This is a list of lap times achieved by various vehicles on the Nürburgring (Nordschleife). The list itself is broken down into categories.

The Nürburgring Nordschleife (North Loop) in Germany, with its remaining 20.8 km (12.9 mi) long old section dating from 1927, is used by various motoring media outlets and vehicle manufacturers for testing. Manufacturers publish times for promotional purposes while automotive media outlets usually publish times for comparison and reporting purposes. According to Car and Driver, Nürburgring Nordschleife "record-chasing runs are a universally accepted, objective measure of a car’s performance, and shaving seconds gives automakers reasons to grab some headlines."^[1] Compared to the current version, the original Nürburgring track was longer and split into three configurations. The entire track, the Gesamtstrecke (see map above) was 28.3 kilometres in length, composed of the Nordschleife (22.8 km), the Südschleife (7.7 km), and the Betonschleife – the latter a short 2 kilometer warm-up loop around the pit area. The lengths of the two segments, when considered separately, add up to more than the whole, since each circuit also incorporated some parts of the Betonschleife.^[2]

Nordschleife runs are not without sometimes prominent critics. The British motoring programme Top Gear used the Nordschleife for their challenges, often involving Sabine Schmitz. Top Gear's James May, however, was very critical of the influence of Nordschleife lap timing, saying that it "corrupts performance when it is used by car makers to develop new models. Testing prototype cars on a circuit is nothing new, obviously: it's probably been going on since someone drove a horseless carriage onto a disused donkey derby track. But the 'Ring, through being communal and open to all, encourages a pointless scrabble for comparative lap times that isn't helping you or me."^[5] According to Popular Science, "beating the 'ring, and making a YouTube video to prove it, is about the best marketing move a sports car company can make, even one that plans to roll only a double-digits'-worth of cars out of its production facility."^[6]

The views and definitions differ among automakers and also among journalists. According to Porsche, the Porsche 918 Spyder did set a "Nurburgring record for a street-legal automobile",^[7] while the car landed on place 3 on this list behind two Radical SR8. With roof reinforced for safety reasons and observed by sport auto,^[8] the record was widely reported by the media. Magazines like Car and Driver and the wider automotive industry declared the worldwide street-legal Porsche 918 the new record holder since the SR8 didn't meet full type-approval and only could get British single-vehicle approval.^{[9][10][11][12]}

Two months later, Nissan claimed, which was also widely reported in the media, a ring record for its Nissan GT-R Nismo as "world's fastest volume production car". Engineers later confessed that the car had been "specifically tuned for the Nurburgring" with significant changes from the standard car, including the addition of not road legal parts. The Nissan GT-R was fourth place on this list at the time.^{[13][14][15][16]}

• The Radical SR8 achieved record in 2009 for the fastest road-legal car with a time of 6:48^[17]

There are varying lap lengths. Therefore, not all of the lap times are comparable.