Star Trek: Every Starfleet Starship Class Ranked Worst To Best
16. Intrepid
Rick Sternbach designed the Intrepid class USS Voyager for Star Trek's third live-action spin-off, though the design that the audience saw on-screen was almost not the one that was decided. The nacelles were originally longer with a more swept down look. A studio model of that version was built, before the producers settled on the final version as pictured above.
This ship was another experiment. It was, at the time, the fastest vessel in Starfleet (handy, considering they had to hightail it back from the Delta Quadrant) and also employed bio-neural gel packs to transmit power, though these do not seem to have gone into wide-circulation in the fleet.
The ship was a surprisingly sturdy one, as evidenced during Voyager's seven year exodus. It was able to take extreme damage and continue flying - best depicted during the Year of Hell two part story.
Though smaller than the Galaxy class, it also contained similar firepower and was well equipped to withstand attack from superior forces. Also, it was designed for planetary flight and was able to land on the surface of a planet when the situation arose.