Rear wheel drive cars are cars where the torque of the engine is applied to the rear wheels.

The main advantage of rear wheel drive is higher limiting acceleration than front wheel drive due to weight transfer which gives greater traction for the rear wheels; but also removal of other subtleties which are common to front wheel drive, such as torque steer.

Rear wheel drive cars tend to oversteer under acceleration much more than front wheel drive cars, and this 'feels odd' to drivers used to front wheel drive cars. Modern manufacturers therefore design rear wheel drive to have similar handling to front wheel drive wherever possible via suspension tuning.

Due to components such as differentials being rear mounted, Rear wheel drive cars generally have more even weight distribution than front wheel drive; although some cars such as mid or rear engine cars have more weight on the rear axle. This is not normally noticeable, although can make skids unrecoverable if massive oversteer is experienced due to too much acceration; but it also increases the maximum acceleration and actually improves braking due to more even weight distribution under braking (weight transfer adds weight to the front tires evening out the grip).

More or less, all seriously high performance racing cars are rear or mid engined with rear wheel drive, (except where skidding is likely such as rally cars, which prefer all wheel drive).

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