Always been confused by those alphanumeric car names introduced by ze Germans not so long ago? Well, get ready to pull out your smartphone and bring up your Mercedes-Benz app. Our colleagues over at Automobile Magazine report the automaker plans to revamp its lineup’s naming scheme to make order out of chaos. However, it still looks like chaos to us, just by a different name.
At first, the new schema looks pretty simple. The letter “C” will prefix Mercedes-Benz coupes and convertibles like the current CL-Class coupe. “G” will prefix Mercedes’ crossovers and SUVs like the current GL-Class and GLK-Class. Finally, “SL” will designate Mercedes-Benz extensive portfolio of sports cars.
That’s the easy part. After reviewing our erstwhile colleague’s post several dozen times (and banging our head against the flatscreen monitor), we developed the following chart to hopefully make things a bit clearer for you. However, we also want to throw a big “don’t hold us to this” caveat out there as well.
| Current Name | Vehicle Type | Based On | New Name |
| CLC (speculated) | Four-door “coupe” | Upcoming A and B-Class compacts | CLA |
| GLC-Class (upcoming) | Crossover | Upcoming A and B-Class compacts | GLA-Class |
| A-Class | Coupe, convertible | All-new | CLB(?)-Class |
| C-Class | coupe, convertible | C-Class sedan | CLC-Class |
| E-Class | Coupe, convertible | E-Class sedan | CLE-Class |
| S-Class | coupe | S-Class sedan | Unknown |
| CL-Class | coupe | S-Class sedan | SLC-Class |
| SLS AMG (upcoming) | Coupe, convertible | unique | SLR(?) |
Source: Automobile Magazine
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