Fourth-generation Skoda Octavia to be unveiled on November 11

The Octavia is one of Skoda’s (and Volkswagen Group’s) best selling models internationally. The outgoing model has been immensely successful in the global market and even has its share of fans in India. The Octavia is a segment leader in terms of features and luxury offered for the price and to keep it that way the company will be releasing the next-generation Octavia to the world on November 11 in Prague.

What’s New?

Test mules of the next-generation Octavia have been snapped extensively in estate and sedan form revealing a bunch of small and major changes.
The exterior design is more of an evolution of the current Octavia but it does away with the split-headlight design featured on the outgoing car. Instead, it gets sleek LED headlights while retaining the familiar Skoda family face. The rear of the car sees a major overhaul with sharp angular surfaces on the boot and what looks to be triangular shaped taillights but they are covered in clever camouflage. We will get to see what’s what when the car is unveiled in November.

On the inside, the new Octavia will be slightly roomier thanks to clever packaging and an updated platform. The dashboard is completely reworked with a new tablet-like infotainment display closer to the line of sight with the AC vents and controls underneath the large screen. Some prototypes have been spotted with a Maybach-esque two-spoke steering wheel too.

What’s under the hood?

The Octavia gets a range of engines in the global markets. In India we expect it to retain the 2.0 TDI motor, albeit in BS6 form and get an all-new 1.5 TSI engine paired with a 48 Volt mild-hybrid system. We hope to get the vRS variant of the new Octavia in India which is expected to match the performance of the outgoing vRS but may get a smaller engine coupled with hybrid assistance.

When will it come to India?

Skoda is expected to start global sales of the all-new Octavia in early 2020 so we will probably get the refreshed model in mid or late 2020. The Octavia is currently priced between Rs 16-26 lakh and we can expect the price to creep up a little higher to account for the added features and space.

The Octavia currently competes with the Honda Civic, Toyota Corolla Altis as well as the newly updated Hyundai Elantra, outselling all of them in recent times and the next-generation Octavia will aim to continue this trend.

Image credits: Auto.cz