Skoda lifted the veil on its facelifted Octavia RS about a month ago before hosting a special event last week in Vienna, Austria for the media. Now, the hot liftback is making its first appearance in an official promo clip and it's being showcased together with its more practical companion, the Octavia RS Combi. To be honest, I'm beginning to get used to the odd headlight arrangement, but I'll reserve my final judgment until I will have the chance to see the car up close.
Besides the split headlamps, the Octavia RS has also gained a redesigned hood and a slightly modified front bumper, while at the back the taillights have gone through a very nice nip and tuck. The interior cabin has been essentially carried over from the pre-facelift model, with the exception of new infotainment systems available with 8.0- and 9.2-inch capacitive screens and with touch buttons on the left side.
Underneath the reworked hood resides the same 2.0 TSI engine, but now it has 230 horsepower as standard instead of the previous 220 hp. The 2.0 TDI soldiers on with 184 hp and you can have this diesel version with either a standard front-wheel-drive arrangement or with optional AWD. Sadly, the gasoline-powered model is FWD-only. If you care more about torque rather than horsepower, go for the diesel as it has 380 Nm whereas the TSI has 30 Nm less.
Rather unusual for only a facelift, there is one important mechanical change as the RS has gained a 30-mm wider rear track. As a matter of fact, all Octavia facelift models now come with wider rear tracks that have increased by 20 to 30 mm, depending on version.
Later this year, Skoda is expected to introduce a hotter variant of the gasoline-powered RS and it is believed the 2.0 TSI will be dialed to 245 horsepower as seen in the Golf GTI Performance facelift. Meanwhile, the regular RS models are slated to go on sale in the following months.
