Forget the gloom, Car of the Year proved we're in a performance car golden era
Fewer manuals and higher weights than ever. But 2025's best performance cars were still thrilling
Two firsts for eCoty 2025. Though the McLaren Artura Spider came very close last year, the Revuelto is the first hybrid to win. And though variants of the Gallardo and Huracán have finished second (and the Diablo VT 6.0 too, back in 2000), the Revuelto is also the first Lamborghini champion.
Since 2021’s Huracán STO, with its active aerodynamics and patented forged composite materials, it feels like Lamborghini has been gathering momentum technologically, creating cars with the dynamics and tech to match the dramatic design and remarkable engines for which it has always been famous. In the Revuelto, that journey arc has arrived at a truly complete car.
As Colin observed, it’s a Lamborghini you don’t have to make excuses for, and as John said, it is a definitive 21st‑century supercar. I grew up with a Countach poster on my wall and the Revuelto has much of that car’s presence and sense of being a machine like nothing else – but it backs it up in the way it drives too.
Other themes from this year’s test? There was only one manual gearbox, in the 992.2 911 GT3 – and that car can be specced with PDK instead if customers wish. Hats off to Porsche for still offering the manual, and giving buyers a straight choice between the two gearboxes; the GT3 is the same price whichever transmission you choose, and whether you go for the winged body as tested here or the de-spoilered Touring option. The PDK has its own appeal but the H-pattern gives the 911 an extra layer of tactility that each judge commented on. The fact it’s a great gearshift doesn’t hurt, either.
Also reflecting a macro industry trend, there were more all-wheel-drive cars in this year’s test than ever before. But each was very different: the Corvette and Lamborghini power their front wheels purely by electric motors; the AMG can be switched into a rear-drive-only mode if desired, and the Audi can be two- and even three-wheel drive some of the time, depending on what its Torque Splitter rear axle is up to. Only the Defender Octa has ‘traditional’ four-wheel drive – and that includes a two-speed transfer case and electronic active diff.
Average power outputs have grown, too. More than half the cars in the test, including the Land Rover, had more than 600bhp. And only three had less than 500bhp. But the most intense, extreme driving experience came from one of the least powerful cars, the Alpine A110 Ultime. Power-to-weight, and how the engine feels in the car, are still the most important factors. But having 800bhp-plus to play with is also pretty addictive – and the clever electronics in the Ferrari, Aston Martin and Lamborghini make that kind of power more accessible than ever.
As well as power, prices are big this year too. Five cars each exceeded a quarter of a million (one of them costs more or less half a million, depending on spec). Only one, the Audi, dipped below £63,000 (though this test car, in top Carbon Vorsprung trim, tops £70k).
But if some of the above sounds a bit gloomy, there’s a very real sense that 2025 is actually a pretty golden time for performance cars. All 12 of these machines are truly brilliant bits of kit. To illustrate that, one of my favourite drives of the test was behind the wheel of the Mercedes-AMG GT63 Pro, following Stuart Gallagher in the Maserati GT2 Stradale, on wide, well-sighted, endlessly winding roads through the night back to the hotel: the space to properly stretch the AMG’s seriously muscular legs, with what looked like an escaped endurance racer to follow as a pathfinder as the GT2’s headlights cut through the dark.
Another favourite was in the Audi RS3, being shadowed by Richard Tipper in the Ferrari 12 Cilindri, playing with the RS Performance drive modes and appreciating just how aggressively the RS3 can be – and likes to be – driven. The AMG and Audi were the two lowest-scoring cars in the test and both are still capable of creating the kind of drives that live long in the memory. And there were a few of those from all of the cars over the course of this test. The cheapest car came last and the most expensive car came first – but that doesn’t tell the whole story.
eCoty really is a tough test for the cars. Days start before sunrise and end long after nightfall. Collectively, the 12 cars in this year’s test covered 15,000 miles over the week. Many of them were very hard miles, and the worst kind of driving for any car’s durability – endless starting and stopping; countless three-point turns on full lock and fiddly manoeuvres in remote locations; tedious low-speed crawls and drive-the-wheels-off-it strops, frequently back to back; fogged-up cold-start mornings and blazing-hot afternoons; different drivers, different driving styles, different opinions. Winning eCoty really isn’t easy, and the Revuelto’s unanimous victory is fully deserved.
