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The quickest, strongest Volkswagen Golf R but is about to hit showrooms in 2027, with the flagship scorching hatch reportedly set to make use of the turbocharged five-cylinder petrol engine from the Audi RS3 and RSQ3 efficiency fashions.
Whereas the present Golf R and its predecessors have used 2.0-litre turbocharged four-cylinder engines, based on Autocar, the following Golf R will go one higher by utilizing the two.5-litre five-pot, codenamed EA855, delivering fanatics essentially the most highly effective, speedy Golf R within the nameplate’s two-decade historical past.
It’s tipped to be revealed to commemorate the Golf R’s twenty fifth anniversary in 2027.
Concurrently with Autocar’s report, spy images have been taken of what seems to be a warmer model of the present Golf R that was spied testing on the Nürburgring.
Within the present RS3, the five-cylinder makes 294kW/500Nm via a seven-speed dual-clutch computerized transmission (DCT) with all-wheel drive, for a 0-100km/h declare of three.8 seconds.
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The present Golf R has 245kW/420Nm – additionally utilizing a seven-speed DCT and AWD – and has an official 0-100km/h declare of 4.6 seconds.
Present scorching hatch rivals embrace the 235kW/420Nm Honda Civic Kind R and the 206kW/392Nm Hyundai i30 N, each with turbocharged four-cylinder engines. There’s additionally the turbo three-pot 221kW/400Nm Corolla GR GTS from Toyota, which additionally teased a good hotter model earlier this 12 months.
The five-cylinder R will probably be a farewell to petrol energy, a swansong forward of the EU’s controversial ban on inner combustion engines (ICE) set for 2035, however nonetheless beneath important debate.
Volkswagen has beforehand stated it will maintain providing petrol-powered Golfs – together with GTI and R efficiency fashions – with combustion energy, even when electrical variations of the long-lasting hatches are launched.
The corporate already affords plug-in hybrid variations of the present Golf, and is about so as to add a traditional hybrid powertrain to the small automotive’s lineup.
This scorching five-pot R would be the first time the ‘R-badged’ Golf may have greater than 4 cylinders because the 2006-2010 Mark V R32’s narrow-angle V6 was offered right here, making ‘solely’ 184kW. This doesn’t depend ideas such because the wild Golf W12-650 (12 cylinders, 650hp) of 2007.
The way forward for the five-cylinder engine was beneath a cloud amid ever tightening emissions legal guidelines, which means the RS3 must discover a new energy unit, as would the opposite automotive utilizing the engine – the Cupra Formentor VZ5, not offered in Australia.
Regardless of the challenges, Autocar studies Volkswagen has instructed there’s extra to return from the five-cylinder – which can embrace extra energy, citing former Audi Sport boss Sebastian Grams telling the British outlet in 2023 “there’s nonetheless a option to go” with the engine’s functionality.
This may increasingly embrace {hardware} and software program tuning upgrades, with revised suspension – required because of the RS3’s heavier entrance axle in comparison with the present Golf R’s – to deal with the elevated energy and barely heavier mass the bigger engine brings.
There may also be larger, carbon-ceramic brakes, whereas the five-pot R may additionally use the RS3’s torque-splitting mechanical rear differential, and – just like the 2026 Golf GTI Version 50 – include light-weight solid alloys shod with semi-slick tyres and weight saving seats.
The R must also be sooner across the famed Nürburgring Nordschleife circuit in Germany, the place a pre-production Version 50 set a 7 minute 46.13 second lap time earlier this 12 months – at the moment the quickest from a manufacturing Volkswagen.
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