Audi plans to make some big news next week, the German automaker set to reveal the next-generation version of its best-selling model, the Q5. Ahead of that formal unveiling, Audi released this teaser image and gave some hints as to what’s coming. Significantly, the midsize SUV will be offered with a range of powertrains, including gas, hybrid and all-electric. Here’s what we’ve learned so far.
Audi’s best-selling model, the Q5, is getting a significant update for the next model year.
With a full 20 new models to launch over the next 16 months, Audi is putting an emphasis on what might be considered its most important product line. If nothing else, the 2025 Audi Q5 will bring a complete makeover to the German automaker’s best-selling product line.
The debut of the third-generation SUV is scheduled to take place on September 2, though this teaser image provides a little insight into what’s in store. And, according to CEO Gernot Dollner, Audi will follow with a complete makeover of its entire SUV line-up.
As it’s been doing with so many other new models, Audi will launch an all-electric version of the 2025 Q5. But it will offer potential buyers a variety of other powertrain options, as well.
What’s new
The third-generation Audi Q5 will be a complete, ground-up makeover.
As the teaser suggests, the new SUV borrows heavily from the new A5. While the automaker may not sell as many sedans as it did a decade ago, the A5 remains one of its most stylish models and helps set the brand’s future design direction. Fittingly, the Q5 will signal where the rest of the Audi SUV line-up will go.
We can see that the nose of the new Q5 will take on an edgier appearance, with more sculpting to the hood, and will use lighting as a more dynamic part of the design. That includes more slit-like LED running lights that, along with the headlamps, flow across a more angular nose.
The new Audi Q6 e-tron features the new warning light system coming to the next-gen Q5.
Digital lighting can alert other drivers.
Expect to see lighting to play an equally important role at the back end of the 2025 Audi Q5. And that should include the OLED digital taillights from the Q6 e-tron. The all-electric SUV has a built-in warning system that goes beyond basic brake lights.
The vehicle’s proximity sensing system and other onboard technology can detect potential problems, whether an accident ahead or the need to make a sudden stop. It then displays symbols to alert drivers behind. Unfortunately, that technology has yet to be approved by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and doesn’t seem likely to make it over to the U.S.
As for the adaptive headlights, they use scores of focused pixelized bulbs capable of automatically dimming just the parts of the road ahead where there might be oncoming traffic or pedestrians to avoid blinding them. Whether that makes it across the Atlantic is also uncertain.
More Audi News
- Audi Expands All-Electric Offerings with New A6 E-Tron
- Audi Teases Q6 E-Tron, Confirms March 18 Unveiling
- Porsche, Audi Recall 130,000 EVs and PHEVs Due to Fire Risk
Powertrain choices
Like the sibling Volkswagen brand, Audi has made one of the biggest commitments of any European automaker to going electric. But that doesn’t mean it’s abandoning combustion engine technology, at least for now.
The new Audi A5 coupe appears to have provided some design inspiration for the next-generation Q5.
“With the third generation of our most successful SUV, we will now begin rejuvenating our SUV portfolio with efficient combustion engine models and hybrid versions,” CEO Dollner said in a statement accompanying the Q5 teaser image.
What that means, well, Audi won’t provide specific details until next week. But the Q5 typically mirrors what the automaker offers in its A5 line. So, that could include a pair of turbocharged 2.0-liter options making 148 and 201 horsepower, respectively, as will as a bigger package making 268 hp. That’s expected to motivate the Quattro all-wheel-drive package that should be the mainstay offering for U.S. buyers.
Electrified options
The new Q5 should also bring a variety of electrified options, starting with one of more conventional hybrid and a plug-in hybrid carried over from the existing SUV. Add an all-electric option and there’ll be plenty to choose from – though American buyers likely will have a smaller array of powertrains to choose from.
We won’t have access to the diesel, for one thing, and may not get the smaller gas engines, nor the hybrids. At least, that’s early speculation. But Audi could announce some surprises considering the fast-growing U.S. demand for hybrid powertrains.
The 2025 Audi Q5 could begin rolling into European showrooms soon after its Sept. 2 debut. As is so often the case, however, American buyers will have to wait a bit longer for the midsize SUV to arrive here.
Sounds great. Developing an electric option seems the only way Audi can get around their oil ring problems that have plagued their gasoline engines for more than a decade.