Bringing a sports car to the production line is never an easy process. For a successful introduction and a long production run, the car has to combine high performance with a look that appeals to the tastes of high-end car buyers. The Acura NSX managed to cover both requirements well with its introduction in 1990 by Japanese automaker, Honda.

Development of the NSX began some six years before it hit the market at the Italian design firm Pininfarina. The resulting design, the Honda Pininfarina Xperimental, contained many of the final features that would make it into production as the NSX, including the mid-mounted V6 engine and the rear-wheel drive. Throughout the development process, the designers were dedicated to creating a car that was on par with the sports cars being produced in Italy or Germany. To this end, many of the technologies used in the vehicle were the same as those utilized in the company's F1 motor-sports program.

The Acura NSX model released in 1990 was a somewhat scaled down version of the race cars being produced at the time by Honda. The vehicle was lightweight due to its aluminum chassis and suspension, included titanium connection rods and forged alloy wheels among other innovations that made it one of the most advanced vehicles on the road. Some compromises had to be made, however, simply to make it drivable at legal speeds on city streets and highways. For those looking for a pure NSX experience without the everyday use compromises, Honda soon released the NSX-R model in 1992.

The NSX-R was developed to take full advantage of the technology present in the NSX. Through the removal of items such as the audio system, spare tire and traction control, Honda managed to reduce the vehicle's weight a further 265 lbs. The car's suspension was tuned to allow for better control over high-speed cornering, along with the car's springs to change the vehicle's bias from a rear-wheeled on to front-wheeled for even more steerage control.

After the introduction of the NSX-R, Honda continued to produce NSX models, making several minor changes throughout the production run to improve vehicle performance, such as stiffening the suspension and reducing the vehicle's weight in the 1997 NSX-S, or switching from pop-up headlights to fixed lights in the NSX Refresh model in 2002.

Toward the end of the production run in 2005, Honda was only selling several hundred NSX vehicles across the entire model line and the NSX was no longer on par with the best of the sports cars being produced. Honda made the decision to stop production of the Acura NSX at that time, deeming it not worth the cost of production.