The auto industry has a well-kept secret: Performance SUVs don’t actually make any sense, and can be worse than their non-performance variants. They can be punishingly stiff, outrageously expensive, and little better on track than their standard counterparts due to all that weight that’s still sitting high off the ground.
If there’s an ideal way to make a performance SUV, it’s to put all your skill points into the engine — keep the suspension plush for highway rides, but let a massive engine make passing zones a breeze. It’s a formula that Audi hints at with the new SQ7, and comes so close to mastering.
Full Disclosure: Audi shipped me out to Utah to drive four crossovers (and ride one mountain bike) all at once. The Q7, SQ7, Q8, and SQ8 have all been lightly updated, and between the smaller changes and shorter drives these reviews likely won’t be the 1,600-word epics you’ve come to expect from my byline. Audi paid for my transportation, lodging, and food.
The Audi SQ7 is, simply, the performance oriented Q7. Same three rows of seating, same 2025 update to the fascia and lighting, same infotainment that will let you change your wallpaper in exchange for 13 real life American dollars per JPEG. It’s comfortable, it’s practical, it’s a nice place to spend your time.
Only, the SQ7 is simply nicer than the Q7 on which it’s based. While the interior may not change much, beyond some accent stitching and an admittedly pretty sick red seatbelt, the powertrain is improved in two very meaningful ways: The engine and the transmission.
In standard trim, the Audi Q7 is powered by a two-liter inline four cylinder making 268 horses and 273 lb-ft of torque. The tester I drove swapped out the four for a three-liter V6, which bumped power figured up to 335 horsepower and 369 lb-ft — better, to be sure, but still a number that leaves me wanting. The SQ7, with its four-liter V8 delivering 500-horsepower and 568 lb-ft of torque, is the sweet spot.
Calling a 500-horsepower SUV some sort of Goldilocks compromise is a claim only an auto journalist accustomed to sporty cars could make, but it’s one I can justify. Simply put, crossovers are heavy now — the SQ8 clocks in at 5,291 lbs on its own, before you start filling it with passengers. Add in your family and your fuel, and you’re looking at some truly serious weight.
Take that weight, and place it on an uphill highway. Stick it behind a slow-moving semi, and set the whole scene in the oxygen-poor high altitudes of Utah. Suddenly, 500 horsepower isn’t some absurd figure found on a supercar — it’s almost a necessity to execute a safe pass.
That situation also shows the benefits of Audi’s other change with the SQ7: The transmission. The SQ7 actually uses the same ZF 8HP gearbox as the standard Q model — and seemingly every other car in the world — but it’s been massively retuned for more responsiveness. Where downshifts in the Q7 were sluggish and unreliable, here they’re… better.
If you expected that sentence to end in perfection, you’re looking in the wrong segment. Crossovers don’t need lightning-fast hyper-responsive shifts, and many owners would likely be annoyed at such behavior in the real world. What a performance crossover really needs is a gearbox that’s just responsive enough to fade into the background, a point of frustration neither for its eagerness nor for its sluggishness. In that, Audi hits the mark.
The SQ7 is not an RS model, it’s not the top of Audi’s crossover performance pantheon. It will not set a blistering Nurburgring time, it will never stun at the drag strip. But, with between its power and the way that power is delivered, the SQ7 becomes a vehicle where the drivetrain fades into the background — attuned to what you’re looking for from a car, simply doing whatever you ask in comfort and without complaint.
That middle ground, that half-commitment to performance, makes for a car that’s far better to use every day than an ultra-stiff BMW M crossover. It’s not overwhelming, it’s not even particularly impressive, but it’s exactly what a performance SUV should be. God help us, 500 horsepower is now a benchmark for crossovers.
