VW turns ID 2 into new-era: Golf with GTI flagship

Entry-level EV is tipped to be called ID Golf after being redesigned as a hatch; VW will replace GTX tag with GTI for all future EVs

- GREG KABLE, FELIX PAGE

Volkswagen has gone back to the drawing board for its long-awaited ID 2 urban EV, providing its smallest electric car with a completely new exterior and interior that are set to be previewed on a new concept car in March.

Scheduled to go on sale in 2025 at a targeted base price of €22,500 (£20,135) in today's money, the compact five-seater is being lined up to get the Golf name, according to Wolfsburg insiders. Autocar sources have also confirmed that the ID 2 will be the first Volkswagen based on the MEB-Plus platform - an updated version of today's widely used MEB electric car structure that features new LFP (lithium iron phosphate) prismatic battery cells and charging speeds of up to 200kW, among other developments.

Nothing is official at this stage, but Autocar has been told that a number of different naming combinations for the production version of the ID 2 have been proposed in internal meetings in recent months, including the ID Golf nomenclature first alluded to by Volkswagen CEO Thomas Schäfer in an interview with Autocar in October 2022.

At the time, Schäfer, who took control of Volkswagen in July after his predecessor, Ralf Brandstätter, was appointed to head up the company's Chinese operations, said: "The Golf name has huge value. The recognition it receives at [customer] clinics - people absolutely understand what we are talking about. So to change the name to something completely different doesn't make sense."

The initial suggestions were that the Golf name may be reserved for a facelifted version of the ID 3. However, this is denied by Autocar sources, who say "the true value of the Golf lies in a car the size of the ID 2".