2027 Audi RS5 Puts The Fun In 'Vorsprung Durch Technik'

Usually when an automaker includes some on-track driving as part of a first-drive program, the intent is for us reviewers to be able to suss out the car's dynamics as much as possible in just a few laps, with the goal of being smooth, precise and fast. But at the Driving Experience Center Saalfelden — a complex consisting of a hotel, multiple handling tracks and rally courses, and all sorts of other vehicle testing facility accoutrements nestled against an Austrian mountain — Audi has brought us to the track so can can find out how easy the new RS5 is to drift, with the goal of having fun.

Fun is something I think Audi, and the RS5 specifically, has desperately needed as of late. To be frank, I hated the current-gen RS5. Don't get me wrong, it's objectively a perfectly good German sport coupe/sedan, but I always found them to be totally boring, lacking in any standout character. I haven't really clicked with many Audis of the past half-dozen years (before you get to commenting, I never drove an R8), but some of the latest Audi Sport products have given me hope, like the updated RS3 and RS Q8, and the electric RS E-Tron GT and SQ8 E-Tron.

Even putting the drifting session aside, this new B10-generation RS5 is the first Audi that's had me smiling and saying "man, I love this car" every time I got out of it. It's rowdy and fun as hell when you want it to be and cosseting when you don't, and its plug-in-hybrid setup not only feels worthy of existing, but is a necessary part of why I find the car to be compelling — it also fulfills Audi's long-running tagline of "Vorsprung durch Technik," or "progress through technology." And I promise, the curb weight never even crossed my mind.

Full disclosure: Audi flew me to Austria so I could drive the new RS5 on some of the best roads I've ever been on, plus a fun handling course. They put me up in two different hotels and fed me some wonderful bread and cheese.

We're initially supposed to hit the track in the RS5 on our first night in Saafelden, but it's pretty rainy, so that gets canceled much to the chagrin of our group. "Don't y'all have Quattro?" we ask, pointing out how many other automakers have still gone on track when it's wet. But the Audi folks remind us they want us to really kick the car's tail out, and doing that on summer tires in the rain would get nasty fast. So instead, ahead of dinner we have extra time to talk to the RS5's product planners and engineers while admiring a bunch of differently spec'd RS5s.

And I've gotta say, this thing looks unbelievably good. Audi's latest design language is tickling my fancy more than the stuff from a few years ago, and the regular A5 is a nice-looking liftback sedan, but its transformation into the RS5 is even more impactful than when Steve Rogers was given the super-soldier serum. The only body panel shared with the A5 is the hood. Yes, the days of RS cars being a bit subtle and under-the-radar are long gone — there's really no escaping the new RS5's undeniable maw of a front end — but who is buying a 630-horsepower sport sedan to be subtle?

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The grille won't be the first thing you'll notice, though, because both your eyes and the light will be transfixed by the RS5's flared fenders. Pretty much all Audis have good shoulders, especially the RS models, and I think the new RS5 may have the best boxy Audi haunches ever. Both the front and rear fenders have been widened by over an inch and a half on each side of the car, and it's more than three inches wider than the outgoing RS5. The arches are filled well by the 21-inch wheels with a square 285/30 setup (20s are standard, but we didn't drive or see any cars with those), and the RS5's special suspension gives it a fantastic stance that has the car sitting almost an inch lower than the A5. The front fenders have vents that are actually functional vents, too, shaped like the ones on the RS3. My favorite design element has got to be the rear diffuser, though, with giant oval exhaust tips positioned closer to the center of the bumper. The OLED headlights and taillights that look like checkered flags are a nice touch, too.

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Inside there are fewer design changes. The steering wheel has two red buttons that do fun things, plus new scroll wheels that are a welcome addition. The bucket-style seats are fantastic, with thick bolsters, good adjustability and the option of ventilation and massage; even after hours in the car, my ass and back still feel great. I'm still not sold on the optional forged carbon-fiber trim, which also extends to the exterior, but build and material quality is great overall, and there's some cool usage of ambient lighting, like in the perforated door cards.

Mainly the interior is black with the option of some colorful stitching and accents, but one of the cars on display has an Audi Exclusive package with Diamond Silver and Mint Gray leather, which looks fantastic. Another similar package has black leather paired with Neodymium Gold and Bright Orange accents. Like its other German rivals, Audi is further expanding its Exclusive offerings, with all sorts of available paint colors and custom leather schemes. I think the design works much better with an extroverted spec.

It's still drizzling the next morning, but at least we can take the cars out on the road as planned. I start off the day in a red "base" RS5 that looks mean as hell, but is totally docile at first. Upon startup, in the car's Comfort or Balanced drive modes, the RS5 defaults to electric-only operation. A 22-kWh (usable) battery pack sitting above the rear axle provides juice for an electric motor mounted inside the transmission, which puts out 173 horsepower and 339 pound-feet of torque, the latter amount more than the A5's turbo-four. Audi doesn't have an acceleration claim in EV mode, but it's certainly quick enough to keep up with around-town traffic, and it'll do up to 87 mph. On the European cycle Audi says the RS5 has an electric range of 54 miles, which is a genuinely usable amount.

Driving on country roads and through towns the RS5 earns its luxury-brand badging well. The ride is firm but comfortable, the cabin is quiet, and the electric power delivery is effortless. There are a few regenerative braking settings, though the strongest is still far off from one-pedal driving. You can force the car to stay in electric-only mode, but without that button pressed (an actual physical button on the center console), the combustion engine will come on as needed. Aside from sharing the same displacement, everything about the twin-turbo 2.9-liter V6 is new compared to the old RS5's twin-turbo 2.9-liter V6.

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The engine makes 503 hp on its own, already nearly 60 horses more than the old RS5 Competition, and all together there's 630 hp and 608 pound-feet of torque. Yeah, that'll do. I can tell the engine is on in the calm modes, as there's a nice, constant burbly sound and feel instead of an annoying buzzy drone like in some cars, but it's not intrusive. The transitions between gas and electric power are pretty seamless, with no annoying behavior off the line, and there's a bit of regen available in hybrid mode too. Put the car into Dynamic mode and the exhaust gets a little throatier, the chassis tightens up, and it suddenly feels like there's a lot more power on tap, but it's still measured enough for daily driving. Shifts from the 8-speed automatic are more prominent than the near-imperceptible ones in the lesser modes, but far from jarring.

Audi says the RS5 will hit 62 mph in 3.6 seconds, but that feels conservative in practice. No matter the drive mode the powertrain is quick to react to my inputs with prompt downshifts and a surge of torque. Pressing the red boost button on the steering wheel immediately activates maximum power, dropping gears and hiking the revs. It works the same in any drive mode, returning to whatever setting you were in after the 10-second boost is up, and if you're in EV mode it'll instantly fire up the engine and have it primed for you to floor it. It's quite exciting, and the special countdown timer and graphics that pop up in the gauge cluster look cool. Here's a funny stat — after two and a half seconds of "spontaneous acceleration," Audi says the new RS5 will have traveled 74 feet, while the outgoing car will only have gone 48.

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When I turn off of the main road and onto one of the many amazing twisty mountain passes on Audi's drive route, I put the car into RS Sport mode using the red button on the right side of the wheel. (There's also a configurable RS Individual mode, and an RS Torque Rear mode that I don't touch as it turns off stability control and essentially makes the car rear-wheel drive, and the roads are slick.) This really wakes up the optional RS Sport exhaust, which has a really sharp bark to it, loudness with an overrun that doesn't feel artificial. The really good powertrain noises are all the turbo whooshes constantly flying around, though.

RS Sport actually has more of a balanced handling setup and focus on traction than Dynamic, which is more rear-biased. Typically I find Audi's steering to be too overly light for my tastes, and while the RS5's rack is light, it's more satisfying to me than the prior generation's or what you get in an RS6. It does get more weighty in the sportier modes, and the rack is quick, accurate and progressive. Further up the mountain the drizzle turns into an active snow flurry, with the roads getting even slicker and the temperature getting colder. The RS5 still feels sure-footed despite the summer rubber, but best to go back into Comfort mode.

Later, as we're having lunch, the skies finally open up, the track dries, and Audi's team determines it's safe enough for us to go drifting. We're shuttled over to the facility's handling course, an undulating mile-ish-long track that's all tight turns and S-curves with elevation changes. Some of Audi's people are already sliding RS5s around as we get prepared, and damn do they look good doing it.

I know drifting is not what you would expect from Audi, leaders of all-wheel-drive technology, but it's the evolution of that AWD tech that is the RS5's big centerpiece. This is Audi's first car with its Dynamic Torque Control rear differential that uses electromechanical torque vectoring, something that is only possible because of the RS5's 400-volt plug-in-hybrid system; a 48-volt system wouldn't be able to power it. Put simply, an electric motor connected to planetary gearsets inside the rear diff can adjust the torque going to either rear wheel in either direction in just 15 milliseconds, with a possible torque difference of 1,475 lb-ft between them.

As one engineer put it, this allows for "complete freedom" to how and when torque is shifted, which corresponds to immense freedom in how the car behaves. It can be used to enhance stability entering a corner, improve traction coming out of a corner, and better rotate around tight bends. It can also be used for powerslides. The Quattro AWD has a variable torque split between 70/30 and 15/85 front/rear, with a new self-locking center differential that transfers torque quicker in response to throttle input, and that trick rear diff means it doesn't even need a true rear-drive mode to get sideways.

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Before getting behind the wheel myself, I go for a few passenger rides with Andreas Sticht, who developed the torque-vectoring system. Following behind a lead RS5 that's also driving all-out, right off the bat Sticht is freaking tossing it into the corners, sending the car into dramatic skids with a flick of his wrist. It's impossible not to have a smile on my face. After a couple laps of him pointing out the braking and turn-in points, we swap places.

I start out in RS Sport mode with the stability control put in the looser of its settings, and immediately it's clear I am underestimating the RS5's abilities. I'm getting my way around the track quickly, but I'm not turning in sharply enough or getting on the power soon enough to get the car to really rotate. With some egging on from Sticht and a bit more confidence in myself, I pull off some nice drifts exiting a few of the tighter corners. I don't need to overly correct the steering or constantly modulate the gas or brake; it feels like the car does exactly what I'm expecting it to, responding immediately to small inputs.

After a few laps in RS Sport we switch to Dynamic, and it's even easier to provoke the RS5 into a controlled drift. In one section I even get the car to quickly change direction while in a small slide, and it all feels natural and effortless. The five-link suspension and twin-valve shock absorbers keep the car planted and composed, but there's still enough playfulness dialed in to make a small track like this even more fun. I can feel the weight shifting around (it's got a 49/51 weight distribution), but I swear, if you didn't already know the RS5 weighs 5,192 pounds, you'd never guess. It feels legitimately nimble and much lighter than that figure would suggest.

Sadly Audi won't let me keep drifting all day, so following my handful of laps, my drive partner (friend of Jalopnik Jeff Glucker) and I hop into a lovely Bedford Green RS5 that has the Audi Sport package, which is described by an Audi spokesperson as being "one click to happiness." In addition to raising the top speed from 155 mph to 177 mph, it adds the RS Sport exhaust, the 6-spoke 21-inch wheels, ceramic brakes, different bumper designs with forged carbon accents, and some other styling bits.

We drive along the same excellent road as in the morning, but with the surface now being dry I'm able to better explore the RS5's handling. As on the track, you would never guess how heavy this car is. In RS Sport mode there's oodles of grip, and even in more lively Dynamic it rockets in and out of corners with little drama. The car certainly feels big and wide on some of the narrower roads with the shiniest guardrails, but even without the aid of rear-wheel steering it changes directions cleanly and sharply. Audi's traditional penchant for understeer isn't really present here, with the car feeling a lot more agile and eager than its predecessor. The torque vectoring system clearly is a big part of that, but it's not like it's intrusive, or I'm able to really feel what it's doing — it's ten times quicker than the blink of an eye, after all.

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The ceramic brakes are strong and have great pedal feel, though there's a bit of a detectable shift between the regen and friction. You'll get a bit of range back from braking, and sporty driving with the engine on will also help recharge the RS5's battery, which is helpful for when we get out of the mountains and back on the freeway toward a scenic toll road way up another mountain. (There are so many incredible mountains in Austria that Jeff and I kept gawking at, and we drove past the Hohenwerfen castle, which you should definitely look up the history of.)

Every fifteen minutes the weather seems to change, from sun to rain to snow and back again, as we're going from town to highway to mountain road and back again. The RS5's breadth of drive modes and powertrain settings feels actually worth switching between depending on the situation, unlike in some other cars, but even if you just leave it in one (or configure your own RS mode), the car feels well-suited for anything, and ready to have fun at any time. Sometimes miles and miles of twisty road in a sporty car can get tiring, even when driving slowly, but not so with the RS5.

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All of this performance does come with a price. In Germany the RS5 costs around €89,000 without VAT, or about fifteen grand more than the last model. That works out to a starting price of just over $100,000 in the U.S., and while pricing, feature and options availability and other details haven't been announced for the U.S. yet, that sounds about right. That's a hefty sum, for sure, but the RS5 does have a lot of stuff packed into it. Details for our market will be announced next year.

Will Audi's die-hard RS buyers vibe with the RS5's plug-in-hybrid system? I think they will, and I think it'll appeal to more brand newcomers too — it's certainly made me more excited about Audi's future. It's powerful, characterful and really usable, and more interesting than the old V6 to boot. Yes, the car is heavy, but its dynamics are a big step forward for the brand, and it's genuinely fun. The RS5's awesome looks and improved interior only bolster its appeal. "Vorsprung durch Technik," indeed.

You may have noticed that I've gone this entire review without mentioning the RS5 Avant once. Audi had a few of the wagons at the launch, as there were journalists from other markets doing this event before and after us, and while we were allowed to sit in a parked Avant, we were expressly forbidden from driving them. And for now, the official line is that there are no plans for Audi to bring the RS5 Avant to the U.S. — but multiple company spokespeople did talk about how Audi's American dealers have been begging for it, and the automaker sees a desire for performance wagons here.

More than 100,000 RS models of this segment (so RS4 and RS5) have been sold around the world since its inception, and the sedan makes up about 60% of sales globally, with the U.S. being the largest market for the nameplate as a whole. Audi says the new RS5 has so far been the most successful sales launch in RS history (whatever that means) with "extremely strong" demand. Anecdotally, in Los Angeles, surely one of the highest concentration of RS products in the country, I see probably fifteen RS6s for every RS7 I see. Come on, Audi, give us the Avant!

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Because the Avant really does look phenomenal. Like I've already said, the sedan's design rules. I love that it has a liftback cargo area instead of just a trunk, while retaining a great profile and greenhouse. But the wagon is simply even better. Sure, the rake of the rear glass makes it a little less practical than other wagons or crossovers, but the shape is kind of an Audi throwback, and the RS5's styling enhancements are even more well suited to the Avant shape. I'll leave you all to drool all over your keyboards now.