BMW Confirms Next-Gen M3 Touring on Neue Klasse: Wrong Car for India
BMW M has confirmed a second-generation M3 Touring built on the Neue Klasse platform, with both a twin-turbo straight-six combustion variant and a fully electric quad-motor version planned. Sylvia Neubauer, BMW M's head of customer, brand and sales, told Autocar UK that strong US and China demand drove the decision.
What was announced
BMW M will build a second-generation M3 Touring on the Neue Klasse platform, the same architecture underpinning the next-gen M3 sedan. Sylvia Neubauer, head of customer, brand and sales for BMW M, confirmed the decision to Autocar UK, citing sustained sales of the outgoing G81 M3 Touring. Demand, she said, is concentrated in the United States and China.
BMW M is keeping the straight-six alive under Neue Klasse, with a quad-motor EV alongside, not in place of it.
The first-generation M3 Touring, launched in June 2022, was BMW M's first-ever production estate. The next generation will be offered in two distinct flavours: a combustion version expected to retain a twin-turbo straight-six, and a fully electric variant likely to use an 800V architecture with a quad-motor setup. That mirrors BMW M's broader Neue Klasse roadmap, which keeps internal-combustion M cars alive alongside high-performance EVs rather than forcing a single powertrain path.
Neubauer was candid about the US logic. BMW does not sell the standard 3 Series Touring there, calling it "a market for SUVs and very big cars." Dealers, however, welcome the M3 Touring because it sells itself to enthusiast buyers without discounting, unlike the regular estate. China's appetite for performance wagons, particularly among younger buyers willing to pay premiums for niche bodystyles, rounds out the business case. There is no indication BMW India will import the car; the previous M3 Touring was not offered locally, and Neue Klasse priority for India is centred on the iX3 long-wheelbase and Neue Klasse SUVs rather than low-volume estates.
The Car Jury verdict
The Touring is a Europe-flavoured oddity that found unlikely fans in the SUV-heavy US market, and BMW India will almost certainly skip it again. The brand's local energy is going into the Neue Klasse SUVs: Rachit Hirani of MotorOctane points out that "the iX1 has been a huge success for them and the same story can happen with the iX3," and that long-wheelbase electric SUV is what Indian showrooms actually need.
For Indian buyers chasing a fast BMW with luggage space, the answer remains an X3 M40i or, at the top, an X5. The M3 Touring news matters mainly as confirmation that BMW M is not abandoning combustion under Neue Klasse: the straight-six lives, alongside an 800V quad-motor EV. That dual-track strategy is the real takeaway for enthusiasts here.
