Underneath the steel body (seen here in saloon form, although an S3 Sportback also exists) lies the traditional mechanical arrangement. The Volkswagen Group’s EA888 turbocharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder engine is reprised – though now with power boosted from 306bhp to 329bhp and torque from 295lb ft to 310lb ft.
Directly downstream of the engine sits the S-tronic seven-speed dual-clutch gearbox previously offered, although it can now decouple and allow the car to freewheel when the driver lifts off the throttle. It’s also worth noting that the S3 isn’t available with a manual gearbox.
Among the car’s various drive modes, Audi has added a new Dynamic+ setting, which, if you’re game enough to select it, wastes no time announcing this car’s agenda. It amps up the throb of the car’s exhaust but also hikes the engine’s idle speed slightly, in order to get quicker standing starts out of the dual-clutch gearbox.
This is, sure enough, a markedly more raw, direct and unfiltered kind of performance car to drive than it used to be. It makes sense, if you consider the slightly more rarefied price positioning, for Audi to go after really keen drivers a little bit more, and office car park show-offs a little less – and that’s definitely what the S3 is doing.
It has a boostier, gruffer power delivery than the pre-facelift car and feels a touch more urgent as it pulls towards the redline. It makes for a car with plenty of real-world-accessible pace, but also a slightly bolder and more expressive audible character than it used to have. The engine has quite a fruity thrum about it. No doubt with some digital back-up, and probably not by coincidence, it does a passable impression of an RS five-pot.