This time around with the A3, Audi's taking a route aimed directly at American car buyers. The A3 and S3 hit the ground first as sedans, and it's a shape that will ring reassuringly familiar to Audi owners and intenders. It's quite like that original A4, in fact, even the 80/90 compacts that came just before. From the available LED headlights, to the emphatic, spare grille, to the gentle roll of the roofline into the stubby trunk, it's as quintessentially Audi as any of the brand's sedans, though it's been penned with completely new sheet metal, and with a distinctive angle to its rear pillars.
The 2015 Audi A3 TDI is fitted with a 150-horsepower 2.0-liter turbodiesel four-cylinder engine that produces 236 lb-ft of torque, driving the front wheels through the dual-clutch gearbox. It's offered only with front-wheel drive.
The interior of the A3 and S3 ventures into new aesthetic territory for Audi. More of the VW roots show through in the horizontal dash, though it's differentiated well with round vents, a trio of small climate-control knobs, and by a new MMI controller on the console and by the LCD display that rises from the dash a uniquely German solution to infotainment that hits a fragile note in the cockpits of Benzes and BMWs, too.
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