The AMC Gremlin, also called American Motors Gremlin, is a subcompact car introduced in 1970, manufactured and marketed in a single, two-door body style (1970–1978) by American Motors Corporation (AMC), as well as in Mexico (1974–1983) by AMC's Vehículos Automotores Mexicanos (VAM) subsidiary.

Using a shortened Hornet platform and bodywork with a pronounced kammback-like tail, the Gremlin was classified as an economy car and competed with the Chevrolet Vega and Ford Pinto, introduced that same year, as well as imported vehicles including the Volkswagen Beetle and Toyota Corolla. The small domestic automaker marketed the Gremlin as "the first American-built import."

The Gremlin reached a total production of 671,475 over a single generation. It was superseded for the 1979 model year by a restyled and revised variant, the AMC Spirit, which continued to be produced through 1983. This was long after the retirement of the Ford Pinto, which suffered from stories about exploding gas tanks, as well as the Chevrolet Vega with its rusting bodies, durability problems, and aluminum engine.

The idea for a sub-compact sized model in AMC's product line began in 1966 when design chief at American Motors, Dick Teague, and stylist Bob Nixon discussed the possibility of a shortened version of AMC's compact car. While on an airline flight, Teague's solution, which he said he sketched on an air sickness bag, was to truncate the tail of a Javelin. Bob Nixon joined AMC as a 23-year-old and did the first formal design sketches in 1967 for the car that was to be the Gremlin.

Ford and General Motors were reported to launch entirely new subcompact cars for the 1971 model year. On the other hand, AMC did not have the financial resources to compete with a wholly new design. Teague's idea of using the shortened pony car Javelin platform resulted in the AMX-GT concept, first shown at the New York International Auto Show in April 1968. This version did not go into production. Instead, the AMX name was utilized from 1968 through 1970 on a shortened, two-seat sports car built from the Javelin.

Instead, Bob Nixon, AMC's future Chief of Design, designed the new subcompact based on the automaker's Hornet model, a compact car. The design reduced the wheelbase from 108 to 96 inches (2,743 to 2,438 mm) and the overall length from 179 to 161 in (4,547 to 4,089 mm), making the Gremlin two inches (50 mm) longer than the Volkswagen Beetle and shorter than the Ford Pinto and Chevrolet Vega.

Capitalizing on AMC's advantage as a small car producer, the Gremlin was introduced on April 1, 1970. The April 6, 1970, cover of Newsweek magazine featured a red Gremlin for its article, "Detroit Fights Back: The Gremlin". The car was available as a "base" two-passenger version with no rear seat and a fixed rear window, at a suggested retail price of $1,879, and as a four-seat hatchback with an opening rear window, at $1,959 (US$16,241 in 2025 dollars).

From the front of the car to the B-pillars, the Gremlin was essentially the same as the AMC Hornet. Although it was only fractionally longer than the contemporary Volkswagen Beetle, Time said the length of its hood over the front-mounted engine made "the difference seem considerably more", adding that the car "resembles a sawed-off station wagon, with a long, low hood and swept-up rear, and is faintly reminiscent of the original Studebaker Avanti." As with the Volkswagen, the Gremlin's styling set it apart from other cars. Time said, "like some other cars of less than standard size, the back seat is designed for small children only." The Gremlin's wider stance gave it "a stable, quiet and relatively comfortable ride—for the two front passengers", for whom, by small-car standards, there was more than average interior width, seat room, and legroom. The six cubic feet of luggage space behind the back seat was less than in the rear-engined Volkswagen Beetle, but with the seat folded the cargo area tripled to 18 cubic feet (509.7 L).