Audi Q8 plug-in hybrid challenges for ‘holy grail’

Powerful and efficient, this high-end machine promises to do it all.

Motoring’s holy grail is a car that does it all with no compromises, and Audi’s plug-in hybrid Q8 has a decent stab.

This luxo large SUV can travel 74km on battery power alone, there’s a powerful V6 engine for longer adventures, it’ll tow your 3500kg yacht and even accelerate to 100km/h in five seconds flat.

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2025 Audi Q8. Picture: Supplied

All achieved while carrying five in squidgy Valcona leather seats (heated and ventilated upfront), with occupants enjoying tunes from pumpin’ B&O 3D audio while light-bathing under a panoramic glass sunroof.

Compromise for we normal folk is, of course, price. At almost $155,000 before on-roads, this Q8 60 TFSI e (silly name) is reserved for the well-heeled. But Aussies buy more than 25,000 prestige large SUVs each year, so cost of living’s clearly not crippling everyone. As the Davos set prove, money’s only a problem if you’ve not got it.

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2025 Audi Q8. Picture: Supplied

This Q8 with coupe-like rear has been updated for 2025, as has the Q7 with more conventional SUV bum. If you need seven seats, it’s the Audi to choose.

Our Q8’s the sportier customer’s pick, and only five seats leaves space under its boot floor to harbour electric gubbins and batteries for emissions-free driving.

This plug-in hybrid costs $2000 over old, but there’s a 20kW power hike (360kW/700Nm are strong figures), and its larger battery capacity (25.9kWh) boosts electric range by 15km.

The now 74km between charges covers most daily commutes or private school drop-offs. Public charging is free for six years, or a home wallbox (roughly $2000 fitted) does the job in a few hours.

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2025 Audi Q8. Picture: Supplied

And unlike a full electric car there’s no cause for range anxiety. The 3.0L V6 engine has your back when the electric battery’s exhausted, and helps this large SUV maintain a 3.5-tonne tow capacity.

That’s the hauling match of a Toyota LandCruiser or Ford Ranger, and your new boat will be set off more elegantly behind this striking big German.

It’s a flash looking thing, you see. Its revised giant black grille could swallow smaller cars; red brake callipers hide behind 21-inch graphite alloys and a full-width rear light strip is futuristic fabulous.

The cabin’s a scene-stealer. Audi has long been an interior master, blending luxe, technology and commonsense layout. That means an unfussy round steering wheel (crazy, right?), chunky central gear shifter and gauges you actually understand.

A trio of screens can overwhelm and some surfaces are too glossy black, but heated and cooled leather seats have old-world class. They even smell rich.

Rear seats are equally opulent, and with sliding bases and reclining backs, the kids won’t notice the sloping roofline.

The boot? It’s smaller than a normal Q8’s due to the electrical bits, but boot buttons lower the air suspension to make loading (or hitching on the boat) easier.

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2025 Audi Q8. Picture: Supplied

This adaptive suspension lets you choose between a softer, comfier ride or firmer sportier one if corner-carving. It generally soaks up road hits well, but our test car’s optional and mighty 22-inch wheels with skinny tyres really felt the hits. I’d swerve them.

Not so the $2600 rear-wheel steering option. They may turn only 5-degrees, but reduce the Q8’s turning circle by a metre, almost matching Audi’s tiny Q3 SUV’s.

On a fast corner, and despite weighting 2.5 tonnes, the Q8 PHEV uses its quattro all-wheel-drive and trick rear steering for incredible agility. It refuses to wobble around like many giant SUVs.

Damn it’s quick, too. Rapid off the mark, its electric and petrol V6 motors combine for pinning acceleration. It’s as quick as an Audi SQ8 costing $25,000 more.

Yet it makes most sense in “EV only” mode, silently and blissfully wafting along using just electrons. If you drain the battery, simply ask the V6 to charge it while driving and it’s job done in 30 minutes. But you’re hardly saving the planet this way.

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2025 Audi Q8. Picture: Supplied

Cheaper petrol and diesel Q8s are available, while an RSQ8 Performance with Audi’s most powerful production petrol engine’s coming soon. Next year, as an FYI, an all-new Q8’s due.

Verdict

Truly luxurious, polished drive, tows as much as a LandCruiser and could drop fuel bills to zero. That’s some compensation for its huge sticker price.

4 stars