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Audi A3 e-tron will start at $37,900 with 8.8kWh battery and EV range of 16-19 miles

There are a lot of things to love about the Audi A3e-tron which got a price tag this week. Chief among them is the car’s beautiful looks and almost reasonable $37,500 starting price tag. Unfortunately for the EV enthusiasts amongst us, it has a relatively small battery, unless you are comparing the Prius PHEV. Audi says the 8.8kW hour battery will take the etron around 15-20 miles on a charge (subject to tuning and final EPA testing). That’s not even a tenth of the range of the Tesla Model S and that makes sense since the battery is a tenth of the size.

Audi is also a little ambiguous about when the electric will kick in saying that the ICE will be required to help for high powered situations.

As the owner of a Prius plug-in, this sounds very familiar and it s a big turn off. The ICE ticks on all the time and it is hard to make it a few miles without gas. Hopefully Audi’s controls are a little better.

So for now, think of this as a A3-priced A3 with 17 miles of electric tacked on with a whole lot of powertrain complexity that comes with it. 

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Comments

  1. Daniel Steinberg - 9 years ago

    You hit the nail on the head. As soon as I saw the graphic of the powertrain…man – that is overly complex. It’s just so unnecessary. I love Audi, don’t get me wrong, but what a terrible way to go about it. There’s nothing quite like seeing the Tesla powertrain in the store – a thing of real beauty and simplicity

  2. BEP - 9 years ago

    You can’t get a lot of power out of (an into) a small battery. That’s why the ICE has to kick in, and that’s also why some PHEV takes more time than expected to recharge.
    About your title, I don’t think you really mean a 8.8 kW battery. It’s not conceptually wrong, but the engine would have to be on almost all the time. 😉
    Daniel Steinberg: you don’t get to see everything when you look at the Tesla “showroom chassis”; there are pumps, compressors, and all sort of ugly things if you look inside a real Model S.

    • Daniel Steinberg - 9 years ago

      Totally! Though once you’re sitting in the finished car and you have not only a ton more space in the cabin (e.g. – no big center console) but also the entire frunk, it almost feels like night and day.

      Not quite an apples-to-oranges comparison, but I have an electric skateboard that goes 12 – 16 miles on a charge…and it’s not one of the ones that has a giant box hanging off the bottom. The battery’s built into the deck. Sort of crazy they couldn’t get any more range out of this car.

Author

Avatar for Seth Weintraub Seth Weintraub

Publisher and Editorial Director of the 9to5/Electrek sites. Tesla Model 3, X and Chevy Bolt owner…5 ebikes and counting