Volkswagen has been testing a Tiguan R for roughly three years, but you're still not going to find one at a dealer near you in the immediate future. What you'll find instead, if you're living in Europe that is, will be a T-Roc R as a crossover alternative to the mighty Golf R hot hatch. Should you want more power in a larger package, arm yourself with a lot of patience as a road-going Tiguan R is not coming anytime soon.
Based on a statement made by an undisclosed "senior VW source" at the 2019 Frankfurt Motor Show, Carsales has learned the Tiguan R won't be out until 2021. The silver lining is a near-production concept will be revealed at some point next year when VW is also going to launch a facelifted Tiguan. The Australian magazine goes on to specify the high-performance crossover won't be a hybrid as it will rely solely on a turbocharged 2.0-liter gasoline engine.
Don't get your hopes up too high for a manual transmission as it is believed the Tiguan R will be offered exclusively with an updated seven-speed DSG hooked up to the 4Motion all-wheel-drive system. No word about how much power the four-cylinder 2.0 TSI will deliver, but with a new Golf R coming out in 2020 with more than the 300 hp available today, it would make sense for the beefy crossover to have at least that. Logic tells us it will pack more punch than the 300-hp T-Roc R given its higher position in the VW hierarchy.
The Tiguan facelift and its hot R derivative might not have a long life as the next generation will allegedly arrive in 2022 with a completely new look. The current model hasn't received the long-rumored "coupe" version, but it looks like its replacement will adopt a swoopy shape with a more sloped roofline. "Radical new look" and a "more aggressive roofline" is what the rumor mill has been churning, but take these details with the proverbial grain of salt.
Meanwhile, another hot crossover from the VW Group of roughly the same size as the Tiguan R is inching closer. We're talking about the five-cylinder RS Q3, which might have been tested by Audi using the body of a Tiguan R Line since we've spotted prototypes that had the latter's body with the former's dual oval exhaust tips.
