Volkswagen is continuously expanding its fully electric range of the ID. family, in a quest to become the world’s largest EV manufacturer by 2025. As announced by VW Group’s CEO, Herbert Diess during his speech, the latest addition will be the upcoming ID.8, a large SUV serving as the brand’s electric flagship. The ID.8 (Atlas-sized SUV) will join the current range of electric models including the ID.3 (Golf-sized hatchback), the ID.4 (Tiguan-sized SUV), the ID.6 (Passat-sized SUV), plus the upcoming ID.5 (coupe-SUV), and ID.BUZZ (T7-sized MPV) to be unveiled next year. Those models will be later joined by the production version of the project Trinity flagship offering Level 4 autonomous driving capabilities.
The Volkswagen Atlas launched in 2016 and facelifted in 2020, is the largest vehicle based on the MQB platform measuring 5,037mm long, 1,979mm wide, and 1,767mm high. The ID.8 will have similar exterior dimensions with the Atlas but it will offer more interior space benefiting from the MEB electric architecture and the lack of an internal combustion engine upfront. This means it will definitely be a full 7-seater, as even the smaller China-bound ID.6 CROZZ and ID.6 X already offer three rows measuring 4.8 meters. Volkswagen’s largest electric SUV will integrate the same design language as the rest of the ID. family, slightly evolved for a more imposing look.
As for the technical specifications, we guess that the ID.8 will use the larger 77 kW battery in order to offer a competitive range. It is also expected to feature the more powerful dual electric motor layout with a combined output of 301 hp and all-wheel drive. We don’t have a release date but from the presentation, we understand that the ID.8 will be a global model thus we expect it stateside. While nothing is official yet, knowing the huge variety of SUVs in Volkswagen’s global range, we wouldn’t be surprised if the German company rolled out an ID.9 coupe-SUV as the electric equivalent of the Atlas Cross Sport sharing its underpinnings with the ID.8. After all, this is the same strategy followed by the ID.4 and ID.5 siblings.
Herbert Diess has announced that the MQB, MLB, MEB, and PPE platforms currently underpinning all of the VW Group’s modes, will consolidate in a single “super-platform”, reducing complexity and production costs. This will be part of an 800 million investment announced for the Wolfsburg development facility, where the platform and its modules will be designed. The Scalable Systems Platform (SSP) will serve as the base for all future EV models across the whole brand portfolio of the VW Group. Power figures will range from 114 hp for the base models all the way up to 1,140 hp for the performance flagships. All models will be autonomous-ready and equipped with the hardware (sensors, cameras, etc), while the software enabling certain functions will be offered through over-the-air updates available on demand at a certain cost.
