That the base Audi E-Tron GT is a complete banger is by no suggests a surprise. Yeah, it really is a detuned edition of its 637-horsepower RS counterpart, but with stable architecture setting up a foundation for fantastic on-highway manners, I assure, the conventional GT is anything but a snoozefest.
RS or not, each E-Tron GT has the exact powertrain — just one that’s shared with the Porsche Taycan. A ninety three.four-kilowatt-hour battery pack sends ability to a pair of electrical motors, managed by a two-pace transmission. Thanks to the E-Tron GT’s 800-volt vehicle architecture, it can accept charging speeds of up to 270 kilowatts, which means you can carry the battery from flat to an eighty% state of cost in about 20 minutes.
As for the figures, the base E-Tron GT provides a utmost of 522 horsepower and 464 pound-toes of torque on overboost, ensuing in a three.nine-second -to-sixty-mph time. Is the RS E-Tron GT more quickly? You betcha. And when you can definitely observe the .eight-second disparity if you’re activating start management and cannonballing down a runway, in day by day driving, you can in no way absence for fast, unrelenting thrust. The GTs’ array estimates are not way too much apart, both, with the base E-Tron rated at 238 miles and the RS coming in just behind it at 232.
When it arrives to the E-Tron GT’s experience and dealing with, each the base and RS styles offer a similarly fantastic experience. All E-Tron GTs have a a few-chamber air suspension with Convenience and Dynamic settings, and while the distinction concerning these modes isn’t huge, the GT yet strikes a near-fantastic balance of supple consolation and taut security. The digital ability steering receives more quickly in Dynamic manner, way too, but the E-Tron GT definitely normally takes a backseat to the Taycan in this department. Porsche is known for its rapid, communicative steering and it really is a essential attribute that sets these German siblings apart.
Efficiency-improving systems like torque vectoring and rear-axle steering definitely amp up the experience, making the E-Tron GT very agile. These goodies are conventional on the RS, but are readily available for the base E-Tron GT by way of a $six,000 solution pack that also involves 20-inch wheels, laser headlights, carbon fiber inside bits and blacked-out exterior trim. Larger 21-inch wheels are also readily available, if that’s your jam.
The cabin is significant-tech if a bit active.
Audi
Like the Porsche Taycan, the E-Tron GT does not offer substantially in the way of regenerative braking. You can dial in a very little bit of regen by way of the paddles on the steering wheel, but it would make a negligible distinction in how the motor vehicle drives and the consumer experience is kind of backwards, due to the fact you use the would-be downshift paddle to incorporate regen. Audi insists it really is a lot more productive for an EV to coast as an alternative of promptly recuperate and the corporation suggests its buyers want a a lot more natural braking feel, but I counter by saying just one-pedal driving is an experience that’s wholly exclusive to EVs and a great just one at that. Why not just make it an on/off change like Ford does on the Mustang Mach-E?
Funnily adequate, when you hit the brake pedal, the E-Tron GT essentially does use regen to in the beginning sluggish the motor vehicle down, until eventually you input adequate drive to activate the mechanical stoppers. The conventional E-Tron GT utilizes metal brakes and the transition concerning power recuperation and caliper touching rotor is imperceptible. The RS E-Tron GT arrives conventional with Audi’s (and Porsche’s) surface-coated brakes, but you can solution a lot more impressive carbon ceramics as part of an RS-exceptional 12 months A person deal that arrives with a bunch of upholstery and design upgrades but charges — gulp — $20,350.
Talking of upholstery, you can get the E-Tron GT with a sustainable (and vegan) leather-cost-free inside, while fantastically stitched cow hides are optional if you’re not as eco-minded. The GT’s cockpit is a whole lot busier than the Taycan’s, with much a lot more buttons and knobs and a odd very little round pad of audio controls put to the ideal of the cup holders. But even so, the general cabin quality is just what you’d hope from an Audi, with impeccable in good shape and complete and fantastic interest to depth. The rear seats are ready to accommodate typical-sized grownups with out situation, while like the Taycan, the E-Tron GT is not a hatchback, so beware the rather small trunk opening. Foundation E-Tron GTs are only readily available with a glass roof that can’t be opened and isn’t tinted adequate to block out the sunlight and glare, which is silly. If you want the stable carbon fiber roof, you have to acquire the RS.
Continue to not marketed on the design, individually, but Ascari Blue positive appears very good.
Audi
Both of those E-Tron GT styles get Audi’s excellent Virtual Cockpit digital gauge cluster, as perfectly as a ten.1-inch central infotainment monitor managing the company’s uncomplicated-to-use MIB3 software package, comprehensive with wi-fi Apple CarPlay and wired Android Auto. A whole suite of driver-aid goodies are involved, way too, while lane-maintaining assist and adaptive cruise management are bundled as a $two,250 solution on the entry-level E-Tron GT High quality In addition trim.
You can want $a hundred,995 to get into the High quality In addition E-Tron GT, a number that involves $1,095 for spot but excludes any likely federal or regional tax credits. All in, you’re on the lookout at ideal all over $a hundred and twenty,000 for a entirely loaded E-Tron GT Status, which undercuts the a lot more impressive RS E-Tron by about $20,000. Taking into consideration these two E-Trons are so dang identical in the way they glance and travel, I might skip the RS enhance, individually. But with an EV this perfectly-rounded and entertaining, both way, you can’t go completely wrong.