Audi RS3 review

Ingolstadt sharpens up its five-cylinder hyper-hatch, writes Illya Verpraet

- Illya Verpraet

This car was not supposed to exist. The 8Y-generation Audi RS3 was signed off based on a business case that assumed it would never make it past the base A3's midlife facelift, because the 2.5-litre five-cylinder engine that defines this car's character couldn't be made compliant with the upcoming Euro 7 emission standards not economically anyway.

But then Euro 7 got postponed, and it turned out that making it pass the latest Euro 6 variation was achievable with a bit of tweaking. The game was on to keep the last remaining car with a five-cylinder engine alive for a few more years. After all, despite now-astronomical pricing, the demand was still there, and it's a great halo product for Audi.

As well as the regular A3's facelift tweaks, the RS3 has gained a number of intriguing mechanical upgrades. We have never strapped the timing gear to this generation of the RS3, so let's do that now and see if the five-cylinder can go out on a high.

WHAT'S IT LIKE?

As before, the RS3 is the most extreme car to sit on the Volkswagen Group's MQB platform. More commonly featuring a 1.5-litre four-cylinder engine with front-wheel drive, here it sports the long-running EA855 2.5-litre five-cylinder. There is a new catalytic converter aftertreatment to keep it legal, but that hasn't affected power and torque. Meanwhile, the exhaust flaps open earlier in the rev range for a more enticing soundtrack. Like the smaller engines, the five-cylinder is transversely mounted, which makes for quite a crowded engine bay.