We told you about it a few days ago: Volkswagen has confirmed its desire to remove the Passat from its lineup in the near future. This mythical family sedan appeared in 1973. Affordable and well equipped, it gave families access to German quality. All under nice dress, as well as a cabin with very well thought out features. The golden age of grand tourers for long trips, and for several people. Bred from 7 additional generations, the eighth and current one dated 2014. In 2022, it was removed from the catalog, now only the Passat SW remains. But we believed in this temporary departure while we waited new generation. Finally, nothing will happen, and the Passat will no longer exist either in this form or under this name.

Goodbye Passat, hello ID.7

Don’t worry, it will not be replaced by another SUV, but by a sedan. However, the main novelty will be its motorization, which will be 100% electric.. Step out of the TDI diesel, TSI petrol or even the GTE hybrid. Passat, like Polo or Tiguan, will receive a new electric generation. But unlike them, who will have the right to the designation “ID.Polo and ID.Tiguan, the new electric Passat will be called the ID.7. Its prototype was the ID.Aero concept presented at CES in Las Vegas earlier this year. In recent weeks, a camouflaged version has been shown. Volkswagen has confirmed that the Aero concept will take the name ID.7 for its final form. Now it is done, the production version has just been introduced in China. This is a version reserved for the Chinese market, but it will be very close to our European version. This is due on April 17th.

Another model in the ID family

What does this Chinese version tell us? At first glance, it represents all the attributes of ID models. Curves, aerodynamic silhouette, lights with shining “eyelashes”. The door handles are flush, as, for example, on the ID.4 and ID.5, and the body is two-tone. Behind, there is a wide light band, the ID.4 trick is there too. To be honest, we expected a bit more boldness in the design, as was the case with the ID.Aero. It is announced in China with a Electric motor with a capacity of 201 horsepower, for a maximum speed of 155 km/h. She sits down 77 kWh battery (same as ID.Buzz?), for claimed autonomy of 700 kilometers. Attention, these are Chinese homologation cycles, so you will have to wait to get the European WLTP cycles. It is expected to start in Europe at just under €50,000. So, do you think it’s a worthy replacement for the Passat?