Trademark Filing Hints at a Ford Mustang Sedan

We’ve come close to seeing a Ford Mustang sedan several times in the model’s history, but the project has never materialized. While nothing is official yet, Ford recently added fuel to the four-door bonfire by trademarking the Mach 4 name.

Ford registered the Mach 4 nameplate on February 25, 2025, in the United States, and its application was assigned serial number 99055118. The trademark is pending, meaning it needs to be reviewed by the relevant authorities before it can be approved. Ford told the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) that it wants to use the Mach 4 name on “motor vehicles, namely gasoline and electric automobiles, pick-up trucks, sport utility vehicles and their structural parts.” While that’s vague, it rules out, say, a sweatshirt.

Enthusiast website Ford Authority speculates that Ford intends to employ the Mach 4 nameplate on a four-door Mustang. This would be distinct from the all-electric Mustang Mach-E crossover, which shares little more than a name with the traditional two-door Mustang. The publication sketches the outline of a Mustang-based sport sedan that would presumably go head-to-head against the four-door version of the new Dodge Charger. If that speculation is accurate, the model could offer rear-wheel drive, a 5.0-liter V-8, and a six-speed manual transmission.

The idea of a Mustang sedan isn’t as new or as controversial as it might sound. Ford has experimented with numerous Mustang off-shoots over the past couple of decades, and several of them had four doors. One was notably unveiled in 1965 and based on the first-generation model. The idea was consigned to the attic, where it collected dust. In 2024, Ford reportedly showed dealers a four-door Mustang named Mach 4 during a closed-door meeting (they were also shown a lifted, Baja-racer-esque coupe).

But even before that, Ford executives had floated the idea of a four-door Mustang.

“We will never build a Mustang that isn’t a Mustang. For instance, there will never be room for a small, two-row Ford SUV with a Mustang badge stuck on it. But could we do other Mustang body forms — a four-door or whatever? I believe we could, as long as these models have all the performance and attitude of the original,” Ford CEO Jim Farley told British magazine Autocar in May 2024. Was the Nürburgring lap record set in December 2024 a way to lay the foundations of a Mustang sub-brand? Ford has doubled down on enthusiast cars in the past couple of years, and there’s a ton of equity in the Mustang name.

But what if Ford Authority is wrong? What else could Mach 4 stand for? Another possible answer is all-wheel drive, which the Mustang has never offered. The notion that rear-wheel-drive is the only proper way to make a sports car is losing ground; even the BMW M3 is available with all-wheel drive, and the new Charger is only all-wheel-drive. We think demand would be there, though it probably wouldn’t be huge, but whether the Mustang’s platform can be configured with all-wheel drive is an entirely different story.

As always, bear in mind that a trademark application doesn’t guarantee that a nameplate will end up in showrooms. Sleuthing through trademark requests can, however, offer an accurate look at how a company is thinking about its product pipeline. Applications can be duds, though. Carmakers routinely trademark names that they think they might use or that they’d rather not see on a competitor’s car. Ford might launch a four-door Mustang Mach 4 in the not-too-distant future, or it might simply want to ensure that, say, Honda doesn’t introduce a car named Mach 4. The company hasn’t commented on the trademark filing.