Toyota’s subcompact car that debuted in 1999 was the Yaris. The name was used internationally for Toyota’s small car line, whose first-generation models went on sale from 1999 in hatchback and sedan forms.
In Japan, the closely related hatchback was called the Vitz, while export markets used names including Yaris and Echo. The first-generation Yaris replaced the Toyota Starlet and Tercel in many markets. Its European-focused design came from Toyota’s European design operation, helping give the car a distinctive rounded shape and a practical interior.
The alternatives can cause confusion because Starlet was the Yaris’s predecessor, not the answer. The iQ was a much smaller city car introduced later, and the Aygo was a separate city-car model developed for European markets. Toyota has also reused the Yaris name for sedans, performance models such as the GR Yaris, and the Yaris Cross subcompact crossover. In Japan, Toyota eventually replaced the Vitz name with Yaris in 2020.