Excellent fuel efficiency, especially on the highway
Well-balanced sport suspension provides comfort and performance
Class-leading interior design
Elegant, distinctive exterior design
Dislikes:
$66k base price is quite steep
Not the roomiest mid-size luxury car
Annoying dashboard squeak
Let us open this review with a few disclaimers: We’re a big fan of diesel engines, and we also believe Audi makes some of the nicest luxury sedans on the road. So when we heard the new A7 TDI was arriving for testing, we were both thrilled and a bit nervous. Would this big diesel luxury sedan live up to my expectations?
When we first reviewed the regular A7 a few years ago, we judged it to be an outstanding vehicle. From the unique fastback styling, to the brilliant powertrain and class-leading interior, the A7 instantly made it to the short list of cars that we would consider buying, should we ever win the lottery. The A7 does what so many Audis do best, which is provide a sublime level of balance between performance, refinement, and comfort.
The A7 TDI takes this winning package and slips a 3.0-liter turbo diesel V6 engine under the hood. Although only rated at 240 hp, it’s the 428 lb-ft of torque that makes this a honey of an engine. Married to this capable engine is the same brilliant 8-speed automatic transmission that’s found in the regular A7, and here it takes full advantage of the diesel’s relatively narrow powerband to provide surprising acceleration. According to Audi, the A7 TDI is only a few ticks slower than the regular A7 in the sprint to 60 mph, which should mean well under 6 seconds. Although not quite rocket ship fast, our experience certainly verifies that this is a high performance vehicle.
The benefits of this abundance of torque are especially noticeable when cruising down the highway. Maneuvers requiring quick acceleration while at speed, such as passing or merging, are absolutely effortless. The A7 TDI also comes standard with Audi’s signature quattro all-wheel drive. Given the amount of torque available from the engine, it is nice to know that when you stand on the gas, power is transmitted to the road through all four tires.
Given that a regular gasoline fed A7 has an equally potent supercharged V6 engine, there aren’t really any performance benefits to the diesel engine. The real added benefit is exceptional fuel efficiency. The EPA gives the A7 TDI a 29 mpg combined rating, and a lofty 38 mpg on the highway. We were easily able to achieve over 30 mpg on a short 200 mile road trip, and with a little more restraint on the throttle it shouldn’t be too hard to stretch it into the high 30s. These are remarkable numbers for a car with equivalent performance to almost every other luxury sports sedan.
Our test car even came equipped with a set of optional summer tires mounted on large 20-inch rims, which surely didn’t help much with efficiency. This extra helping of sticky rubber does provide an impressive amount of grip, and the test car also featured a slightly stiffer sport suspension, which luckily still provides an impressively smooth ride. An unusually rainy weekend prevented a thorough test of the handling limits, but the quattro all-wheel drive meant we could still play around in the corners, confident that the car would stay firmly planted on the road.
The interior of the A7 TDI is typical Audi, meaning class leading and hard to fault. The quality of materials is generally excellent, although we did notice an annoying squeaking noise that seemed to emanate from one of the speaker grills in the dash near the windshield. Oddly enough, the A7 we tested several years ago featured a similar squeak. We would certainly hope that if we owned the vehicle Audi would take care of this, as it was an odd flaw in an otherwise superbly designed interior.
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Like most modern luxury cars, the A7 TDI comes with a host of standard features and a lengthy options list. Our test car featured the Prestige trim level, which adds four zone climate control, ventilated seats, and numerous other goodies. A Bang & Olufsen sound system adds almost $6,000 to the sticker, but gives you stellar sound quality and the novelty of a pair of tweeters that pop up out of the dash. On the safety front, a Driver Assistance package provides adaptive cruise control, active lane assist, and Audi pre sense plus.
Altogether, this pushed the price to over $81k, an impressive sum for a decidedly mid-sized luxury sedan. Skip all the options and a base A7 TDI can be had for around $66,000, which is still a few grand more than a comparable gas powered A7. Any cost savings gained from the extra fuel efficiency seem almost absurd given the total cost of entry. A Prius alternative this definitely isn’t. But for wealthy progressive folks looking to soothe their conscience through reduced C02 emissions, while still enjoying the performance of a luxury sports sedan, the A7 TDI has few peers.
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About the author
Alex Kramer
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