Now it's getting laughable

Audi throws nomenclature overboard again

How can you confuse your customers as much as possible? Audi: Yes! You can't really think of anything more than a joke like this about the interplay that the Ingolstadt-based company is playing with its model names. Audi is already throwing the recently introduced nomenclature overboard again!

Just recently, the VW subsidiary announced that it wanted to ensure clarity with a new logic in the model designations: Designations with even numbers stand for pure electric cars, those with odd numbers for combustion engines and plug-in hybrids. Q for SUVs, A for saloons/coupés and estate cars.

And now a press release flutters into the mailbox that begins like this:

"Worldwide stringency and clear orientation for all customers based on the model designation: Audi strengthens the alpha-numeric structure of its nomenclature." Orientation, in other words, unmistakable clarity. However, this is not about the oh-so-clear logic described above, but:

"The previous distinction between purely electric vehicles and models with a combustion engine based on the number is no longer applicable." Aha. The model designation "will in future be globally standardized and transparent according to the size and positioning of the respective model." In German, this means: back to the start, it will be as it was before.

Attention, wisdom!
Of course, in principle it is absolutely laudable to take back wrong decisions and not to insist on something just because it has been decided. This applies not only in the automotive industry, but in pretty much all areas of life.

Apparently, Ingolstadt didn't think this through well enough originally. Feedback from customers and dealers around the world has prompted the Group's management to rethink and thus make a U-turn. "With our nomenclature, we now enable all customers worldwide to find their way around our portfolio intuitively. We therefore designate our models in such a way that their size and positioning are clear at first glance," says Marco Schubert, member of the Board of Management, as if they had invented something new.

Same designation for combustion and electric vehicles
By focusing on size and positioning, purely electrically powered vehicles will once again be able to share a letter-digit combination with combustion engines in future. The necessary differentiation between individual models and derivatives in the portfolio will be made via the additional designation of the body shape (e.g. Avant, Saloon or Sportback) as well as the already familiar drive abbreviation (e.g. e-tron, TFSIe, TFSI or TDI).

The first new model with this new, old nomenclature will be the Audi A6 with combustion engine, which will celebrate its world premiere on March 4. As the A6 Avant TFSI, for example, it will be clearly distinguishable from the purely electrically powered A6 Avant e-tron by its engine abbreviation. What will probably also remain are the meaningless number combinations, which are intended to indicate the engine output.

There are no plans to retroactively change models that are already on sale. This means that the Audi Q4 e-tron will keep its name, although it is actually an Audi Q3 with electric drive. The same applies to the Audi A5, which would actually be an Audi A4, but is not allowed to be called that because it has a combustion engine. The A5 was previously known as the coupé version of the four-door A4. The four-door A5 will therefore continue to cause confusion. But apparently, none of this was thought through in advance