The Audi TT retired after three generations in 2023; it was sent off with a Final Edition model. While we won’t see a fourth-generation TT in the near future, the German brand is reportedly looking at ways to fill the model’s gap in the coming years with an electric sports car.
Daniel Schuster, a spokesperson for Audi’s technical development department, told British magazine Autocar that the company is debating what the TT’s successor will look like. “We are taking a blank sheet of paper to see what is the right ‘icon.’ It’s not just about looking at what we have now and saying, ‘it’d be cool to make it electric.’ It’s really about what would be a great addition to the range,” he explained.
Audi is taking this project seriously, it wants to keep past and current TT owners in the fold, and it has plenty of time to decide what the TT’s successor will look like; the car is tentatively scheduled to arrive “within five or 10 years.” It won’t be called TT, a decision which seemingly suggests the model will break with its predecessors in several ways. Regardless of what it’s called or what it looks like, Audi is preparing an “emotional” car developed with driving enjoyment and performance in mind. This extends to the sound that the electric drivetrain will make.
While silence is a major selling point for electric cars, part of the thrill of driving a sports car is the sound; the TT’s replacement has to make some kind of noise. Mimicking the distinctive exhaust note of the turbocharged five-cylinder engine that powered the range-topping TT RS has been ruled out, according to the same report. “Honestly, we had some prototypes where we reproduced the five-cylinder sound and it didn’t fit at all,” revealed Rolf Michl, Audi Sport’s managing director. It will be interesting to see how Audi differentiates the noise that its future electric sports cars make. Beyond the TT’s replacement, the brand is also allegedly working on an electric successor for the RS6 wagon.
“You will be surprised,” concluded Michl. “For us, the RS DNA has to be reflected. It is not better or worse. It is just different,” he concluded.
Related video:
