Stop the presses: The mildly updated A4 has been seen with a new rear bumper.
It may be a German car with German plates on a road in Germany, but the production version of this Audi A4 prototype will not be sold in Deutschland, nor will you find it in the rest of Europe or in the United States. The reason for that is because the premium sedan is in fact the long-wheelbase version exclusively sold in China where rear legroom continues to be very important for customers regardless of the segment they’re shopping in.
Looking at the back of the car, we can see that aside from the Chinese lettering, the trunk lid also carried a badge representing Audi’s weird nomenclature introduced some years ago in India and China before being implemented in recent times across the world. The “45 TFSI” means the car had an engine developing anywhere between 226 to 248 horsepower (169 to 185 kilowatts) as per the controversial double-digit naming scheme rolled out worldwide since the second half of 2017.
Despite being a China-only car, the prototype does allow us to catch a glimpse of the styling tweaks in tow for the international version of Audi’s 3 Series and C-Class rival. As you can easily see, there won’t be that many as so far we can only see the reworked rear bumper hosting new dual exhaust tips featuring a more angular shape instead of the current model’s round finishers. The taillights appear to be virtually the same, but things could change between now and the model’s debut.
There’s not much to say about the front end either as although there was camouflage all over the bumper, the styling tweaks will be kept down to a minimum. As it was the case with the taillights, the headlights are carried over from the current A4.
Audi has a busy schedule up ahead as it’s gearing up to introduce the new A1 Sportback, the production-ready E-Tron, the SQ2, and the next-gen Q3, so it’s unclear whether the four rings will have time this year to launch the mid-cycle refresh for the A4. The S6 was just spotted without any camouflage, which leads us to believe it will also be out in the months to come.
Photos: CarPix