The 2025 Audi S5 Is A Throwback To When Cars Didn’t Have To Fake Being Cool

So much in the world is fake today, from the bots that roam social media to the endless array of bogus products. Our cars are also guilty of fakery as some cars cover up uninspired engine notes with noises played through speakers while other cars can’t even be bothered to give you real vents or real exhaust tips. Then there’s the new Audi S5. This is a car where what you see is what you get without any puffery. It’s brutally fast, stunningly gorgeous, and impressively smart. But as always, America is going to miss out on one of its coolest features.

The S5 is an important car for Audi. It’s not a secret to anyone in the car world that electric vehicles are on the rise. Audi is no different as it fills out is own lineup of EVs. However, the S5 is Audi proudly saying that it hasn’t given up on internal combustion just yet. The S5 is Audi pointing at the car enthusiast who works in an office by day and takes care of kids by night and its telling them that they don’t have to stop going fast just yet.

But, what the S5 has shown the most to me that Audi hasn’t lost the plot on making dignified cars that deliver healthy smiles per mile.

(Full Disclosure: Audi invited us to Nice, France to test the new S5. Audi has paid for all of my travel, lodging and food, with the interesting twist of paying for the best seats on every aircraft I’ll be flying on. I’m grateful for the experience.)

Audi Is Reinventing Itself Again

Most automakers on this planet seemingly have no real idea how to brand their EVs. Some automakers, like Ford, bring back old names that sound like they could be used for electric vehicles. General Motors went all-in on that whole Ultium thing just to give up on it. Cadillac is currently addicted with using “-iq” as a suffix. Others just slap a big ol’ “E” somewhere into a model’s name and call it a day.

The European brands are perhaps the most entertaining when it comes to trying and failing to name EVs. Mercedes-Benz used to slap an “Electric Drive” onto the names of its electric models, then it switched to EQ, which is supposed to mean “Electric Intelligence.” Smart did the whole ED and EQ thing, just to ditch both to go with a naming scheme based on hashtags that has no meaning at all. A #3 is bigger than a #1 while the #2 will be the smallest vehicle. Yes, you’re supposed to say “hashtag 3” not “number 3.”

Things get more confusing when you move over to the house of Porsche, where the Taycan Turbo sounds like an ICE, but is an EV. Jaguar doesn’t help itself either with the existence of the E-Pace and the I-Pace. Guess which one of those is the EV?

Audi has chosen an equally baffling route. The brand has decided to classify its even-numbered cars as EVs while the odd ones remain ICE. But wait, didn’t Audi already have a name for its electric models? Yes, Audi has a model called the E-Tron and then applied the E-Tron name to electrified versions of its other models. There is a historical precedent for that. Decades ago, Quattro was the name of a model, then it just became the brand name for Audi’s AWD system. E-Tron is now just an identifier.

For a little bit of further confusion, Audi’s revamp of its nomenclature isn’t happening all at once. So, there are still ICE models that you can get with an even number. But in the future, Audi wants the evens to be EVs and the odds to be ICE.

This new naming convention spells trouble for the A4. That 4 is supposed to be the mark of an EV now, so what does Audi do with the gas car? The company is replacing it with a car kicked up one digit, creating the new Audi A5. The automaker says the A5 is its very first ICE vehicle to take on a new name, and there will be more to come.

As silly as that sounds, it isn’t the first time Audi has done this. Thirty years ago, Audi found itself in a bit of a rut. People saw its lineup as old and stodgy. Its plan to revamp its image included clean sheet designs and some moonshot projects, but also a complete renaming of its lineup. The car that succeeded the Audi 80 became the Audi A4. Now, three decades later, Audi is changing the nomenclature of its lineup again, so now the A4 evolves into the A5.

Audi sees this as a huge deal. The A4 was a revolutionary vehicle when it hit the road in 1994 and the automaker is hoping for similar fanfare when the A5 and S5 reach American shores in the spring or summer.

The A5 And S5

These new cars represent Audi’s continued commitment to ICE while it continues its EV development. Audi says the A5 and its variants–of which the U.S. is getting just the A5 Sedan and the S5 Sedan– are the first cars to ride on its new Premium Platform Combustion (PPC) car platform. Audi describes PPC as:

The new A5 series is based on the Premium Platform Combustion (PPC), a platform architecture for conventionally powered vehicles with longitudinally mounted engines. This platform works with the E³ architecture. At the same time, the PPC enables gradual electrification – initially in the form of mild hybrids. The PPC combines great variability and state-of-the-art technology with high economic viability.

As for the E³ architecture, that’s Audi’s name for what it calls the digital nervous system of its new cars. In short, the E³ architecture is a computing platform involving a fully networked digital interior, vehicle systems that can update and add features over the air, and more. Basically, your car is a rolling computer, from Audi:

The transfer of functions from the sensor-actuator level to the computer level, i.e. the increasing decoupling of hardware and software, will the reliable management of increasing complexity in the years ahead. Another focus of development was on high-performance and secure networking of domain computers, control units, sensors, and actuators in order to master more complex systems and support modularity. Another goal is high-performance and seamless backend connectivity for Car-to-X swarm data applications and compute-intensive offboard functions. Audi will introduce the new electronics architecture gradually in all future vehicle models.

While all of this sounds cool, not all of it is coming to America. One of the advertised benefits of PPC is that the ICE models built on it can be electrified over time. The A5 and S5 benefit from a mild hybrid drive that Audi calls MHEV. It’s a 48-volt electrical system that not only pumps up fuel economy a little, but also adds a small 23 HP boost to acceleration.

The tester I drove in France had this 48-volt system, but the U.S. model will not. I’m told that losing the system makes a negligible difference to acceleration, so we won’t be missing much. If anything, that’s less complexity for the fourth owner to worry about 20 years from now. The MHEV system makes the A5 series very much like an old Toyota Prius. The system will shut the engine down as you come to a stop. Then, you can take off for a very short amount of time on EV power alone before the engine wakes up. It’s all super seamless and most drivers won’t even notice it in action. But again, us Americans aren’t getting it.

While I’m on the subject of what we aren’t getting, we also aren’t getting any Avant variants of the A5, which is a darned shame because the wagons are far more practical and, in my opinion, look far better than the sedans we will be getting. However, Audi said it made the decision not to give us the wagon based on low demand, so I guess we only have ourselves to blame. Still, the lack of long-roof goodness in America is a crying shame. We aren’t even getting the S5 Avant, which is already forbidden fruit to mark on your importation calendar for 25 years from now.

You also won’t read any driving impressions of the regular A5 here, either. While there were A5s at the event for journalists from other markets to drive, the American version of the A5 will be so different than the Euro version that Audi didn’t see the point in even putting us behind the wheel of the Euro version. The good news is that the difference I’m talking about here is that the American A5 should end up with somewhere about 68 more ponies than what the Europeans are getting. Yes, for once, the Americans aren’t getting the shaft on engine output.

With all of this in mind, let’s talk about what you’re looking at here. Audi says the new A5 Sedan and A5 Avant are 190.1 inches long (4,829mm), 2.6 inches (67mm) longer than their predecessor. The automaker is quick to note that the size of the new A5 series places it in a weird market position. These cars are five inches longer than something like a BMW 3 Series, ever so slightly longer than a 4 Series Gran Coupe (which isn’t a coupe at all), and shorter than a 5 Series. Audi sort of wants this car to be its own thing, but I see people cross-shopping these against other German cars, anyway.

Audi went with a classic sporty design with the A5. There’s a long hood up front, a short deck in the rear, and bulging quarter panels that are meant to be the visual representative of Audi’s famous Ur-Quattro. At the same time, Audi wants the upper middle class to be interested in the A5, and the designers chose to give the vehicle some elegance through flowing curves, 20-inch wheels shod in 245 section width Goodyear tires, and an overall design that seems surprisingly restrained.

One thing I did note is minimal brightwork. Consumer tastes have apparently shifted enough that chrome is out and blacked-out bits are in with only a dash of metal, but that metal can’t be too flashy. I like it.

I also like how the S5 isn’t afraid to have some real openings. Yes, a chunk of the main grille is fake, much like pretty much every other car, but the lower side vents in the bumper are real. It’s sort of silly that I have to mention that, but that’s where we’ve gotten in today’s world.

Pixelated Lighting

The biggest innovation in the A5’s exterior is not so much in its design, which I think looks hot, but it’s really in the lighting. The A5 series comes with LED lighting up front and what I can only describe as screens for taillights. Audi has been rather obsessed with bringing OLED technology to car lighting, with the first production car to get them being the 2016 Audi TT RS.

The A5 and S5 feature the second generation of Audi’s OLEDs and honestly, these might be the most amazing car lights I’ve ever seen.

I’ll let Audi describe the lights:

With around 60 segments per digital OLED panel, the rear lights of the A5 are increasingly becoming a display in the rear of the vehicle. This enables car-to-x communication and increases safety on the road. The HCP4, one of five domain computers, controls the communication light and the active digital light signature, among other things.

In the case of the second-generation digital OLED rear lights, six OLED panels with 364 segments generate a new image several times per second using a specially developed algorithm. At the rear, all digital OLED segments are used for the active digital light signature. The overall light intensity of the rear lights and indicators does not vary.

With the second-generation digital OLED combination rear light, the Audi A5 family is taking lighting design, functionality, and road safety in its class to a new level. The digital OLED technology shapes the appearance and increases the range of functions. The technology sets new standards in terms of personalization: With a total of eight digital light signatures – included with the Matrix LED headlights in combination with the digital OLED tail lights – customers can personalize the appearance of their A5/S5 Sedan or A5/S5 Avant more extensively than ever before. The selection is possible via the MMI touch display (Multi Media Interface), and the options can also be displayed via the myAudi app. The digital OLED rear lights of the new A5 can communicate with the immediate surroundings (car-to-x).

The short version is that the A5 series taillights are essentially pixelated and the car can control each pixel to make a dazzling active light how. The DRLs and taillights of my S5 tester “breathed” while the vehicle was switched on. The pixels slowly and gently turned on and off in a manner that made the lights seem like they were shimmering.

Getting a camera close to the lights reveals that they really are almost as if Audi stuck giant low-res phone screens in the taillights. But it’s more than that because there are still other LED lights behind the OLED panels, giving the taillights a true 3D form. These lights are also programmable. You can set different animations for the dynamic light functions and you can tweak how the lights look as you drive. After all, what’s the point of having pixelated lights if you can’t have fun with them?

Audi’s quest for turning taillights into screens has been a properly crazy one, too. Company representatives said that when Audi reached out to its suppliers to help it make the second-generation of these lights, the suppliers said there’s no way this could be done. So, Audi made these lights in-house first to prove that you could stick hundreds of pixels in taillights.

While this all sounds very unnecessary, the OLED lights seem to have a good safety element to them. They catch your attention, which is great because you want to be seen when you drive. But that’s not all, as the OLED displays can communicate with other cars on the road. The lights can warn a driver behind you of a breakdown or if you hit the hazard switch the OLED displays will form a bright hazard triangle of their own.

Americans Have Too Much Freedom

Now that I have you excited I have to deliver the bad news. The version the U.S. is getting will be seriously nerfed. Audi says that American regulations ban the use of dynamic lighting like this. NHTSA isn’t fond of the idea of breathing, pixelated taillights, or being able to change your light animations on the road.

Audi says Americans will be able to set different animations for when you lock or unlock your car. You can also choose what the lights will look like when you drive, but your lights will be totally static when you drive without any sweet active animations. Audi is betting on a future where it can change the minds of the American government, so we are getting the same hardware the Euro cars get, but the functions will be software-locked.

Doubly unfortunately, this means if you crunch up your Audi, you’ll need to pay to replace all of the sweet OLED tech you’re not allowed to use. All of that being said, Audi does recognize that there are ways to unlock those functions in U.S. cars, but the official word is that Audi does not endorse such mods.

Like A Flight Deck

Moving inside, I like how the A5/S5’s interior wraps around the vehicle’s occupants. The dashboard gracefully flows into the door panels and the seats cup your tuchus and your back like you’re being embraced from behind by your significant other. The seats are reassuring and perhaps most importantly, they keep your body planted as you carve mountain roads.

The interior is filled to the brim with luxurious materials from Nappa leather for the seats to Dinamica microfiber making up much of the soft touch points.

Audi also tosses in some real metal to rub your fingers across. All of this is great, but what’s not so cool is the presence of that nasty piano black plastic stuff that you’ll never be able to keep clean. At the very least, we get right back into cool again with all of the neat lighting signatures. Even the logos in the seats glow at night.

I also hope you’re not allergic to screens because, by-golly, Audi went all-in on screens. The driver gets a giant curved display acting as an instrument cluster and an infotainment system while the passenger gets their own screen to play with.

Audi’s infotainment system feels similar enough to a smartphone’s interface that I think most drivers won’t have a problem navigating it. The real highlight, I think, is with the passenger display. The passenger has access to some car data, so they can judge your driving skills.

One handy thing they can do is enter an address into the navigation system so you can focus on driving.

The front passenger can also have their own personal infotainment experience, including watching a movie. Unfortunately, this passenger infotainment system is sort of half-baked. If your front seat passenger decides to watch Shrek, everyone in the car has to listen to it. There isn’t an AUX input or Bluetooth for the passenger screen. So, whatever the passenger does impacts the whole car, which, to me, almost defeats the purpose of giving the passenger their own screen.

Not everything about the entertainment system is bad though. You can option your A5 and S5 with a 20-speaker Bang & Olufsen 3D sound system.

The whole “3D” part comes from the tons of speakers, yes, but also the fact that you get speakers in your headrest, which adds something a little cooler than just simple surround sound. The sound doesn’t just surround you, but comes at you with different depths.

Another cool feature is how you can set the vehicle to deliver audible directions just through your headset speakers so the rest of the car doesn’t get blasted with “IN A QUARTER MILE, TURN RIGHT.”

The “Bang” part of Bang & Olufsen definitely lives up to its name in this car and I don’t even need to tell you that this is Mercedes Jam Session Approved. The music comes out crisp, clear, and with just the perfect amount of bass even when you play at max volume like I do. Hearing loss? Say again?

Built Like A Steakhouse, Handles Like A Bistro

Alright, so enough about the nerdy stuff, how does this beast drive?

Audi set us loose into a mountain range north of Vence, France. If you’ve never driven in France before, let me describe these roads. Take your average American country road and cut it in half. Boom, that’s what the roads were like that wrapped around those French mountain passes. It seemed like every mountain curve was a blind curve and to my eye, it would appear that the French do not believe in guardrails.

We faced an abundance of switchbacks, epic cliffside drives, and corners that put even scenic routes in America to shame. And if the lack of guardrails weren’t dangerous enough for you, there weren’t shoulders and if something went terribly wrong, your choices were to fly off of a cliff or try your luck with a sharp rock face.

But don’t worry, if that didn’t get your heart pumping enough, you’d also be surprised to find out that French roads are chaotic. Every other car crosses the centerline on blind curves, nobody obeys the speed limit, and sometimes it seems like red lights have a five-second rule.

Yet, the S5 handled it all with poise and grace. Under the hood of the S5 is a 367 PS (361 HP), 407 lb-ft of torque 3.0-liter V6 with a variable geometry turbocharger.

That’s bolted to a seven-speed dual-clutch transmission to get you to 62 mph in 4.5 seconds before you race on to an electronically limited top speed of 155 mph. These times were calculated with the boost of the mild hybrid system. However, Audi says the U.S. version will have identical acceleration numbers despite not having the 48-volt system.

How does it hit? The power strikes like a hammer. The S5 launches hard enough to squeal its tires as you find yourself exceeding hilariously slow European speed limits in no time flat. But it’s also not just about straight-line speed. Take the S5 into some real curves and the car will take them before begging for more.

In my drive, I found myself flying around switchbacks with my drive partner clutched into his grab handle holding on for dear life. But he really didn’t need to as the good ship S5 wasn’t bothered by the tight and narrow tarmac. The chunky brakes also got a workout as I dodged Renault Twingos that cut sharp corners in the mountains.

An automotive journalist cliche is to say that a car rides on rails. This car doesn’t do that. It’s a bit too big and a bit too heavy to stay entirely grounded to the ground, however, the S5 hugs the road for far longer than most owners behind the wheel will retain skill. The S5’s limit is far higher than you’ll find any public road not called the Nürburgring or the Autobahn. What that means is that despite buying a sedan large enough to comfortably fit two big and tall guys in tandem, you aren’t being punished for that choice.

I also like how the S5 responds at its limit. If you’re really paying attention, you’ll feel the tires begin to give way before they actually do. Push the car past that point and the rear end kicks out just a little. Audi says it engineered the car to have largely neutral handling and it feels like the engineers largely hit the mark. The vehicle doesn’t seem to plow forward when pushed, nor does the rear end want to fight the front for dominance. An amateur driver could build some confidence in this thing.

The S5’s weight–which Audi hasn’t yet published–is clearly felt in turns, but the vehicle powers through it. Part of the handling comes with assistance via torque vectoring via the vehicle’s Quattro system, which utilizes what Audi calls a sports differential plus a clutch-based AWD system to deliver power to the wheels that need it most. If I had to guess based on the previous generation S car, this one, which is bigger in every metric, is probably around 4,000 pounds.

Audi says that under sporting conditions, the Quattro system aboard the S5 will favor the rear wheels, specifically the one with the most traction. In most driving situations, Audi says the distribution is 30 percent front and 70 percent rear. This is a permanent AWD system, however, Audi says that times the car will send all of its power to the front wheels. These will be situations where AWD is unnecessary, such as driving slow in a city, steady speed driving, coasting, or gentle cornering. This is done to aid fuel economy, which Audi says is around 30 U.S. mpg combined under current testing. I got far less than that, but my right foot was suspiciously heavy during my drive.

Aiding in your quest for speed is a suite of technology. Audi didn’t skip out on the equipment you expect in a modern car today like a programmable HUD and parking sensors. My drive partner accidentally got to test out the emergency braking system. He got a little distracted by the French scenery and didn’t notice that the traffic ahead stopped. The car noticed what he didn’t and brought us to a hard, but safe stop.

Also included in the software package is a lane departure warning system, adaptive cruise control, and a park assist. The European Audi S5 has a tow rating of 1,900 kg, or 4,188 pounds. Thus, a towing assist program is also in the software package. Sadly, there’s no word on if Audi will allow Americans to tow anything.

Audi says this is why the car handles well:

A stiffer steering connection and stiffer suspension mounts on the front axle ensure controlled and precise handling. In addition to the standard steel spring suspension, a sports suspension and the S sports suspension with adaptive damper control are available as options. The sports suspension comes as standard on Audi A5 models with exterior S line and in the S models. Both variants of the sports suspension lower the ride height by 20 millimeters.

Brake torque vectoring was developed by Audi and used for the first time in the Audi Q8 e-tron, bringing a noticeable improvement in driving. The system is activated immediately when turning into a bend. As a result of a targeted brake intervention, the vehicle can turn in even more quickly and agilely and counteract understeer situations.

The steering is no longer connected via rubber elements and is instead rigid and, therefore, stiffer. The torsion bar installed at the steering gear input is significantly stiffer than its predecessor, which reduces the elasticity up to the wheel. This has a highly positive effect on the vehicle’s response near the center position, conveys lightness, and ensures precise handling. Stiffer chassis mounts on the front axle enhance this effect. The steering movements are transmitted more directly to the wheels, the steering response is considerably more perceptible behind the wheel, and the feedback from the road is better. Reduced friction ensures a greater steering feel.

Despite the above, I thought the S5 still didn’t have enough steering feel. Yes, I know that numb steering is such a common thing nowadays that it might seem unfair to even bring it up. However, I have driven new cars that still clearly communicate what the wheels are doing through the steering wheel. The S5’s steering isn’t completely dead, but it feels almost as if the front wheels are talking to you in a different language. There’s something there, but you’re only understanding every tenth word or so.

At first, it was somewhat hard to pinpoint exactly where the front wheels even were. I think if I owned the car I would eventually figure it out, but our short press drive wasn’t really long enough.

The sport suspension mentioned above felt great, with one small caveat. The S5 was taut. Body roll was well controlled and the few imperfections found on the French roads didn’t seem to bother the S5 much at all. The big wheels and the sport suspension didn’t even ruin the car’s fatigue-reducing comfort. However, you should be aware that like other hardcore sporty vehicles, the S5 is low enough that you will scrape leaving some driveways and when hitting some speed bumps, so be prepared to hit these obstacles at an angle or you’ll grit your teeth like I did.

It Doesn’t Fake Being Cool

My driving experience with the S5 left me with one conclusion: Ignore the fancy tech, the big screens, and the dual-clutch transmission and the Audi S5 feels pretty close to an old-school experience. This was bolstered by the fact that the S5 wasn’t pretending to be something it wasn’t. As I said earlier, the car has real vents on its body.

But even better is how that V6 under the hood sounds good and Audi didn’t cheat to get there. The powerplant hits with a deep note that escalates to a classic V6 soundtrack with a dash of turbocharger. The V6 sounds so good that multiple journalists asked if Audi was piping sound through the speakers or doing one of those induction tube things. Audi’s engineers were flattered and told us nope, the sound we were hearing were the engine’s honest character. Even better was when they pointed us to the exhaust pipes and yep, they’re real through and through. It’s wild that “it doesn’t have fake exhaust tips” is even a plus I have to write about, but even other VAG products are notoriously guilty for fakery. I’m happy Audi’s engineers are proud to have made a pleasurable soundtrack without resorting to cheating.

Throw the good handling in with the healthy power, gorgeous styling, and comfortable interior and I think Audi has a winner here. The S5 is not going to handle like a Lotus or a supercar. However, I do like to think of it as the family supercar. The S5 is for the kind of person who works in an office all day and takes care of a kid or two by night. This person might have even needed to sell their sweet two-seater. The S5 could be the kind of car for this person. They can still have fun while driving while bringing the spouse and the kid along for the ride.

Unfortunately, it’s still too far out to tell you how much this car will cost, and therefore if the price will be worth it. Audi says the S5 Sedan starts at 78,500 Euros, but this should not be used as a price guide for America. Our version will be slightly different, as will be the factors playing against the price. But, just for giggles, let’s say the American one cost $80,000. Audi has a couple of buyers in mind here. It thinks an S5 buyer is going to be someone with a decent income, but will find a two-door sports car too impractical. The automaker also expects a lot of A5s and even some S5s to end up in high-end fleets.

Do I think the S5 would be a good buy at that price? I think someone paying that price will like what they’re getting, then love it even more if they can unlock the fancy OLED lights.

As time rolls on, Audi will reveal more information about the American market S5 and its A5 base. But for now, a handful of us got to taste what’s coming. The Audi S5 represents Audi’s path forward in internal combustion, but it also hasn’t lost that Audi DNA. The Audi S5 is like John Cena in a business suit, bulky but still a lot of fun. It’s basically a supercar a person with adult responsibilities can look forward to driving the kid to daycare in, and I think it’ll excel at that.

(Images: Author, unless otherwise noted.)