New 2025 Audi Q5
Both Q5 models ride on a mix of springs. The standard model is tuned to be comfy on steel springs, but you can spec a sports suspension (standard on SQ5) for a more exciting ride thanks to Frequency Selective Damping. Frequency Selected Damping is designed to reduce damping forces at high frequencies (terrible road surfaces, for example), and up them on the smooth stuff. Should you fancy, air suspension with adaptive dampers is also available as an option. Audi says there’s a wider spread between comfort and sport modes here. Progressive steering comes as standard.
Audi’s new design direction is wonderfully on show here. The new Q5’s exterior look is softer this time around—not that the second-generation car was aggressive, mind you. There are still standout lines around the car to draw your eye neatly to where it needs to be (according to Audi’s designers), but the whole car looks and feels a lot smoother on the outside.
There are a few details to pay close attention to: The creases at the bottom of the doors hide some of the car’s visual weight (it’s not a behemoth, but there’s a lot of metal there), and the soft shoulder lines guide you from wheel arch to wheel arch effortlessly. The rear looks pleasingly wide and ‘purposeful’—the full-width light graphic helps that—and the tailpipes are all real all the time. No more fake tubes for Audi. The Q5 will be available in eleven colors, including an incredible Ultra Blue, and will ride on wheels anywhere between 18-21 inches depending on your spec.
Up front, the new grille is, according to Audi, ‘sporty’—which, depending on the sport, could be true. Its single-unit headlamps are 1.6 inches higher than the last car, however, the DRL that sits within is a separate element. Up front, you’ll find LED daytime running lights, while at the rear you get second-generation OLED units.
Audi’s new party piece of eight adjustable dynamic light patterns carries over to the new Q5. Simply select your pattern of choice via the MMI while you’re stationary, and the next time you turn the car on you can dazzle onlookers with your new style. Only the European market gets to use them while driving. The US misses out on another neat lighting trick, too, as the rear OLEDs can be used to communicate with other road users (with… shapes) about what’s going on ahead.
It’s not all doom and lack-of-lighting gloom for America, though. The Q5’s got a very cool brake light. Under the rear spoiler is a row of super bright lights that look a bit like the floor of the carbonite chamber in The Empire Strikes Back. When you put your foot on the pedal, they reflect on the rear windshield and act as an extra visual cue for tailgaters to back off. In the US it’s not a mere line of tiny red slabs, but the word ‘QUATTRO’ is reflected there. In the EU that’s classed as advertising and is illegal. Not so in the land of the free.
Inside, the Q5 is more aggressive, pointy, and angular. It’s more in keeping with what we’re currently used to from Audi, but it also feels like it pays a neat homage to the design-lead cabins the firm was famed for back in the aughts and noughties. Everything looks and feels solid enough to last for decades more than the first owner will even be thinking about the car.
Keen eyes will spot USB-C ports front and rear, as well as an inductive phone charging pad. There are a few splashes of shiny plastic that will, inevitably, be clean for five seconds over the car’s entire existence and never look the same again, and a slab of buttons to control mirrors, seats, locks, and lights by the door handle is either untold genius or foolishness beyond reproach. Time will tell.
The new Q5 is based on the Premium Platform Combustion, much like the new Audi A5. The platform, says Audi, offers plenty of flexibility and allows for low cars like the A5, and higher ones like the new Q5.