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Originally Posted by Savoy2001
Interesting to hear. Although the s8 isn’t an RS7. I don’t know alot about the Audi lineup. How much different is the s8 vs rs7? S8 is like a regular 5/7 series vs m5 m8 no?
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Once you get to the A6 series and higher, all Audi cars are very similar. You can feel the brand DNA in every one of them. From the interior most people wouldn't even see the difference from an S8 vs RS7, with the obvious exception of the back seats. The dash, the center console, the MMI, the stereo, the HUD, it's all the same.
Audis all tend to drive the same. That semi-loose feeling on the highway carries over to all of them. My 2013 S6 felt that way. My 2023 S8 feels that way. My ex-wife's SQ5 felt that way. Even my R8 feels a little frenetic at high speeds. For example, I drove an R8 on the autobahn a few years ago and over 150 mph I could feel the car lifting a bit and getting squirrely. I was afraid to take it much faster than about 160 mph. Both my 2012 Merc S63 and 2020 BMW M5 Comp felt more stable at those speeds. I drove both of those cars to their electronic limits of 186 mph, and they still felt in control.
I'm not saying any of this to argue that Audi are bad cars. They're great cars and I love mine. It's just that I have a lot of seat time in Audi, BMW and Mercedes having owned all of them over many years and these are the differences I have felt. BMW and Mercedes just drive better. You feel more confident in them at high speed. And the technology on them is more advanced, particularly Mercedes. I spent 2 months driving a 2023 S580 before I got my 2023 S8, and the tech on that Merc is really impressive. The 3D augmented reality HUD makes my S8 HUD look like a Fisher-Price kids toy.
Audis sure do look better, though.
Their designs are so much cooler looking.
I ended up with the 2023 S8 because I needed a car immediately and I could actually find S8s on car lots with the options I wanted. To get an S580 the way I wanted would have been a special order build and I just didn't have time for that. Audi also had big rebates on the A8/S8 to clear out the 2023 inventory. The BMW 7 series was never a consideration. Too ugly now, I just can't do it.
As for the engine, the S8 has the same 4.0T engine as the RS7. The RS7 is tuned for a little more HP to genuflect to the RS badge a bit. I don't know how the performance of the RS7 compares to the S8, however. It's sort of a moot point, as the S8 is a giant long-wheelbase sedan so track performance is not a metric that ranks high for owners.
Since I have an R8 in my garage, I don't need my daily driver to be a small and sporty car. I want something big and comfortable for long trips and driving around town. With the S8, I can go to dinner and drive my friends comfortably. They are both over 6 feet tall yet the back seat is perfectly fine and they can stretch out.
Personally, I don't care for the RS7. That car occupies a funky segment of the car market which I have never understood. It's basically a 4 seater, with a low roofline so that adults can't sit comfortably in the back, and a hatchback trunk that is somewhat limited on luggage capacity due to the sloped rear window and roof line. For example, my german shepherd could not ride in the back of an RS7 because she can't stand up (the window is too low).
I think an RS6 is the better car vs. RS7 because it has a more useful trunk space with a taller roof line. Put doggo in the back and it's obvious.
The RS6 looks better, too.