The 2025 Audi A6 and S6 E-Tron liftback sedans exemplify everything most of us laud German luxury vehicles for. They look simultaneously cutting-edge and classy, make you feel powerful, showcase an impressive raft of technology, and of course, are supremely comfortable. Two half-days buzzing around Tenerife’s low-speed roads weren’t enough to snuffle out every foible, but both A6 and S6 versions of Audi’s new E-Tron sedan definitely got me more excited about electric cars.
The Basics
These are large-medium-sized sedans with ample room for four adults and a decent haul of luggage. Ride quality, comfort, and performance felt like the vehicle’s top priorities in that order.
Andrew P. Collins
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Audi’s Premium Platform Electric (PPE) architecture underpins the A6. Like pretty much all electric vehicles, what looks like a skateboard made of batteries is what you’d find below the car’s body if you could lift it off. Speaking of lift, the liftback-style rear cargo hatch (Audi calls this “Sportback”) is one of the car’s cooler practical features. Instead of just having a trunk that pops open, the whole rear glass comes up allowing for a lot of cargo-ingestion flexibility.
We won’t be getting the Avant wagon version in America. I think it looks cooler, but its practical benefit over the Sportback is minimal. As for the basic performance specs, here’s how the three main versions break down:
A6 E-TronA6 E-Tron QuattroS6 QuattroBattery800v, 100 kWh (gross), 94.4 kWh (net)800v, 100 kWh (gross), 94.4 kWh (net)800v, 100 kWh (gross), 94.4 kWh (net)Range370 miles (390-plus with Ultra Package and 19-inch wheels)333 miles324 milesHorsepower362422496
543 with launch control0-60 mph5.2 seconds4.3 seconds3.7 secondsTop Speed130 mph130 mph149 mph
Aerodynamics are critically important for electric cars and the new A6 design reflects a lot of attention paid there. It looks slippery from every angle … even the underside, which is practically flat with air-guiding panels.Every visual detail your eyes hit on the car’s body, from the wheels to the little scooplets at the outer edges of the front bumper to the complex lower grille area, looks optimized for aero.
Audi
Audi’s people say the Euro model, which can use little cameras for side mirrors, hits an exceptional coefficient of drag of 0.21. The U.S.-spec car claims 0.23, which is still good. For context, a Tesla Model S and Lucid Air, two good benchmarks of slippery sedans, are both about 0.21 on that scale.
Andrew P. Collins
The headlights are presented in a pretty aggressive squint, but the car’s vibe is not overtly angry. In fact, having spent some hours staring at it in person, I think it’s considerably less intense looking than some of Audi’s other offerings. The A6 body design does a great job of straddling the line between eye-catching and ostentatious. I could have used a little more spice on the S6, maybe some graphics or a slightly more pronounced rear spoiler? But generally, they’re elegant cars.
The only decorative element that’s a little goofy is the light-up rear emblem—Audi’s four-ring badge on the back lights up red with your taillights at night. It’s not egregiously eye-roll inducing but if I pulled up to a family function with this I’m sure my in-laws would tease me—God forbid somebody thinks you’re sneaking up at night in a Volkswagen! I wouldn’t turn it off if you could, though.
Inside is where I felt some real surprise. As soon as you plop into the driver’s seat you’re presented with a barrage of digital visual inputs and information—that wasn’t the shocking part, that’s every new car. Unexpectedly though, I didn’t hate it in the A6.
Between the liftback hatch and fold-down seats, there’s a lot of cargo flexibility here. Andrew P. Collins
I’m feeling screen fatigue(both in life and in car design) in a major way lately and was particularly skeptical of this car when I realized it not only has a complex multi-color heads-up display but also a colossal sweeping screen that blends the main gauge cluster to the central infotainment as one piece. But wait, there’s more, because you can also spec a passenger-side co-pilot’s screen (option price TBA) which our test cars had.
The frunk (front trunk) is cool but very small—that’s my iPhone 13 Mini. It’d fit a laptop bag, at least. Andrew P. Collins
It almost feels like you’re presented with as much square-inch’age of screen as you get windshield. But, most impressively, once you familiarize yourself with the vehicle’s various controls, the A6 does a nice job of providing a breadth of information without being too annoying about it.
Let’s start with that head-up display, which adds rich and colorful elements to the road ahead of you like you’re playing a video game. It was almost impossible to photograph, but for example, if you’re running a little wide on a high-speed turn, the car will put a red band at the edge of the road. Come to an intersection with GPS activated, and it’ll overlay a big arrow in your field of vision almost like you’re looking at augmented reality.
I usually don’t care for that level of robotic hand-holding, but even I have to admit that this Audi does a good job providing a lot of information that’s somehow not egregiously distracting once you get used to it. Same goes for the main infotainment screen—you’d need to spend a lot of time learning the shortcuts before breezing through it, but it’s angled and aligned at a good level to be visible without getting in your way.
The co-pilot passenger screen seems a little redundant since anybody riding shotgun in this car is probably going to have a huge iPhone, but I did find it helpful when my colleague and I were trying to plot our way around Tenerife without pulling over. This screen does get oddly warm, though.
The steering wheel felt good, and I really liked the shifter (a heavy-duty toggle switch in the center console). But Audi’s button selection is a little odd—the brand is using pushable panels, so, like, a bunch of buttons close together are really just one button you’re pushing different parts of. It feels a little janky to me, so hopefully the company at least saved a lot of money with this move.
I loved the decisive action on the shifter, but all those buttons on the door control are all just different parts of one button. Same for the drive modes/hazard light/traction control bar. It’s not awful, just, kind of odd. Andrew P. Collins
Finally, the e-tron cars have a cute party trick in the optional glass roof. Touch a button and it’ll go from frosted to clear. We’ve seen that before, but the Audi’s can be “opened” in increments, creating a partially sunny interior.
Driving Experience
I got to shake down two versions: The relatively modest rear-wheel-drive A6 E-Tron and the 543-hp S6 E-Tron. The front end of the rear-drive model felt a little lighter, but the difference was not nearly as pronounced as I was expecting. So I either wasn’t driving hard enough or the car provides a lot of insulation from its own mass (probably a little bit of both).
The S6 is more than quick. When you ask it to scare you, it won’t hesitate to dropkick your guts backward as the vehicle surges ahead. But both the S6 and the base car (which is no slouch, either) were very easy to get comfortable with thanks to the way the accelerator pedals are calibrated. With the exception of a few flat-to-the-mat moments, neither version of the car felt overwhelming or intimidating.
Andrew P. Collins
Put another way: The sense of power is paired well with one of control; you don’t feel like you’re along for the ride here, the hp increases in a satisfyingly manageable way as you lean into the tall pedal.
Similarly, the progressive steering clicked with me almost immediately. I felt like steering wheel effort and front wheel position were very smartly paired and despite the car’s substantial size, it seemed plenty responsive.
Braking was more than sufficient for casually spirited driving but not overly grabby in traffic. In fact, the car’s behavioral consistency at low, medium, and high speeds really stuck with me days after returning the key. This, I think, is a double-edged sword of the enthusiast-car EV. Objectively, it seems like a great accomplishment of engineering—the car seems happy everywhere and always. But it does make it tougher to assign the machine a personality. It just kind of works, so if you’re the type to say “Where’s the fun in that?” well, you might want to stick with older cars for a bit longer.
Andrew P. Collins
I don’t think it’s fair to say EVs are not engaging at all, though. And the A6 E-Tron in particular gives you a lot of flexibility in how it behaves with four different regenerative modes. In a full one-pedal mode, regen is very aggressive, and letting off the tall pedal reels the car back to a stop almost linearly. You can also deactivate it completely and let the car coast, acting more like a traditional gasoline burner, or you can put it in an automatic mode that adapts based on conditions. Using paddles on the steering column, you can also toggle between two other in-between levels.
But the driving attribute I enjoyed most was the car’s ride and sense of balance. Optional air suspension helped provide a superbly smooth ride on straights and good athleticism through turns, transitioning back and forth between those settings without skipping a beat.
A sport luxury sedan must be smooth above all else. Go too soft and you’ll wallow in corners; too stiff and you’re miserable on rougher roads. Both the A6 and S6 E-Tron split the difference perfectly and felt just right on Tenerife’s nice roads.
The silver trim pieces on this S6 were not my favorite, but that green’s a cool color. Andrew P. Collins
And finally, the last line of defense between your butt and the road, the seats: exceptional. I preferred leather to the cloth I saw in one of the test cars, but the shape, bolstering, and supportiveness in the A6 E-Tron seats were among the best I’ve been in. The back seats are a little upright, but there’s plenty of legroom and even headroom in spite of the low roofline.
As for which one I’d rather have, the A6 seems like better get since it’s already got more than enough power for really ambitious passes and can absolutely impress passengers with a silky smooth sprint to the highway speed limit. That said, if you’re looking for the kind of acceleration that will silence EV skeptics, the S6 might be worth the splurge. It’s not just a little quicker, it feels much faster from a stop or slow roll.
The main question mark left for me when it comes to the S6’s daily driver compliance is its ride over rough roads. I felt basically zero difference in casual-driving ride quality between the base A6 and S6 E-Trons, but the tarmac we were testing on was smooth and gorgeous. How well it’d handle the potholes of, say, the route from my house to the Newark airport, or from your house to your office, remains to be seen.
Range, Charging, and Efficiency
From a practical and mechanical standpoint, the standout technological attribute of this particular EV is probably its charging curve. While I often see EV people crowing about peak charging, I’m starting to think that the curve is a more important metric and the Audi E-Tron’s seems good.
With a great peak but a weak curve, an EV would charge quickly for a short period of time but then take forever to top up. We didn’t get to test this car’s charging at all, but based on this graph, I’m getting the impression that the e-tron will actually get you more power at a charging station over a moderate period of time and therefore end up getting you more power on a practical-length stop.
Audi
The A6 and S6 E-Tron have charge ports for Level 2 and 3 (one on each side), will come with a NACS adapter by they hit the market, and are said to charge from 10% to 80% in as little as 21 minutes.
Audi quotes a max range of more than 390 miles with the base rear-drive A6 E-Tron with the Ultra Package and 19-inch wheels while the S6 E-Tron is rated for 324 miles.
The Early Verdict
Pricing on the American-spec 2025 Audi A6 and S6 E-Tron is still TBA, but we can broadly extrapolate from the Q6 E-Tron SUV with which it shares a platform. That vehicle starts at about $64,000, with the SQ6 starting closer to $73,000 and topping out at a bit over $80,000. These are not inexpensive cars, but, my initial impressions were overwhelmingly positive.
Andrew P. Collins
I loved the way it rode, was impressed by its sportiness on twists, and I really like how the cockpit design is clean but also complex. There are a lot of shapes and layers going on; some electric cars make me feel like I’m sitting at an Ikea table with an iPad, but this was more like a spaceship.
I’m curious to know a lot more about how these drive in less pleasant conditions and what their real-world charging performance is like. But as far as creating a proper executive express driving experience, the A6 E-Tron absolutely nails it. I’d go so far as to say that this car did a lot to nudge me toward EVs—it’s a lovely machine spanning the chasm between traditional luxury and tech-forward futurism.
2025 Audi A6 & S6 E-Tron SpecsA6 E-TronA6 E-Tron QuattroS6 QuattroBase PriceTBA<<<<Powertrainsingle-motor rear-wheel drive | 100-kWh batterydual-motor all-wheel drive | 100-kWh batterydual-motor all-wheel drive | 100-kWh batteryHorsepower362422496
543 with launch controlTorqueTBA<<<<Seating Capacity5<<<<Cargo VolumeTBA<<<<Curb WeightTBA<<<<0-60 mph5.2 seconds4.3 seconds3.7 secondsTop Speed130 mph<<149 mphRange370 miles (390-plus with Ultra Package and 19-inch wheels)333 miles324 milesQuick TakePower, control, comfort, and a clean design—even without a turbo or a V8, it’s got all the elements a high-end sedan needs.Score9/10
Got some more electric luxury car insights? Drop the author a line at [email protected].
