Article Summary
- BMW sees the new i3 as "more or less the successor of the i4."
- The company's product manager Bernd Körber suggests BMW may have some more news to share in the future.
- For now, the the i4 G26 is heading toward retirement so as not to clash with the i3 NA0.
The writing had been on the wall for quite some time, and now it’s official. The i4 Gran Coupe is dying so that the i3 Sedan can live. BMW broke the news earlier today in Munich during a Q&A session following the NA0’s debut. In a press interview, the firm’s product boss, Bernd Körber, revealed that the i3 will take over.
“In the first step, effectively, the i3 is more or less a successor to the i4. But then you will see not something I can talk about today. Then you will see the portfolio unfold over the next years in terms of electric. So more to come. But the i3 will more or less be this kind of successor for the time being.”
Reading between the lines, Körber is suggesting another EV is in development. However, it’s too early for BMW to talk about it. We do know for sure he wasn’t referring to the i3 Touring. The electric wagon has already been officially announced, and it’s even under consideration for the United States. It’s unclear whether he was alluding to another i4 liftback or a different model. We believe it’s the latter.
From what we’ve heard, only an i4 NA2 two-door coupe has been approved for production. I, for one, would appreciate the extra flexibility that comes with a five-door liftback over a traditional sedan with a trunk lid. Then again, if practicality is your top priority, that’s what the Touring is for.
There would be overlap between an i3 Sedan and an i4 Gran Coupe, although that hasn’t stopped BMW before. After all, there was a time when a customer could head to the local dealer and choose between a 3 Series Sedan, a 3 Series Touring, a 3 Series Gran Turismo, or a 4 Series Gran Coupe. But this kind of complexity costs a lot of money and yields few financial gains, so it’s probably not worth experimenting with anymore.
Logic suggests the transition from the i4 Gran Coupe to the i3 Sedan won’t happen overnight. The i3 won’t enter production until August, and we believe there will be several months of overlap before the i4 is retired. The G26 is rumored to go out of production either by the end of the year or early 2027. As always, nothing is official until BMW says so.
If a two-door i4 is coming, it will likely launch after the iX4 (which still hasn’t been officially announced, by the way) and the i3 Touring, so don’t expect to see it before 2028.
