas. It’s a one-off plug-in hybrid sedan making 1,195 horsepower, and it’s the first car from a new bespoke program the company is also calling Eximius.
That’s well over 600 hp more than a standard Revero. Karma claims 60 mph in 2.7 seconds and a 200-mph top speed.
The basic layout survives the swap. The Revero is a series hybrid, so the gas engine never drives the wheels. It acts purely as a generator, charging a battery that feeds a pair of rear-mounted electric motors.
In the Eximius 1, that generator is now a V-8 displacing more than six liters. Same idea, absurdly different scale.
Karma rose from the wreckage of Fisker Automotive and has sold evolutions of the original Fisker Karma, badged Revero and GS-6, on and off for years. The Gyesera now replaces the Revero, refining the same design and powertrain approach.
So this is a farewell. A loud one.
The hardware backs up the numbers. Karma fitted two-piece slotted carbon-ceramic brake rotors and Öhlins semi-active dampers. The car rides on 21-inch magnesium center-lock wheels and sits nearly two inches wider than a stock Revero.
Carbon fiber covers much of the body. The weave is left bare on the front fenders, and the blue paint fades in gradually across the front doors.
Karma calls the car track-ready, and the aero suggests it means it. A carbon splitter sits between gaping intakes up front, each carrying an LED strip that forms an arrow with the headlight elements. Two thin nostrils flank the lamps.
Fender vents bleed pressure out of the wheel wells. A panel wearing the number 5 hides an outlet for brake heat. Out back there’s a massive diffuser, a towering wing, a fin rising near the rear doors, and a billet aluminum exhaust tip.
The cabin sticks to the same script. Blue-tinted carbon fiber lines the seats, steering wheel, console, doors, and dash. Recaro buckets wear blue Alcantara and leather, topped with Alcantara in a shade Karma calls Moondust.
The pedals are machined from billet aluminum. The center console has been stripped to essentials, including a red emergency kill switch.
None of this is happening in a vacuum. Porsche has Sonderwunsch, Bugatti has Sur Mesure, and Rolls-Royce has Coachbuild. At the top of the market, a personalization division is practically standard equipment.
Karma, a small American company, now wants a seat at that table. Through Eximius, customers can request changes to the body, the powertrain, and performance parts.
Karma says it will build no more than nine bespoke cars from each series production model it launches. For a brand this size, that number is a ceiling, not a promise. The company hasn’t said how many buyers are lined up behind this first one.
The Eximius 1 already has an owner, with delivery scheduled for 2027. The Gyesera is next in line for the Eximius treatment, and nobody outside Karma knows yet what engine someone will ask to stuff into it.
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