G20 BMW 3 Series: Farewell To The Last Classic 3er

The G20 BMW 3 Series debuted at the Paris Motor Show on October 2, 2018. Almost exactly eight years later, it goes out of production in October 2026. Its replacement couldn’t be much more different. The G50 3 Series debuts on September 30, takes its face and cabin from the electric i3 built on the Neue Klasse architecture, and goes into production at Dingolfing in November. On the outside, nothing carries over from the car it replaces.

That makes this a good time to look back at the G20. Looking back, it did something BMW has already done: it looked like a 3 Series from every angle, it drove like one, and you could run most of the car with plenty of buttons and switches.

A 3 Series You Could Recognize From Across A Parking Lot

Park a G20 next to an E46 or an F30 and you can see they’re related. The kidneys grew compared to the F30 and now sat in a single frame, but they stayed two horizontal openings scaled to the front end. When the G22 4 Series arrived in 2020 with its tall vertical grille and split the fanbase, the 3 Series became the sensible sibling, and plenty of buyers picked it for that reason alone.

The headlights kept the twin-element look that traces back to the quad round lamps of the E30, E36 and E46. On the pre-LCI car, a small notch cut into the lower edge of each unit reached toward the kidneys. The 2022 3 Series LCI (Life Cycle Impulse, BMW’s term for a mid-cycle refresh) slimmed the lights down without losing that double signature. At the back were three-dimensional L-shaped taillights, a shape BMW has used on its sedans for decades, and the Hofmeister kink stayed at the C-pillar. None of this was radical, and that was what made it work. From the side, or from just the taillights at night, you knew what you were looking at.

The G50 goes somewhere else entirely. Based on the i3 and what BMW has said so far, it gets slim, geometric kidneys set into a horizontal glass band that runs into the headlights, plus flush door handles and thin horizontal taillights. Design chief Adrian van Hooydonk has said customers will be hard-pressed to tell the gasoline 3 Series from the electric i3 by looks alone. Underneath, the G50 still rides on an evolved CLAR platform and keeps the B58 inline-six, so the continuity is mechanical mostly.

The M340i Belongs Among The Best 3 Series Ever Made

Any list of the greatest 3 Series has the E30 M3 and E46 M3 near the top, and both are full M cars. Among regular 3ers, the M340i has a strong claim to being the best BMW has built. Its B58 3.0-liter turbocharged inline-six made 382 hp and 369 lb-ft in US trim, which on paper beats several earlier M3s. It came in a car you could live with every day on the standard suspension.

American buyers could also pick how they wanted it. The xDrive version was the obvious choice for winter traction and quicker launches. The rear-wheel-drive M340i was for people who remember why they got into BMWs in the first place. Getting both options in a performance sedan was already becoming rare. The G50 is expected to launch with xDrive only, and its M350 successor gets more power from the same B58 – 437 HP / 443 PS.

The Last 3 Series With A Clutch Pedal

The manual gearbox in the regular 3 Series died with the G20, and quietly. Americans never got one. From launch, BMW made the eight-speed ZF automatic standard on every gasoline G20 worldwide. The six-speed manual survived only in Europe, on the 318d and the rear-drive 320d. The 320d lost it when the 48-volt mild hybrid arrived for the 2020 model year. That left the 150-hp 318d as the last 3 Series with three pedals, and the manual was gone by the 2022 LCI.

The G80 M3 kept a six-speed in the family, but that’s an M car, and the next M3 is expected to be automatic and xDrive only. The G50 looks set to offer no manual anywhere in its lineup. That would make it the first 3 Series without one since the nameplate launched in 1975.

The M340d Touring Could Be The Last Of Its Kind

The M340i is the enthusiast’s pick in America. In Europe, the car BMW fans will miss most is the M340d Touring. Its six-cylinder diesel makes 250 kW (335 hp) and 700 Nm (516 lb-ft) and sends it through xDrive, in a wagon that can carry a family’s holiday luggage. Not long ago, 700 Nm in a mid-size wagon was V8 territory. In the M340d it came with diesel range and the effortless shove that makes it one of the best cars in the G20 range to drive.

BMW has yet to talk about the future of 3 Series diesels, but none of the spy photos has shown one yet. With Euro 7 on the way and diesel demand shrinking across Europe, it’s reasonable to wonder how long even the four-cylinder diesels will last in the 3 Series. The G21 M340d Touring may be remembered as the last great diesel 3 Series, and maybe as one of the last great diesel BMWs sold new.

An Interior Built Around Buttons

Step from an iX3 or the new i3 into a G20 and it feels like an older generation, which it is. The iDrive rotary controller stayed on the center console even after the LCI, and it’s still the best way to use an infotainment system while driving because you can do it by feel. The air vents are adjusted with physical controls instead of a menu. You also get real buttons for the hazards and defrosters, and a volume knob.

Our favorites are the pre-LCI cars. They run iDrive 7 on a 10.25-inch center display (8.8 inches on base cars), with a full physical climate panel underneath. By 2026 standards the screen is small, and that’s why we like it. It sits high on the dash without taking it over, and iDrive 7 is quick and logically laid out. The 2022 LCI brought the Curved Display, which pairs a 14.9-inch touchscreen running iDrive 8 with a 12.3-inch digital cluster, and moved most climate functions into the screen. That was the first step toward where BMW is now. The G50 goes much further: a Panoramic iDrive display across the full width of the windshield base, a bigger central touchscreen, and fewer physical controls.

A Generation With More Range Than Most

The G20 family was also unusually broad. The G21 Touring arrived in 2019, and in 2022 it became the basis for the G81 M3 Touring, the first M3 wagon BMW ever sold. The 330e made the plug-in hybrid a mainstream choice in the range with 288 hp combined. China got the long-wheelbase G28. Production was spread across Munich, San Luis Potosí in Mexico, Shenyang in China, and assembly sites in India and Southeast Asia. The G20 had to serve fleet buyers, commuters, families and enthusiasts all at once, and it managed that without looking like it was trying.

The G50 3 Series will beat it on every spec-sheet measure: more power, better efficiency, but also more screens. What it gives up is the G20’s continuity, the ability to look at a 3 Series and see every earlier 3 Series in it. That’s why we expect well-kept late M340is, especially rear-drive cars, and M340d Tourings to hold their value better than the market expects. If you’ve been putting off ordering one new, production ends next month.