2025 Audi RS Q8 Performance First Test: The Super SUV Super Bargain?

Here, in no particular order, are some truths: A black leather seat on a sunny summer’s day is the hottest substance known to humankind. The first bite of an apple always tastes the best. And finally, cars have gotten far, far too expensive. So it would follow that the 2025 Audi RS Q8 Performance’s extraordinary price tag is nuts even given its extraordinary performance, right? Well …

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To some degree, we all have price-tag brain worms when it comes to seeing luxury vehicle MSRPs nowadays. We’re used to seeing unachievably high dollar signs, scoffing, and moving on with our lives. This is not to say the Audi is cheap by any means. But when you consider how it drives, the performance it offers, and how it stacks up against the other super SUVs in the Volkswagen Group playbook, you start to consider its six-figure price in a new light.

Within Spitting Distance

Sitting atop the Q8 family is the 2025 Audi RS Q8 Performance, good for a claimed 631 horsepower and 627 lb-ft of torque from its 4.0-liter twin-turbo V-8. An eight-speed automatic transmission sends power to all four wheels and shoots the 5,388-pound luxury SUV from a standstill to 60 mph in just 3.3 seconds.

The quarter mile passes in just 11.6 seconds at 118.1 mph, and the SUV covers our figure-eight test-course lap in 24.3 seconds at an average of 0.85 g. Stopping from 60 mph happens in 98 feet.

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By comparison, the 650-hp, 4,990-pound 2024 Porsche Cayenne Turbo GT—a MotorTrend performance record breaker—hits 60 in 2.9 seconds, passes the quarter in 11.2 seconds at 121.5 mph, laps the figure eight in 23.4 seconds at an average of 0.87 g, and it stops from 60 in 99 feet.

Then there’s the 2023 Lamborghini Urus Performante, weighing 4,993 pounds and producing a claimed 657 hp. Its numbers are 3.0 seconds to 60, 11.3 seconds at 121.3 mph for the quarter, 23.1 seconds at an average of 0.87 g for the figure eight, and 108 feet to stop from 60.

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But these numbers aren’t terribly far from the heavier and lower-power Audi. Compared to its cousins, the 2025 RS Q8 is indeed slower, but not enough to disqualify it from the conversation.

Super SUV

It certainly feels like a super SUV. Accelerating off the line while using launch control and a customizable RS drive mode results in a feral roar from the exhaust and chest-compressing urgency; the power hits like a wall. The transmission cracks off aggressive shifts, kicking your head into the headrest over and over again. It’s a wonderful execution in theatrics.

With traction control off and the RS mode set to maximum sportiness, our figure-eight test revealed a balanced chassis that happily alternates between understeer and oversteer based on your driving. Although things are more neutral while trail-braking into corners, the torque-vectoring differential is good at inducing power-on oversteer midcorner to scrub away any front-end push. We attempted the same thing with the sport differential set in Balanced mode, and the chassis still rotated just as eagerly under power, just with slightly more restrained angles.

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This is where the 2025 Audi RS Q8 Performance plays a little mind game with you. It has the stance and seating position of a car. And it’s so fast and capable you forget you’re in an SUV—right up until you thrash it hard enough to produce some modest body roll.

As for the brakes? Damn. Needing just 98 feet for a dead stop from 60, the RS Q8 Performance returned phenomenal (neck-straining, eye-bulging) stopping distances for a vehicle so big, heavy, and relatively tall. Tracking straight and totally under control, the only drama was a touch of nose dive and a good bit of loud gronching—a MotorTrend test team technical term—from the ABS.

Also: Those sizable carbon-ceramic brakes come standard. Cool.

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Slow things down a bit, and there’s plenty else to enjoy. Handsome and geometric lines define the exterior and interior. The cabin leather emanates a subtle but high-dollar fragrance without the use of gimmicky air fresheners, and the saddle-colored quilted leather is a delight to the eyes and touch. All the seats are comfortable and offer ample room. You can fit plenty of whatever you’d like in the vast trunk.

A version of this infotainment setup made its debut in the faraway time of 2018 when Audi launched the Q8 as a 2019 model, and it’s seen very few updates since then. As such, you still get the three-screen setup, with the lower screen used as the dedicated climate control center. Like the Infiniti QX80 we just reviewed, the climate interface only appears to respond to one touch input at a time, which might make it fiddly for two people to use it at once.

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Look beyond the excessive use of piano-black trim, however, and it’s actually pretty neat how modern and fresh this setup still looks and feels. The design is simple and straightforward, and that’s helped it weather the car industry’s lightning-quick evolution in infotainment layouts.

As a daily driver, Audi tuned the RS Q8 Performance to lean toward sport rather than luxury. Around town, the big 23-inch wheels cause the car to jounce and buck over bumps, but things smooth out tremendously once you hit a reasonably smooth stretch of highway. A shockingly tight turning radius makes it a dream to live with in parking lots, too. And no matter the drive mode, the RS Q8 Performance’s steering feel remains light but quick and direct. MotorTrend executive editor Mac Morrison said it best in his first drive of the car: “Audi did not fall prey here to the misguided idea of equating ‘dynamic’ with ‘stupidly heavy.’”

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Just two complaints. First, some of the buttons sound and feel a bit plasticky for a six-figure super SUV. Second, the overall sound deadening is great, but we wish we could hear more of that lovely engine note from inside the cabin.

No Longer Midpack

When your stablemates include a Lamborghini, a Porsche, and the Bentley Bentayga, it’s difficult to stand out. For a long time, the Audi didn’t feel like it could even sit at the same table. But with the RS Q8 Performance and its casual Nürburgring lap record, those tables have turned.

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Especially—especially!—when you price it out. The base MSRP for this test car is $137,495. Options such as the blue paint, Bang & Olufsen sound system, Executive package, 23-inch wheels, Luxury package, and the RS sport exhaust system add around $15,000.

We know the RS Q8 Performance is a skosh slower than the Cayenne Turbo GT and Urus. But it’s also more than $60,000 and a whopping $128,000 cheaper than those two, respectively. Super SUVs prices have crept into the $200,000 range, so the Audi’s sub-$150,000 starting point is the best bang for your performance buck.

Sure, it doesn’t have the shouty badge snobbery of the other two. But Audi has always been about understating rather than overstating, and the RS Q8 Performance delivers big performance that is sure to be more than enough for almost anyone driving it in the real world on a daily basis.