Does the Audi S3 still have an interior to brag about?
When the old Audi A3 was discontinued a few years ago, I wrote myself a short opinion column on TopGear.com, praising the car’s dashboard, “RIP into the best car interiors of the 21st century.” yelled at It unexpectedly melted our webservers and sparked a lot of debate about what constitutes a good interior and whether the old A3 was actually as good as the cabin. , and many others were wrong.
I stand by it. It wasn’t as uncomfortable as modern cars. No touch screen. Infotainment with haptic click wheel controls. Convenient “virtual cockpit” Digidial. Regular steering wheel buttons. Rotary climate control. Dense plastic and lots of knurling. Oh, and the center screen tucks away in the dashboard like a shy meerkat when not in use. Nice night time it. calm down.
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But I’m not just going to rant about all the ways Audi messed up the new A3/S3/RS3 cabin. In many ways, this is the VW Group’s survival capsule of common sense, but Seat, Skoda, Cupra and Volkswagen themselves have spent the past few years declining for user-friendly ergonomics with woeful touchscreens and minimal buttons. We have cheerfully discharged our common reputation.
Here’s what Audi did well. Yes, the A3 is touchscreen centric right now, but touchscreens are fast. A tactile “click” to indicate a successful tap is useful. The color-coded menu is clever. Also, unlike Golf, he doesn’t need two weeks to start every time the car wakes up. carplay connection? perfect.
The steering wheel holds decent click buttons and a scrollable wheel.No Q4 e-tron’s scary swipe panel here. Only things that work.
climate control Existence, that is, they are not relegated to touchscreens. This switchgear is cheaper to look and operate than the old A3, but at least it’s eyeless. The same goes for seat heaters. And no one wants to dive into a touchscreen submenu to enable air recirculation when passing through a smelly farm. Here, one button does the job.
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It also has 4 window switches. A button for locking and unlocking the door. And what a joy! Knurling survives in the form of industry-leading motorized mirror he adjusters. It’s the most expensive part of the whole car.
What’s interesting is how much Audi has incorporated into its flagship car. Its most expensive and more advanced product, his e-tron GT. Some of his £100,000 EV super saloons have the same touchscreen as this S3. identical instruments. Same heater button. Same mirror and window switchgear.
It must have been very tempting for Audi to deck the ultimate e-tron with technology for technology’s sake…but it wasn’t. It keeps things simple, and as a result, it’s all touchscreen, with haptic buttons behind the steering wheel and a ridiculous out-of-sight drive selector.
It feels good to step into an S3 or any other A3 and see this same “unbroken, unfixed” simplicity right in front of you. I never lamented that I was “cluttered”. I never wondered aloud how I could get warm or where the door handle was.
No, I still don’t think the current A3 has as good an interior as the old A3. However, it’s the best interior the entire VW group is making right now, and it’s very likely the best interior for a while until the design executives take action.
