Whenever someone asks me which new car best fits the description of a “sleeper,” the Audi S6 sedan is the first car that comes to mind. Sure, you could argue that any S-badged Audi can be a sleeper, but the S6 is especially fitting. It’s not as huge as the S8, and not as eye-catching as the S7. In a subtle color, the S6 can truly blend into a parking lot or a crowded highway, while still being able to smoke 95% of the cars on the road in a straight line.
Audi has been selling a gas-powered S6 in North America on and off since 1994, but according to a report from Edmunds, that time is finally coming to an end. There’s a clear distinction to make here, though: The S6 is not dead. It’s still very much alive … as an EV.
The S6 e-tron, released last year, looks like it’s going to fill in for the gas-powered S6 in Audi’s lineup, complete with a quicker 0-60 time and more horsepower. If I’m honest, the S6 going all-electric feels like the most logical step forward for the nameplate. But I’m not sure this e-tron fits the “ultimate sleeper” mold in the same way. Thankfully, the regular A6 is here to save the day (in a way, anyway).
Audi’s Lineup Reflects The Brand’s Shrinking Size
According to Edmunds, the gas-powered S6 is being cut to simplify the greater A6 lineup. An Audi spokesperson confirmed to me the car wouldn’t be making a return for the 2026 model year, but stopped short of confirming its absence from the lineup in the years moving forward.
Considering just how far Audi sales have fallen, tightening up its offerings and focusing on its most profitable models seems like a smart play. Last year, its sales (or lack thereof) in the full-size luxury sedan segment proved that having multiple models in the same category wasn’t driving success.
Sales were down 16% year-over-year for Audi in 2025, dropping to 164,942 vehicles sold. For some context, that’s a drop of over 26% compared to Audi’s sales in 2019. The VW Group subsidiary, which used to go toe-to-toe with brands like BMW and Mercedes-Benz, now sells only a fraction of the volume of those brands. You could argue Audi has lost the plot, and that their main buyer base has slowly trickled away throughout the past decade to brands like Tesla. But that’s a story for another time.
Not all hope is lost, though, at least from where I’m sitting. The A6 e-tron and S6 e-tron, which I drove last year at Audi’s media launch event for the car in California, felt like a genuinely competitive product that I could see people actually choosing over the comparable BMW or Mercedes. In its base form, it gets nearly 400 miles of range for under $70,000, which is pretty good. It even looks cool, so long as you don’t look at it from the side (in which case it starts to look like an overweight house cat).
The S6 also just makes sense as an EV. What’s more sleeper than 543 horsepower in complete and utter silence? The e-tron is incredibly quick and loves to cover lots of ground at high speeds, like you’d expect of any S6 before it. The only problem is that its looks are far more distinctive than the outgoing S6’s design, which I’d describe as “the most average-looking sedan ever built” (in a positive way, of course). Going that route makes it look more appealing, sure, but it sort of spoils the sleeperiness of it all.
Whether buyers actually care about that aspect, I’m not really sure. It used to be that if you wanted a sleeper, you bought an Audi. But with electric cars democratizing acceleration for the masses, does it really still apply?
The Best New S6 Might Just Be The A6
While the gas-powered S6 is going away, the regular ICE-powered A6 is still around, and refreshed significantly for 2026. It too is facing some lineup simplifications, but with the crux that the last remaining powertrain available actually makes the car pretty quick. From Edmunds:
Instead of offering four- and six-cylinder engines, the new A6 only comes with a turbocharged V6. This 3.0-liter engine produces 362 horsepower and 406 lb-ft of torque. And according to Audi’s estimates, the A6 will scoot to 60 mph in 4.5 seconds — one-tenth of a second quicker than the last 444-hp S6 we tested.
The new A6 has handling covered, too, if you choose the $5,850 Sport Plus package. Checking that option box nets you rear-wheel steering, a stiffer suspension, summer tires, and most importantly, a trick rear differential that uses torque vectoring to send power to whichever rear wheel needs it most, a piece of equipment normally only seen on S and RS models.
You could make the argument that the gas-powered A6 might be the closest successor to the outgoing S6. It has the acceleration numbers you’d expect from an S-branded car, and the chassis equipment available to keep up when the road gets twisty, too. In fact, I’d argue the new A6 might even be more of a sleeper than the current electric S6 and the outgoing gas-powered S6, since it looks more like a normal car and it doesn’t have any S badges affixed to the body.
My point is that while the gas-powered S6 is dead, it’s not like you can’t get that experience from Audi anymore. There are two cars—the S6 e-tron and the new A6—that take up that mantle in two different ways, depending on what you need from a car. Whichever way you choose, it’ll cost you: The S6 e-tron starts from $79,995, while an A6 equipped with the Sport Plus pack comes in at $71,245.
Top graphic image: Audi
Well, when you’d like to know what happens when you take a reasonably attractive sedan and stuff a shed load of batteries under the passenger compartment, just look at the side profile of the S6.
I’ll give Audi’s design team an ‘E’ (tron) for effort.
These look ok. Even in profile.
I, a human with a physician-approved BMI, am allowed to share a residence with a slightly overweight (don’t call her fat) cat. In any case, I don’t see any heavy feline resemblance. That feels like trying too hard.
I would just like to point out that my overweight house cat looks nothing like an Audi S6 from the side. I suspect that comparison only goes one way.
Looks a bit like a Buick.
I still think the mid cycle facelift for the new A6 is going to involve heavily revised taillights. They just really bring the exterior design down.
I wonder how many dozens of these they are going to lease out?
Audi used to design such great-looking cars. But like, when Obama was president.
That side profile is giving strong Fusion vibes, especially the greenhouse and crease in the doors.
I can see that. It could be worse. I thought Fusions were handsome cars.
and those cars have aged like fine wine, IMO. it’s crazy to see how far the designs have fallen
Seeing these photos of the new A6 and S6 remind me exactly why I am keeping my C7.5 S6 with the TTV8 until they pry it out of my hands. I’ll keep the obscene maintenance bills knowing a snarling V8 is right in front of me. Plus, buying a used one you just get the large maintenance bills without a large upfront price. It’s a tax that you know going into it.
Man, the new Audi design language is really awful. I’ll take a last gen CPO S6
Another anonymous lozenge shaped emission from VAG with the usual haptic interior from hell and a laughable price tag. Hard pass.
When I could not afford them, I loved Audis, a decade+ ago.
Now that I can actually buy one… I still like a few of the exteriors, like the A6 above.
But as soon as I see the interior, I’m out. I wanted the new A5… but when it came out all I saw was screens on top of screens, nary a button in sight. Screw that. I’m out.
pepperidge farm remembers when Audi’s looked really nice.
(seriously though, wtf is all that going on there)
I’ll be the contrarian here…
I actually like the S6 e-tron. It isn’t the most beautiful car, but it is way more practical than the i5 and is basically as close as you can get to electric wagon utility. It may be a fastback but it has a ton of cargo capacity below the window. It’s also a touch cheaper than the i5 M60 and I think that lately Audi dings you less with options than BMW. Not sure what this competes with from MB.
I think everyone here would appreciate it more if it were an S6 avant though.
The EQE AMG is probably the closest MB competitor, and by far the priciest. Audi has sort of carved out a niche by having a larger fastback, but it’s not the only one. BMW’s i4 is a smaller vehicle with less cargo than Audi’s S6 e-tron, but it’s also 200lbs lighter and $9K cheaper in M60 spec with nearly 600hp.
Does this seem backwards to anyone else?
Why not make the low-key super car the fire-breathing, flame-farting the gas-powered car, and the daily, volume(relatively speaking)-seller the EV (or more sensibly hybrid)?
Also, it’s fuck ugly, as Nsane has thoroughly documented.
Audi way overestimated the demand for EVs and is still paying the price. Their original plan was to not even offer an ICE A6 at all and have the A5 as the ICE model and A6 as the BEV. They had to go back on that and development on the EV was far enough along that it would’ve been more trouble to nix it than get it to market.
The vehicle is still going to be a huge failure in the US market and isn’t really even competitive with its counterparts but there are enough Audi loyalists who can be talked into leasing one that they can at least recoup some of their money. Meanwhile they’ve made the regular ICE one way more powerful and performance oriented than usual to bridge the gap.
All things considered I think they’ve made the best out of a bad situation. Making the gas A6 edgier than its competitors could steal some sales from BMW and Mercedes. It slightly undercuts the 540i and E450 and with all the performance goodies it’s probably going to be a more engaging car as well, since those are pretty much straight up luxury barges that happen to have a lot of power.
Wasn’t VW/Audi required to invest in EV’s as part of their Dieselgate penalties?
It was, but I think also somewhat self-imposed. I feel like they volunteered to go big on EV’s because their lack of emissions is the opposite of what they got caught doing with their diesels. This sort of kick-started the EV-craze of the following 10-years because the largest/2nd largest vehicle manufacturer (depending on year) committed to them hard.
Remember this was before, or just as, the Tesla Model 3 became widely available, so when VW made this commitment it was still a world of limited range/utility Nissan Leafs and BMW i3’s, or very expensive Tesla Model S and X’s.
They did a half-assed, bare minimum, job with Electrify America, but for some reason they pivoted nearly all vehicle engineering to EVs which led us to where we are today.
It would obviously be a very different attitude about EVs if the government maintained its trend for supporting them. So many automakers are caught in the middle of EV vs internal combustion right now.
I don’t know what it is but I think the EV A6 is one of the least attractive cars on sale today. It’s bulbous, proportionally crossover-like, and the front end looks like what would happen if you read a middle school art student a description of an Audi front fascia over a pay phone. It’s basically a parody of an Audi with every bad post Tesla luxury car trope in one place inside and out.
It is incredible how in the typical German attempt to make the least offensive, most conservative, practical design possible they’ve somehow made something so unappealing. The new Q5 is bad too but not nearly as much of a war crime. Anyway you’d need to be out of your mind to spend the $80,000 or whatever on an S6 EV.
…with that out of the way I think they may be on to something with the new ICE A6. It looks fine by comparison, they were smart to go V6 only, and the handling package basically makes it an S6 without the obscenely complicated powertrain. It even has the cool differential like the S and RS models. As of now they have all the fun bits behind an absolutely massive paywall, but you won’t pay anywhere near MSRP for an Audi sedan in 2026 and I expect a lot of that stuff will become cheaper and/or standardized over the model’s run.
They’re even getting rid of the haptic bullshit on the steering wheel! Bravo. Anyway if you’re a fan of the old Audi (and you should be) the new ICE A6 does seem like a step in the right direction, and I’ll probably look at a certified one in a couple years. Definitely don’t take on first owner luxury sedan depreciation though…if you want a new one lease it and treat it well so your fellow Autopians can get good deals on certified ones!
It’s not good when you start thinking the Q8 is one of the more attractive options from Audi.
In a sea of awkward tall crossovers I’m actually not too offended by the EV A6, even though it is both ham-handed and boring. The worst things I’ve seen from Audi are the new Q3 and Q5, which manage to look worse than a generic design from a non-premium brand.
So,
Old S6: 444hp and 0-60 in 4.6s.
New A6: 362hp and 0-60 in 4.5s.
Is there a large weight discrepancy? Or have I just forgotten how power works?
1). Ze Germans dramatically underrate 0-60 times and horsepower. Both of these cars are faster than what’s claimed. IRL an old S6 probably breaks the 4 second barrier and I’d imagine the new don’t call it an S6 does too
2). Weight is a big factor. The old S6 was a mild hybrid with a turbo’d and electronically supercharged V6. I want to say it was nearly 5,000 pounds. I don’t believe the new A6 is quite that heavy but I don’t have numbers in front of me.
I’d think someone from Belgium should be well-versed in the deception* of their eastern neighbours.
*in this case, I don’t mind