Brushless. I've had Nitro cars in the past, and it's great and fun, but hard to beat the simplicity of just throwing this one down and go. Plus 6 year olds don't have the patients for the nitro stuff, always tinkering with them. For the money i paid for the Rustler, i love it. It's fast as hell out of the box, can buy tons of upgrades for relatively cheap, and it takes a beating. I ended up getting a smoking deal from a little shop downriver who sells them for the same, or less than you can get them anywhere else, ebay and Amazon included. Being water proof was a huge bonus too.