Kustom
noun
Kustom is a noun meaning “A uniquely modified, post-World War II American automobile built or styled between the 1930s and early 1960s; rather than aiming for performance like…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled K-U-S-T-O-M, and it appears about once in every 14 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of Kustom is Kustoms.
What does Kustom mean?
noun
- 1
USA uniquely modified, post-World War II American automobile built or styled between the 1930s and early 1960s; rather than aiming for performance like early "hot rods", these cars were heavily stylized for show, featuring chopped roofs, molded body lines, and radical paint jobs.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forms of Kustom
- Kustoms plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is Kustom?
Kustom appears about once in every 14 million words in written English, the 113,022nd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Where does Kustom come from?
From custom (custom car); the usage of a "K" for Kustom rather than a "C", is believed to have originated with George Barris.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).