2025 NEW! Audi RSQ8 Performance _ REVIEW on PERFECT ROAD & 0-100 100-200

The Audi RS Q8: A Killer Package with a Twist of Drama

The Audi RS Q8 is a car that defies expectations. With its size and weight, one would think it's not capable of handling sharp turns and quick maneuvers like some other high-performance cars on the market. But, as we discovered during our test drive, this car has got some tricks up its sleeve.

One of the most impressive aspects of the RS Q8 is its handling. With Quattro all-wheel drive and a clever system that sends power to either the front or rear wheels depending on traction, this car can corner like a dream. We put it through a series of sharp turns and quick changes in direction, and the car stuck to the road like glue. The seats, while not as supportive as some other cars, are still comfortable enough to withstand even the most aggressive driving.

But what really sets the RS Q8 apart is its sound. Ah, that V8 rumble! It's music to the ears, and it's a sound that this car does exceptionally well. We're talking proper old-school V8 sound here, not just some digital representation of it through speakers. The exhaust note is deep and rich, with burbles and growls that'll make your heart skip a beat.

And then there's the speed. Oh, the speed! With a 0-100 mph time of just 3.6 seconds, this car is quick. We also measured its acceleration to 200 mph, which clocked in at an impressive 8.1 seconds on our test track. That's faster than some Lamborghinis and even the pre-facelift RS Q7.

But what really impressed us was how well the RS Q8 handles on a track like the Costa Mesa circuit. We were skeptical going into it, thinking that this car would be better suited to the autobahn or a quiet country road. But no, this car has some serious grip and handling prowess. It stayed flat and composed even when pushing hard, and those tires and brakes did their job admirably.

Now, we know what you're thinking: "Isn't the RS Q8 just going to be all oversteer?" Well, yes and no. With Quattro and a clever traction control system, this car is able to mitigate understeer and stay on course even when things get hairy. And it's not just about the technology – the car itself feels very modern and capable.

One of the only criticisms we have is that the seats could use some more side support and a deeper seat. But Audi's new sport seat option, which was available in our test car, addresses this issue nicely. The car also features a new exhaust note system, which makes it quieter than usual but still packs plenty of punch.

Overall, the RS Q8 is a very impressive car that checks all the right boxes. It handles beautifully, sounds fantastic, and has plenty of speed to go around. And with its unique blend of old-school V8 rumble and modern Quattro tech, it's a car that feels both timeless and cutting-edge at the same time.

As we prepared to test drive the RS Q8 on Germany's autobahn, we couldn't help but feel a sense of excitement. We were going for top speed, and we wanted to see just how well this car would handle at over 300 km/h. The result? A very impressive 305 km/h, with plenty of grip and stability even at such high speeds.

So if you're in the market for a high-performance SUV that's got it all – handling, speed, and style – look no further than the Audi RS Q8. It's a killer package, and we can't wait to see what Audi has in store for us next.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwhat's up ladies and gentlemen and welcome to this POV review by autotop now my name is Max and today you join us in Spain we are near Barcelona near the costoli track which is just in the Hills over there and we've been invited by Audi to come and check out the all new RS Q8 performance which is a new model for the Q8 lineup similar to the uh RS6 and RS7 performance of course this is the top dog and uh yeah it is pretty insane I'm going to show you around it today I'll show you all the new stuff on the exterior the interior after that we'll take it for a drive on this beautiful Road running up there which is just nuts uh we've been here I don't know 40 minutes and we've seen two cars so that is really really cool we'll show you some track driving at the costoli track as well and yeah so we've got a packed review today let's get started with the exterior because the rsq8 gets a couple updates mainly of course bumpers headlights rear lights uh stuff like that but also trim for the new performance model now in some markets us uh the Netherlands they will only sell the performance model so the Top Model uh in other markets you also have the regular rsq8 available with 600 horsepower this is 640 and uh you get some cool stuff on the performance so let's have a look at that uh number one you get this trim all around the car and you can choose if you want to have that in carbon fiber uh normally the performance has all this Trim in a a sort of dark gray and that goes for the mirrors and the bump rear bumper or the rear trunk Parts as well and uh but you can choose to have it in this matte carbon fiber which is very very nice especially combined with this silver I think it's a really good match those lines are just so pronounced in that silver really really love that and these massive 23in Wheels also specific to the performance they are optional these are forged lightweight wheels and it saves 5 kilos per wheel so 20 kilos in total so uh yeah that that is going to be a big difference only available on the performance behind that carbon ceramic brakes massive 440 mm discs as you can see that is just so huge um they come as standard on the performance model but you also have a dynamic plus package which uh they are also Incorporated in for the normal rsq8 so that's with the top speed um there are a few different packages available you also have a package which includes the Sport rear differential and the anti- roll control so active electromechanical active roll stabilization which also works really well we've got air suspension that has been tweaked for the RS Q8 and uh of course it varies in R height with the different uh driving mode beautiful matte carbon mirror caps and then what kind of tire sizes are we working with here so these are plli P Zeros and this is a 295 that's not even that wide 295 at the rear and a 295 at the front as well that's not not that wide actually um at the rear we've got more Carbon Trim so you can see all this bumper part here this lower bumper part in this matte carbon fiber that would be in Gray normally so that part also this part included in that package uh you can also choose to have it in high gloss black well I think this is cool I like the the contrast between the silver the carbon the black down here as well I like that new badging of course where the RS or the S has been detached from the red square and uh they also have new digital lights which you can choose basically the light signature so uh yeah we can show some b-roll of what they look like the front and the rear lights have different variations and there's one that's specific to the performance what else I think that kind of covers the exterior it's just a regular facelift bumpers lights stuff like that but uh the fact that you have this performance version available now and you can actually see see I mean those Wheels they they fit the car so well and I think it's a handsome car anyway so let's have a look at the engine 4 L V8 by Turbo um so as I said the rsq8 has 600 horsepower 800 newm of torque the performance gets 640 horsepower and 850 newm uh so that means that your 0 to 100 goes from 3.8 to 3.6 top speed 250 280 or 305 305 only available in combination with the ceramic brakes which is very very smart love that um so they H got this 640 this extra boost of 10 horsepower over the RS6 performance because they have a new highly optimized exhaust system and uh it's also a little bit lighter 1 kilo lighter but also the flow is better and uh yeah they apparently that's where the 10 horsepower comes from and uh it actually also sounds very very good it is pretty insane for an OPF car this is like a proper old school V8 sound uh so yeah really really happy with that that is just awesome so interior also couple changes and a couple things that you get with the performance so you can have different color packages for the interior this has red so you have this red stitching and also a little bit of a red uh color in that perforation so you can see the color a little bit better uh you can have red gray or blue and blue is only available on the performance so that is pretty cool also this uh dark aluminium brushed trim also only available on the performance you get an Alcantara steering wheel Alcantara here on the gear lever and on the armrest and we've got some new dials as well new instrument cluster design with all these white versions we also have some b-roll of the different versions uh it looks very good actually and still this interior is great because even though I'm not a big fan of the all uh Touch system uh it just doesn't work that well on the go and uh you do have to find things in there so I have to turn off the uh lanee keep assist and the traffic sign speed warning every time but this is a little bit of a a small button when you're on the go works fine now uh and then you have your climate down here but the the rest feels kind of old school SUV because you have this High Dash this High Center tunnel uh yeah it works really well all righty so here we go we've got this amazing road ahead which we're going to enjoy now this is the thing about this car it was great pre facelift but by just dialing everything up 10 notches in this performance version you can actually enjoy this big of a car this heavy it's like 2 and 1/2 tons almost it's absolutely massive and it just goes up this mountain Road like a freaking goat it is insane so you have that active anti-roll stabilization that has little Motors that can connect and disconnect the two halves so that means now it's like it's a really stiff firm car that doesn't Flex a lot and then when you go to comfort mode the car kind of chills out those two halves disconnect and then you have a very comfortable cruiser with which you can take your kids to football practice or whatever but then jeez Louise when you get on a crazy Road like this it actually handles it it is ridiculous and then you have these massive 440 mm carbon discs to slow you down 10 Pistons at the front it is ridiculous it really is this this actually might be like one of the biggest improvements and and developments in cars in general the fact that you can do this now with a car of this size and weight yeah it just doesn't make sense so the only sort of negative I have about this is that you get thrown around the car quite a bit and uh the seats just aren't supportive enough you could use a lot more side support and you know the ball string could be a little bit higher and just a bit deeper of a seat but you know that's a detail they do have a new sport seat which M had in that s five that we drove recently uh which was a lot better than this it's not great but uh yeah you just have to hold out hold on for dear life because the car will throw you around it's just it grips so incredibly well oh man it's kind of intense so 3.6 seconds to 100 as I said we also did a 100 to 200 measurement at the just the only track and they did an 8 and 1/2 second run which is actually very good that's very impressive it's faster than Lamborghini Urus it's faster than it's almost a second faster than the pre-facelift rsq8 so it's definitely delivering on that front look at this road what is up with this road I mean it's like someone decided to put like a rally stage here on the side of the highway it's so crazy and uh we also we also measured the 0 to 100 as I said it's supposed to do 3.6 we did 3.5 and as I said it it just the sound I don't understand how they've done this because it sounds incredible let's just open the window as well listen to that that is proper V8 sound that's not being bumped through the speakers incredible oh so when you drive like this in normal mode and just regular Drive um the exhaust is always there so it doesn't quiet down as much as some people might like but there is an optional Sports exhaust available and I think we have that today so yeah it might be a little bit quieter as standard but I quite like the V8 Rumble it's the car feels sort of old school in all the right ways right it's it feels Hightech in the way that it connects those anti- roll bars and that you have such a looking for this button you have such a crazy handling car so it feels really modern in that sense but then this V8 sound feels proper old school those burbles as well I mean that is amazing now of course we've got Quattro all-wheel drive and uh it sends 60% to the rear and 40% to the front you know normally speaking but when it detects slip on any of the wheels then it sends up to 85% to the re here and up to 70% to the front and that is to sort of mitigate under steer so as I said we also went to the costoli track uh which is a really cool track with some undulations some uh elevations and also a crossover to experience this car on the track and beforehand I was kind of skeptical because I thought yeah what are you going to do with an rsq8 on the track I'm sure it's good but it's never going to be excellent but I have to say I was quite impressed with the way it stays super flat of course the tires and the brakes they do have their work cut out for them and uh those are the two things that go first but I have to say it's quite impressive so by refreshing and dialing up the rsq8 I have to say Audi's been on a roll recently they've done this so well and they've kind of added some drama to a car that could use it it handles really well I think it's super handsome especially in this silver I love it there's also new Shakir gold ascari blue and chili red new colors available but it is a very very interesting car and I think I prefer it over the other performance SUVs because like I said it feels a bit old school because you have that proper V8 sound it also it's it's not as shouty and as like look at me as a Lamborghini Urus so yeah kind of a killer package here and uh I really like what they've done with the performance they definitely improved it and uh I look forward to driving it in Germany on the autoban where we can test top speed 305 km an hour that is also proper but this very very impressive this car on this road I mean you wouldn't think it would work this well but yeah crazy and these roads holy moly insane so that's it for this review hope you enjoyed it can subscribe by clicking the big button in the middle you can also check out this video this playlist and I'll see you at the next one byewhat's up ladies and gentlemen and welcome to this POV review by autotop now my name is Max and today you join us in Spain we are near Barcelona near the costoli track which is just in the Hills over there and we've been invited by Audi to come and check out the all new RS Q8 performance which is a new model for the Q8 lineup similar to the uh RS6 and RS7 performance of course this is the top dog and uh yeah it is pretty insane I'm going to show you around it today I'll show you all the new stuff on the exterior the interior after that we'll take it for a drive on this beautiful Road running up there which is just nuts uh we've been here I don't know 40 minutes and we've seen two cars so that is really really cool we'll show you some track driving at the costoli track as well and yeah so we've got a packed review today let's get started with the exterior because the rsq8 gets a couple updates mainly of course bumpers headlights rear lights uh stuff like that but also trim for the new performance model now in some markets us uh the Netherlands they will only sell the performance model so the Top Model uh in other markets you also have the regular rsq8 available with 600 horsepower this is 640 and uh you get some cool stuff on the performance so let's have a look at that uh number one you get this trim all around the car and you can choose if you want to have that in carbon fiber uh normally the performance has all this Trim in a a sort of dark gray and that goes for the mirrors and the bump rear bumper or the rear trunk Parts as well and uh but you can choose to have it in this matte carbon fiber which is very very nice especially combined with this silver I think it's a really good match those lines are just so pronounced in that silver really really love that and these massive 23in Wheels also specific to the performance they are optional these are forged lightweight wheels and it saves 5 kilos per wheel so 20 kilos in total so uh yeah that that is going to be a big difference only available on the performance behind that carbon ceramic brakes massive 440 mm discs as you can see that is just so huge um they come as standard on the performance model but you also have a dynamic plus package which uh they are also Incorporated in for the normal rsq8 so that's with the top speed um there are a few different packages available you also have a package which includes the Sport rear differential and the anti- roll control so active electromechanical active roll stabilization which also works really well we've got air suspension that has been tweaked for the RS Q8 and uh of course it varies in R height with the different uh driving mode beautiful matte carbon mirror caps and then what kind of tire sizes are we working with here so these are plli P Zeros and this is a 295 that's not even that wide 295 at the rear and a 295 at the front as well that's not not that wide actually um at the rear we've got more Carbon Trim so you can see all this bumper part here this lower bumper part in this matte carbon fiber that would be in Gray normally so that part also this part included in that package uh you can also choose to have it in high gloss black well I think this is cool I like the the contrast between the silver the carbon the black down here as well I like that new badging of course where the RS or the S has been detached from the red square and uh they also have new digital lights which you can choose basically the light signature so uh yeah we can show some b-roll of what they look like the front and the rear lights have different variations and there's one that's specific to the performance what else I think that kind of covers the exterior it's just a regular facelift bumpers lights stuff like that but uh the fact that you have this performance version available now and you can actually see see I mean those Wheels they they fit the car so well and I think it's a handsome car anyway so let's have a look at the engine 4 L V8 by Turbo um so as I said the rsq8 has 600 horsepower 800 newm of torque the performance gets 640 horsepower and 850 newm uh so that means that your 0 to 100 goes from 3.8 to 3.6 top speed 250 280 or 305 305 only available in combination with the ceramic brakes which is very very smart love that um so they H got this 640 this extra boost of 10 horsepower over the RS6 performance because they have a new highly optimized exhaust system and uh it's also a little bit lighter 1 kilo lighter but also the flow is better and uh yeah they apparently that's where the 10 horsepower comes from and uh it actually also sounds very very good it is pretty insane for an OPF car this is like a proper old school V8 sound uh so yeah really really happy with that that is just awesome so interior also couple changes and a couple things that you get with the performance so you can have different color packages for the interior this has red so you have this red stitching and also a little bit of a red uh color in that perforation so you can see the color a little bit better uh you can have red gray or blue and blue is only available on the performance so that is pretty cool also this uh dark aluminium brushed trim also only available on the performance you get an Alcantara steering wheel Alcantara here on the gear lever and on the armrest and we've got some new dials as well new instrument cluster design with all these white versions we also have some b-roll of the different versions uh it looks very good actually and still this interior is great because even though I'm not a big fan of the all uh Touch system uh it just doesn't work that well on the go and uh you do have to find things in there so I have to turn off the uh lanee keep assist and the traffic sign speed warning every time but this is a little bit of a a small button when you're on the go works fine now uh and then you have your climate down here but the the rest feels kind of old school SUV because you have this High Dash this High Center tunnel uh yeah it works really well all righty so here we go we've got this amazing road ahead which we're going to enjoy now this is the thing about this car it was great pre facelift but by just dialing everything up 10 notches in this performance version you can actually enjoy this big of a car this heavy it's like 2 and 1/2 tons almost it's absolutely massive and it just goes up this mountain Road like a freaking goat it is insane so you have that active anti-roll stabilization that has little Motors that can connect and disconnect the two halves so that means now it's like it's a really stiff firm car that doesn't Flex a lot and then when you go to comfort mode the car kind of chills out those two halves disconnect and then you have a very comfortable cruiser with which you can take your kids to football practice or whatever but then jeez Louise when you get on a crazy Road like this it actually handles it it is ridiculous and then you have these massive 440 mm carbon discs to slow you down 10 Pistons at the front it is ridiculous it really is this this actually might be like one of the biggest improvements and and developments in cars in general the fact that you can do this now with a car of this size and weight yeah it just doesn't make sense so the only sort of negative I have about this is that you get thrown around the car quite a bit and uh the seats just aren't supportive enough you could use a lot more side support and you know the ball string could be a little bit higher and just a bit deeper of a seat but you know that's a detail they do have a new sport seat which M had in that s five that we drove recently uh which was a lot better than this it's not great but uh yeah you just have to hold out hold on for dear life because the car will throw you around it's just it grips so incredibly well oh man it's kind of intense so 3.6 seconds to 100 as I said we also did a 100 to 200 measurement at the just the only track and they did an 8 and 1/2 second run which is actually very good that's very impressive it's faster than Lamborghini Urus it's faster than it's almost a second faster than the pre-facelift rsq8 so it's definitely delivering on that front look at this road what is up with this road I mean it's like someone decided to put like a rally stage here on the side of the highway it's so crazy and uh we also we also measured the 0 to 100 as I said it's supposed to do 3.6 we did 3.5 and as I said it it just the sound I don't understand how they've done this because it sounds incredible let's just open the window as well listen to that that is proper V8 sound that's not being bumped through the speakers incredible oh so when you drive like this in normal mode and just regular Drive um the exhaust is always there so it doesn't quiet down as much as some people might like but there is an optional Sports exhaust available and I think we have that today so yeah it might be a little bit quieter as standard but I quite like the V8 Rumble it's the car feels sort of old school in all the right ways right it's it feels Hightech in the way that it connects those anti- roll bars and that you have such a looking for this button you have such a crazy handling car so it feels really modern in that sense but then this V8 sound feels proper old school those burbles as well I mean that is amazing now of course we've got Quattro all-wheel drive and uh it sends 60% to the rear and 40% to the front you know normally speaking but when it detects slip on any of the wheels then it sends up to 85% to the re here and up to 70% to the front and that is to sort of mitigate under steer so as I said we also went to the costoli track uh which is a really cool track with some undulations some uh elevations and also a crossover to experience this car on the track and beforehand I was kind of skeptical because I thought yeah what are you going to do with an rsq8 on the track I'm sure it's good but it's never going to be excellent but I have to say I was quite impressed with the way it stays super flat of course the tires and the brakes they do have their work cut out for them and uh those are the two things that go first but I have to say it's quite impressive so by refreshing and dialing up the rsq8 I have to say Audi's been on a roll recently they've done this so well and they've kind of added some drama to a car that could use it it handles really well I think it's super handsome especially in this silver I love it there's also new Shakir gold ascari blue and chili red new colors available but it is a very very interesting car and I think I prefer it over the other performance SUVs because like I said it feels a bit old school because you have that proper V8 sound it also it's it's not as shouty and as like look at me as a Lamborghini Urus so yeah kind of a killer package here and uh I really like what they've done with the performance they definitely improved it and uh I look forward to driving it in Germany on the autoban where we can test top speed 305 km an hour that is also proper but this very very impressive this car on this road I mean you wouldn't think it would work this well but yeah crazy and these roads holy moly insane so that's it for this review hope you enjoyed it can subscribe by clicking the big button in the middle you can also check out this video this playlist and I'll see you at the next one bye\n"