Finalists for the World Car of the Year have been released by international accounting firm KPMG.
They are:

Ford Fiesta
Toyota iQ
Volkswagen Golf VI

To be eligible for the overall World Car award, the contender had to be in production, and sold, on at least two continents during 2008. Vehicles are selected and voted on by an international jury panel comprised of fifty-nine top-level automotive journalists from 25 countries around the world.

Three additional winners for the World Performance Car, World Green Car award, and the World Car Design of the Year will also be announced at the New York International Auto Show on Thursday, April 9, 2009. In preparation, KPMG announced today that the Top Three finalists for the 2009 World Performance Car award, presented by Mobil 1, are, in alphabetical order:

Corvette ZR1
Nissan Skyline GT-R
Porsche 911 Carrera

While the winner of the overall World Car award must excel in a broad range of attributes, the World Performance Car award must demonstrate a specific and overt sports/performance orientation while satisfying the same availability criteria as for the overall World Car of the Year award.

To be eligible for the 2009 World Green Car award, a vehicle had to available in at least one major market during 2008. The vehicle or the green technology could be in production or an experimental prototype with potential near-future application, provided that it was released for individual or press fleet evaluations in quantities of ten or more during 2008.

Due to the complexity of some of the 'green' technologies, three green experts were appointed by the World Car Steering Committee to extensively review all documentation and specs associated with each candidate. They were asked to create a short-list of five finalists for review by the 59 jurors in their second round of voting in February.

The 59 member jury chose the following top three finalists for the 2009 World Green Car award:

Honda FCX Clarity
Mitsubishi iMiEV
Toyota iQ

Cars eligible for the 2009 World Car Design of the Year award are taken from the list of World Car candidates. A design panel consisting of four highly respected world design experts was asked to first review each candidate, and then establish a short-list of recommendations for the jurors. Jurors then voted on the experts' recommendations.

The top three design finalists are:

Citroen C5/C5 Tourer
Fiat 500
Jaguar XF