2028 BMW 5 Series Facelift Rendering Pairs Neue Klasse Lights With A Smaller, Illuminated Kidney Grille

This rendering of the 2028 BMW 5 Series facelift gives the G60 sedan Neue Klasse headlights and an illuminated split kidney grille, and leaves almost everything else alone. It’s a halfway house between the current car and BMW’s new design language, and it fits what we’ve been hearing about how far Munich is willing to go with its mid-size sedan.

The update is the G60’s LCI (Life Cycle Impulse, BMW’s term for a mid-cycle refresh), and production is expected to start around July 2027. That makes it a 2028 model in the US, and it sets the 5 Series up for roughly four more years on sale before its successor arrives.

In July 2025, we reported that BMW had walked back plans for a full Neue Klasse face on the 5 Series. Early prototypes wore something much more radical, but our sources said the production car would keep the current kidney shape with tweaks, largely because a completely new front end costs far more than a light refresh. This rendering imagines what that compromise could look like.

Neue Klasse Headlights Meet A Smaller, Illuminated Kidney Grille

The headlights are the most obvious borrowing. They follow the Neue Klasse design rather than evolving the current units, and they do most of the work of making the car look new.

The kidney grille is where the rendering gets clever. It keeps the split design that every 5 Series has worn, but it’s less bold than on the current car and not as tall. It’s also illuminated, with possible inner graphics that give it a Neue Klasse look without turning the 5 Series into a larger i3. That’s the change we’d want most. The current car’s kidneys are big enough to dominate its face, and a shorter grille lets the headlights set the tone instead.

Below the headlights, the bumper sticks much closer to today’s 5 Series than to the Neue Klasse. The intakes and lower fascia look like a light update of the current design, which is exactly what you’d expect from a facelift built to not rock the boat. Our earlier reporting also points to a subtly reshaped rear bumper and new taillight graphics, though this new rendering doesn’t show the back of the car.

The Side Profile Stays As Clean As Today’s 5 Series

From the side, nothing changes, and that’s fine. The G60 has one of the calmer profiles in BMW’s current lineup, with few creases along the doors, and the flush door handles carry over. LCIs rarely touch the sheetmetal between the bumpers, so the doors, roof, and glass area should be identical to the car you can buy now. New wheel designs and paint colors are the usual LCI additions here.

The Cabin Gets The Biggest Neue Klasse Makeover

The rendering only covers the exterior, but the interior is where BMW is expected to borrow the most from its newer cars. Based on what we’ve reported so far, the facelift switches to iDrive X with a 14.9-inch central screen and Panoramic Vision, the display that projects information across the base of the windshield. Panoramic Vision replaces the conventional digital cluster with three fixed tiles in the driver’s line of sight plus six customizable widgets. The rotary iDrive controller is said to be on its way out, and an optional passenger display is also expected.

Will The 2028 BMW 5 Series Get New Engines?

We don’t expect any changes to the engine lineup. The facelifted 5 Series should keep the same mix of four-cylinder and six-cylinder engines, including the plug-in hybrids, with diesels in Europe and the electric i5 alongside them.

The one possible exception is the 520d. In March, we reported that BMW could replace the B47 four-cylinder diesel in the 520d with the B57 six-cylinder diesel, complete with its 48-volt mild-hybrid system. A bigger engine working less hard can be an easier route through tightening emissions rules, and it would tell European buyers that BMW isn’t giving up on diesel. BMW hasn’t confirmed it, and no output figures have surfaced for a six-cylinder 520d.

The i5 Should Get The i7’s New Rimac Battery Tech

The bigger upgrade is likely hiding under the i5’s floor. The facelifted i7, revealed in April, swapped its prismatic cells for the Neue Klasse’s Gen6 cylindrical cells, which BMW integrated into the existing CLAR platform with Rimac’s help. Energy density rises by about 20 percent, and the updated i7 now packs 112.5 kWh of usable capacity, charges at up to 250 kW, and is rated at more than 700 km (435 miles) of WLTP range in i7 50 xDrive and i7 60 xDrive form.

The i5 also rides on CLAR, and the BMW-Rimac partnership covers more models than the i7. When we first wrote about this in April, we estimated the facelifted i5 could target around 700 km (435 miles) of WLTP range, compared with 516 km (321 miles) for today’s i5 M60 xDrive. If that happens, the i5 gets the most meaningful upgrade of the whole LCI.

We expect to see the refreshed BMW 5 Series and i5 in Summer 2027.