The new Audi A5 has been unveiled as the upmarket replacement for today’s A4, introducing a new combustion-car platform and a range of heavily revised engines.
The name change comes as part of the German firm’s new branding strategy for its next-generation models, with ICE cars taking odd numbers and EVs even numbers.
The A5 will be offered in saloon and estate forms but not, Audi has confirmed, as a coupé or a cabriolet.
It uses Audi’s new Premium Platform Combustion (PPC), which replaces the 17-year-old MLB architecture of the current A4 and has no relation to the Premium Platform Electric that will underpin the brand’s new-wave EVs, including the Q6 E-tron.
In keeping with Audi tradition, the A5 retains a longitudinal engine layout, but it’s said to be much more accommodating of various electrified powertrains.
The A5 will initially offer a range of pure-ICE and mild-hybrid powertrains, the latter using a new MHEV Plus system developed by Audi that utilises two motor-generators for better efficiencies and regenerative braking (see below).
The range opens with two developments of the Volkswagen Group’s ubiquitous EA888 turbo petrol four, putting out either 148bhp or 201bhp. Both are mated to a dual-clutch automatic gearbox, plus Quattro four-wheel drive is an option on the more powerful variant.
Diesel remains an option, with the A5 using a modified version of Volkswagen’s 2.0-litre turbo four, fitted with the MHEV Plus system, boosting its output to 201bhp and cutting CO2 emissions by a claimed 10g/km.
The range-topping S5 has switched back to petrol power, packing a 3.0-litre V6 that’s said to be unrelated to that currently offered in the A8, Q7 and Q8. It gets a variablegeometry turbocharger and the MHEV Plus system, putting out 362bhp – 20bhp more than the old S4’s diesel V6 – and a claimed 14g/km less CO2.