2020 Audi Q4 e-tron price, specs and release date

This is the new Audi Q4 e-tron concept. It’s an electric SUV that will sit below the full-sized e-tron and is the fifth car to join Audi’s e-tron electric-only range.

New Audi Q4 e-tron price and release date

The new Audi Q4 e-tron is likely to cost from around £55,000, which would make it a direct alternative to the Mercedes EQC. While the Mercedes will go on sale later this year, the Audi is not expected until the end of 2020.

New Audi Q4 e-tron styling

The new Q4 e-tron concept might look like just ANOTHER Audi SUV at first glance, but take a closer look and you’ll see it has more in common with the company’s high-tech e-tron electric car. The most obvious carry over feature is the sealed grille, which helps make the car more aerodynamic. Oh, and a none-too-subtle illuminated ‘e-tron’ badge’.

You’ll spot more electric-car DNA when you step to the side of the car where you’ll see e-tron style 22-inch alloy wheels and the same lower body cladding found on the e-tron. While at the back you’ll see the familiar rear light bar, which performs a sequential light up dance when you lock and unlock the car.

Completing the concept car’s look is its Solar Sky paint, which has reflective properties that help keep the cabin cool in sunlight and save battery power that would have been used by the car’s air-conditioning.

New Audi Q4 e-tron interior

While the floor covering is made from recycled materials, the rest of the Q4 e-tron’s interior is made from the kind of posh plastics you’d expect to find in any other Audi. So you get seats double-stitched in Alcantara and light materials used in the upper half of the cabin to make it feel airier.

You also get a cabin that’s loaded with infotainment screens, including a 12-inch display behind the steering wheel and another display the same size on the centre of the dash. To that you can add a head-up display capable of augmented reality so it can, seemingly, project the sat-nav’s directions directly onto the road.

New Audi Q4 e-tron practicality

Audi’s new electric car will be 4,590mm long, 1,900mm wide and 1,610mm tall – making it slightly smaller than a conventional Audi Q5. Thanks to its electric motors though, the Q4 e-tron should feel nearly as spacious inside. With no gearbox to worry about, the Q4 has a completely flat floor and Audi promises “unsuspected spaciousness”  in terms of front and rear legroom.

Being powered by electric is even handy when it comes to storage spaces because you get a large compartment where you’d usually expect to find the gearstick.

New Audi Q4 e-tron driving

The Q4 e-tron will likely be offered with a variety of power options when it goes on sale next year.

The concept car you see here, though, gets a 150kW motor with 310Nm of torque at the back and a 75kW motor that powers the front wheels and has 150Nm of torque.  The combination of the two means the Q4 can get from 0-62mph in 6.3 seconds and tops out at 112mph.

Resist the temptation to nail the throttle at every opportunity and you can expect to get nearly 280 miles out of the e-tron on a single charge.

To increase the range, usually power is only sent to the rear motor, but the front wheels can spin up in a fraction of a second if their extra grip is needed. In fact, according to Audi, the e-tron’s four-wheel drive system is so clever it can predict and stop wheel spin before it’s even happened.

By sending power to whichever wheel can use it best, the Q4 e-tron also feels a lot more dynamic than it looks in corners and it comes with adjustable adaptive dampers that can rein in body lean in bends. And, while the battery pack isn’t light (it weighs 510kg) it sits low in the car’s floor – giving the Q4 e-tron a perfect 50:50 weight distribution and a low centre of gravity that should make it surprisingly nimble in corners.

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