Volkswagen has published revealing design sketches of the 2025 Golf / Golf GTI, and Russia wants to bring back Volga.
This is AM Drive, Motor1’s daily look at the news you need before you get in your car.
Volkswagen surprised us all earlier this month at CES in Las Vegas where it brought the 2025 Golf. The hot hatch was heavily camouflaged but the folks from Wolfsburg did show the interior with its super-sized screen stuck onto the dashboard. The world premiere is likely around the corner considering the German marque has now published revealing sketches.
VW’s Head of Design Andreas Mindt took to Instagram to share these teasers of the regular Golf. Concomitantly, a short clip published by the automaker on YouTube gives us an official look at the GTI. Regardless if we’re talking about the standard model or the hot hatch, “evolutionary” is the best word to describe the car’s exterior. It’s safe to say VW won’t rock the boat with the compact car’s appearance.
When it debuts in the next few days, the not-for-America standard Golf is expected to keep the manual gearbox. However, the GTI will be available globally only with the DSG. The all-wheel-drive R is also likely to forgo the clutch pedal. This will be the final update for the mighty Golf in the internal combustion engine era.
Coming near the end of the decade, the ninth-generation model will be sold exclusively as an electric car on the VW Group’s Scalable Systems Platform architecture. It’s going to be built at home in Wolfsburg alongside other SSP-based vehicles.
Volga Is Coming Back
After bringing back Moskvich in late 2022 to sell rebadged Chinese cars in Russia, local authorities are reviving another long-defunct Soviet brand. A report from Wards Auto claims the Russian Minister of Industry and Trade Denis Manturov has confirmed the return of Volga, which was active between 1956 until 2010.
The plan is to team up with another automaker to speed up development. However, Volga’s parent company GAZ Group has apparently failed to find a partner. That’s hardly a surprise seeing as how most important companies have left Russia following the start of the war in Ukraine. The objective is to make Volga a premium brand but Russian analysts are concerned that working with Chinese automakers will hamper the car’s proposed upmarket image.
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Nevertheless, the first modern-day Volga could be officially launched as early as this summer with a price tag of $28,000 and is going to be used by Russian officials.
In related news, Russia’s AvtoVAZ is planning to roll out a new brand to sell models in the compact, midsize, and fullsize segments. It’s unclear whether these will be based on existing Chinese cars or are going to be underpinned by a new platform engineered by the country’s Central Scientific Research Automobile and Automotive Engines Institute (NAMI).
