Audi’s A6 Avant proves the humble wagon still has plenty to say for itself, wrapped in one of the best paint jobs I’ve seen all year.
Avant is French for “before” or “ahead”, and it’s also the word Audi has used for decades to badge its wagons. This always struck me as a rather clever bit of branding, because while the rest of the market chased SUVs off a cliff, Audi kept quietly building some of the best estate cars on the planet. The all-new A6 Avant is the latest proof that being “ahead” doesn’t always mean being loudest, it just means doing the job properly while everyone else is distracted.
Audi New Zealand let me spend a week with the new A6 Avant, and I’ll admit I went into it with high expectations. Audi does wagons brilliantly, and this one didn’t let me down.
My test car arrived in Madeira Brown Metallic, and I have to say it’s one of the best colours I’ve seen on a car all year, rich, warm, and somehow both understated and eye-catching at the same time. The nose is sharp and confident without tipping into aggressive, with front lighting that’s genuinely a highlight of the design, the clever ‘light dance’ catches your eye long before the rest of the car does.
In profile the A6 Avant is sporty and shapely, athletic without being overly muscular, there’s a real sense of tension in the lines running from the front guards back to the rear quarter, which is arguably the best-looking part of the whole car, the glasshouse tapering neatly into the tailgate without a hint of awkwardness. Round the back, the rear lighting signature carries on the theme set up front, full-width and beautifully detailed.
Under the bonnet sits a 3.0L V6 petrol, offering up a healthy 270kW and 550Nm, enough to get the A6 Avant from zero to 100km/h in a claimed 4.7s, bloody quick for a family wagon, and delivered with a soundtrack that’s more purr than roar. Official NZ fuel economy and emissions are still being finalised for this market, but on the sort of driving I did, thirst never felt like an issue worth worrying about.
Inside, Audi has blended alcantara and leather nicely across the seats and door trims, giving the cabin a genuinely premium, tactile feel. Just quietly, it’s one of the nicer interiors I’ve sat in this year. My one gripe (and it is just me being picky) is the overuse of gloss black plastic on high-touch points like the console and door switchgear; it looks sharp in the showroom but shows every fingerprint and scratch within days.
The expansive three screens deliver information quickly and the graphics are crisp, but old brain again, I’d happily trade a bit of the digital wizardry for a few more physical switches and dials, particularly for climate control, where a proper knob still beats a menu every time.
Front seat occupants are extremely well catered for in terms of space, and the boot is genuinely useful too, the sort of size that swallows a week’s shopping or a set of golf clubs without complaint. Rear seat passengers get a slightly more confined experience, not cramped exactly, but noticeably less generous than up front. A nice touch overhead is the panoramic glass roof, complete with an electronic sunshade, flick a switch and it glides shut, no wrestling with a manual blind required, it’s a small thing but a genuinely clever one.
As part of my time with the A6 Avant, most of my driving fell into the usual weekly rhythm, the odd supermarket run, ferrying people about town, and then a decent stretch of open road once the city traffic thinned out. Around town, the rear-wheel steering earns its keep, tightening up the A6’s turning circle at low speeds in a way that makes a car this size (and it is big) feel genuinely manageable in tight car parks, which I wasn’t expecting from something wearing “Avant” (ok quattro) on the boot.
In anything other than Dynamic mode, the V6 responds willingly enough, though it does feel a touch subdued for the sort of performance numbers on paper. And to be fair, even when opting for Dynamic, you get to treble digits with more refined ease than I was expecting. There’s clearly room above this variant for the S6 or RS6 to really let loose, and I’d imagine Audi knows that too.
Where the A6 Avant truly shines, though, is out on the open road. It’s comfortable, confident and quiet, eating up kilometres with the sort of unruffled composure that makes a long drive feel a lot shorter than it actually was.
As I said at the outset, “Avant” means ahead, and after a week in Audi’s latest wagon, I can’t argue with the branding. It’s not the loudest thing in the segment, and it doesn’t need to be, the A6 Avant is a genuinely accomplished all-rounder wrapped in one of the best paint jobs of the year, and it’s ‘ahead’ of most of what else is on offer in this class.
Thanks for the great pics Harry
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