Volkswagen | A final refresh for the Golf before the electric shift

The Volkswagen Golf will celebrate its 50th anniversary next March^e birthday. A privileged witness to the evolution of a compact car in existential crisis, the child prodigy from Wolfsburg offers for the occasion a mid-term update to his eighth vintage. The German giant presented last week the first images of this opus in European version, which will probably be the last one equipped with a combustion engine.

Certainly, this Golf, which is already nicknamed 8.5 among insiders, represents an evolution on a canvas launched four years ago. Thus, its hatchback dress – only available in the GTI and R variant in North America – remains almost identical to that of its predecessor, except when we look at the design of the diodes which adorn the front headlights as well as the features defining its shield. Its front logo will also be illuminated in the dark.

However, you have to get on board to see where most of the work has been done. There, the steering wheel fortunately abandons the haptic keys for a configuration with physical buttons. The multimedia system also gains a significantly larger 13-inch touchscreen (10-inch standard) that controls an updated interface incorporating the ChatGPT artificial intelligence system to improve voice assistance. The touch controls under the screen will also be backlit to correct a design flaw in the previous version.

Mechanically, this new Golf will only be entitled to a dual-clutch gearbox (7 speeds) and its 2.0L turbocharged four-cylinder engine will benefit from a power increase of 21 hp to increase the count to 262 hp for the GTI livery, according to European data. However, nothing has been said about the 2025 Golf R. The North American portrait of the Golf will likely follow in the coming months.