Honda: 10 Things to Know About the World's Largest Motorcycle Brand

Photo: Ronoli / Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY 2.0)

Honda is the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer - by volume, by number of Grand Prix victories, and by every metric except absolute heritage continuity. Founded in 1948 by Soichiro Honda in postwar Hamamatsu, the company spent its first decade building bicycle-engine kits and small two-strokes. By 1959 it was racing at the Isle of Man TT. By 1969 it had launched the CB750 Four and ended the British motorcycle industry. By the 1980s it dominated Grand Prix racing. And by 2026 it had launched the WN7 - the first major Big Four electric motorcycle and the clearest signal yet that Honda is taking the electrification transition more seriously than its Japanese rivals.

This is the deep-dive companion to our Big Four Japanese hub post. The ten moments below trace how a postwar piston-ring maker became the most influential motorcycle company in history.

TL;DR

Founded 1948 by Soichiro Honda in Hamamatsu as a postwar piston-ring and bicycle-engine maker, now the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer.
The Super Cub (1958) is the most-produced motor vehicle in history (100M+ units), and the CB750 (1969) invented the modern superbike and ended the British motorcycle industry.
Marc Marquez's 6 MotoGP titles, the new CB1000GT sport-tourer and electric WN7 (launched January 2026), and the V3 turbocharged concept - Honda is investing across categories more aggressively than any other Big Four brand.

1. Soichiro Honda founds Honda Motor Co. (1948)

Honda began life in October 1946 as the Honda Technical Research Institute, repurposing surplus military generator engines to power bicycles for postwar Japanese commuters. Soichiro Honda formally founded Honda Motor Co. on 24 September 1948 in Hamamatsu, with co-founder Takeo Fujisawa joining in 1949 as the business and sales partner who would shape Honda's global expansion. Soichiro Honda was the engineer, Fujisawa the strategist - the partnership defined the company's culture for forty years. Soichiro Honda's engineering philosophy of "the power of dreams" still appears on every Honda showroom and continues to define the brand's identity.

Sources: Honda - History; Wikipedia - Soichiro Honda.

2. The Dream D-Type (1949)

Honda's first complete motorcycle, the Dream D-Type, launched in August 1949 - a 98cc two-stroke producing 3 hp, with a pressed-steel frame and basic suspension. The Dream D-Type wasn't technically groundbreaking, but it was the moment Honda transitioned from an accessory and engine-kit maker into a true motorcycle manufacturer. The "Dream" name stuck and would reappear across decades of Honda motorcycles. The original Dream D-Type's design philosophy - simple, affordable, reliable - is still recognisable in the modern Honda Super Cub. By the early 1950s, Honda was building Dream variants up to 350cc and competing for share in Japan's overcrowded postwar motorcycle market.

Sources: Honda - History; Wikipedia - Honda Dream D-Type.

3. The Super Cub C100 (1958)

Photo: Mj-bird / Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA 3.0)

Designed by Soichiro Honda and Takeo Fujisawa working together, the Super Cub C100 launched in August 1958. The brief was specific: a 50cc step-through motorcycle that anyone (including women in skirts and businessmen in suits) could ride, with automatic clutch, weather protection, and the lowest possible operating cost. The Super Cub became the most-produced motor vehicle in history, with over 100 million units sold across all variants and continuing in production to this day. The C100 reshaped personal mobility in Japan, then Southeast Asia, then the world. It is the single product that financed Honda's expansion into superbikes, racing, and ultimately the automotive industry.

Sources: Honda - Super Cub; Wikipedia - Super Cub.

4. The 1959 Isle of Man TT entry

Honda made its first international racing appearance at the 1959 Isle of Man TT, entering five RC142 125cc machines in the Lightweight class. The results were modest (sixth-place finish was the best), but the entry announced that Japan intended to race at the highest international level. Two years later, in 1961, Honda dominated both the 125cc and 250cc World Championships, with Mike Hailwood and Tom Phillis as principal riders. The pattern of using racing as an engineering proving ground - what Honda now calls "the power of dreams" applied to the racetrack - was set in those first TT years and has continued through every era of Honda motorcycle development since.

Sources: Honda - Heritage; Wikipedia - Honda in motorsport.

5. The CB750 Four (1969)

In 1969 Honda launched the CB750 Four - the motorcycle that ended the British motorcycle industry. The CB750 brought together single overhead cam four-cylinder engine, front disc brake, electric start, five-speed gearbox, 67 hp, and a launch price of $1,495 in the US. No British, Italian, or German manufacturer at the time offered that combination at that price. The CB750 invented the "modern superbike" category - inline four, sport-touring geometry, big displacement, mass-production reliability. Triumph, BSA, Norton, and the rest of the British motorcycle industry couldn't match the price, the features, or the reliability. By 1983, BSA was gone, Triumph was being restructured, Norton was in trouble - all victims of the CB750-era Japanese invasion.

Sources: Honda - CB750 Heritage; Wikipedia - Honda CB750.

6. The Gold Wing (1975)

The GL1000 Gold Wing launched at the 1974 Cologne Motorcycle Show and went into production in 1975. Honda's original idea was a "Grand Tourismo" motorcycle - a touring bike with car-like comfort, refinement, and long-distance capability. The flat-four engine was unusual for its era; the smooth, balanced delivery and shaft drive set the Gold Wing apart from anything else on the market. The platform evolved through GL1100 (1980), GL1200 (1984), GL1500 (1988), GL1800 (2001), and the current model with semi-automatic DCT transmission, airbag, and Apple CarPlay. The Gold Wing has defined motorcycle touring for fifty years and remains the reference luxury tourer that all rivals (BMW K1600, Indian Roadmaster, Harley Ultra Limited) are measured against.

Sources: Honda - Gold Wing; Wikipedia - Honda Gold Wing.

7. The CBR Fireblade lineage

Photo: PekePON / Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA 3.0)

The Fireblade lineage began with the CBR900RR in 1992, designed by Tadao Baba. Baba's philosophy was "total control" - compress liter-class power into a 600-class chassis, putting weight and dimensions ahead of outright power. The CBR900RR weighed 185 kg (Yamaha's contemporary FZR1000 weighed 209 kg) and revolutionised what a sportbike could be. Every modern supersport platform - the YZF-R1, GSX-R1000, ZX-10R, Panigale V4 - inherits the Fireblade weight/dimension philosophy. The current CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP (2024) is a near-MotoGP machine for the road: V4 isn't used here, but advanced winglets, semi-active suspension, 217 hp, and electronics derived directly from the RC213V MotoGP bike.

Sources: Honda - CBR1000RR-R; Wikipedia - CBR900RR.

8. MotoGP and WSBK dominance

Honda has won more Grand Prix victories than any other motorcycle manufacturer in history. The major championships include Mick Doohan's five consecutive 500cc titles (1994-1998), Valentino Rossi's first three MotoGP titles on Honda machinery (2001-2003), Casey Stoner's 2011 MotoGP title, and the legendary run by Marc Marquez: six MotoGP titles in 2013, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. Honda's recent MotoGP form has been weaker as Ducati has taken over, but the historical record remains untouchable. In WSBK, Honda has multiple titles plus the iconic RC30 / VFR750R homologation special that won the inaugural 1988 World Superbike Championship.

Sources: MotoGP - Honda; Wikipedia - Honda in motorsport.

9. The Africa Twin and adventure dominance

The Africa Twin name began with the XRV650 in 1988 and continued through the XRV750 (1989-2003), a Paris-Dakar inspired large-displacement V-twin adventure machine. The platform went dormant for over a decade before Honda relaunched the Africa Twin in 2015 as the CRF1000L, with a clean-sheet parallel-twin engine and modern off-road-capable chassis. The current CRF1100L Africa Twin and Africa Twin Adventure Sports ES (2020+) compete directly with the BMW R 1300 GS at a lower price point, with DCT semi-automatic transmission as a Honda-exclusive option. Honda built the modern parallel-twin adventure category alongside BMW's GS, and the Africa Twin remains one of the most credible long-distance adventure motorcycles available in 2026.

Sources: Honda - Africa Twin; Wikipedia - Honda Africa Twin.

10. The 2026 transformation

Photo: MotorideSA / Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA 4.0)

Honda's 2026 portfolio expansion has been the most aggressive single-year product launch in the Big Four for a decade. The all-new CB1000GT sport-tourer (unveiled at EICMA 2025) is the first major Honda sport-tourer in a decade, using a Hornet/Fireblade-derived engine with electronic Showa EERA suspension and full touring electronics. The WN7 electric (launched January 2026 in Europe at approximately EUR 7,500) is Honda's first major large-displacement electric motorcycle and the first Big Four electric motorcycle at scale. And the V3 turbocharged engine concept, shown at EICMA 2025, hints at where Honda is going next - a turbocharged production motorcycle is now plausible within the 2027-2028 window.

Sources: Honda News EU; Wikipedia - Honda.

Seventy-seven years in, Honda is the rare motorcycle company that has simultaneously dominated volume (the Super Cub), invention (the CB750), racing (Marquez's six MotoGP titles), category creation (Africa Twin, Gold Wing, Fireblade), and now the electrification transition (the WN7). No other motorcycle manufacturer in history has produced a comparable record across so many different parts of the industry over so many decades. The 2026 expansion - CB1000GT, WN7, V3 concept - suggests Honda is not slowing down, even as Ducati dominates MotoGP and KTM presses on adventure.

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Do you own a Honda? Which model and year, and would you consider the new electric WN7 as your first electric motorcycle? Drop a comment below.