Audi A4 review 2020: It’s all connected
Leow Ju Len
01/09/2020
Space and Practicality
The rest of the A4 is little changed from before, so it’s still a car for a nuclear family — the rear seats are neither cramped nor particularly spacious, but they’re perfectly habitable to full grown adults so your kids will fit fine.
Up front, there’s lots of space and comfortable seats that feel firm. It’s easy to find a nice driving position, and storage space for odds and ends is acceptable. You get two cupholders, deep door bins, a tray under the centre armrest and a shallow bin where the MMI controller used to be.
The boot is 480 litres in capacity, which is identical to that of the BMW 3 Series and bigger than what the Mercedes C-Class offers (435 litres). Usefully, it’s a squarish space and if you need more load lugging capacity the rear seats fold in a 40:20:40 split.
Competition and Pricing
No one chooses their premium German compact saloon by boot size, of course, and there are meaningful differences between the three. As you’d expect, the 3 Series is a sharper drive, while the C-Class is the most languid of the three. That puts the A4 somewhere in between them in terms of how it strikes a balance between driving pleasure and placid comfort.
Within the Audi A4 range itself, for now your choice is between this and the less powerful A4 35 TFSI S tronic, which has 150hp and costs S$9,950 less. You still get all the things you want in a nice exec car: three-zone climate control, powered front seats (with memory for the driver’s chair), the Audi Connect digital services and smart navigation system, the virtual cockpit and all that good stuff.
Whether you feel like paying a bit more for the extra power is up to you, but how’s this for a curve ball: spend the money on the S$6,368 carbon fibre exterior package instead. Your pals can’t see if your car has an extra 40hp, but they’ll certainly notice a carbon boot wing.
As for whether you have to limit your choices to the A4 and its usual rivals, it’s worth pointing out that Audi’s own Q3 is a strong alternative, even if it’s a sport utility vehicle. It has more load capacity, its connectivity game is just as strong, and it’s a decent drive that puts plenty of emphasis on safe handling. Then there’s the Q3 Sportback (below), which is a more stylish take on the same car.
The ride quality and on-the-move refinement of the A4 does trump its stablemater. Yet, in a global trend, saloons have lost ground to crossovers, and cars like the Q3 are why.
About the Author
Leow Ju Len
CarBuyer Singapore's original originator, Ju-Len in person is exactly how he is on the written word and behind the wheel. Meaning that he darts all over the place and just when you thought he's lost the plot, you realise that it's just you not keeping up with his incredible rate of speed and thought.
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