Audi Has (Finally) Replaced the TT Roadster With an All-Electric Sports Car

The Audi TT was one of the most beloved cars of the 1990s and 2000s—or any decade, a paragon of simplicity and form matching function. Its death in 2023 amid declining sales felt unjust, but now it’s slated for a comeback.

Audi debuted the Concept C on Tuesday without naming the TT, instead describing the Concept C as an “all-electric two-seat sports car.” But to anyone with eyes, the Concept C is what the TT should’ve become all along: It is the “TT reborn,” as Autocar said, and not a moment too soon.

At the launch event in Milan, the marque insisted that the Concept C is not a new TT. Nor is the just-unveiled sports car a new R8, which was discontinued last year. The Concept C is both; in fact, according to Audi, it’s part of an entirely different class.

“The Concept C is not a successor of the TT. It’s a different segment to the TT—it’s somewhere exactly in the middle between TT and R8,” Gernot Döllner, CEO of Audi, told Autocar. “We will come up with a name once the car hits the road as a serious product.”

Regardless, Audi seems to indicate with the Concept C that it is turning the page on both the TT and R8. The car maker did not release power numbers other than to say the new auto is all-electric, though it is expected to be quick. The production version of the Concept C is expected to closely match the concept, too, and will launch in 2027, Audi said.

“The Audi Concept C marks the beginning of a new design philosophy and thus a defining moment for the four rings,” Audi said in a statement. “It previews a future production model and will shape further models beyond that.”

The production version of the Concept C also will be electric only, with no internal combustion engine option.

“We believe the electric drivetrain is a perfect fit,” Döllner told Autocar. “It’s not a car for the race track—it’s a car for country roads, for performance driving.”

That, of course, sounds like the TT, and not so much the R8. And it is the TT that remains a touchstone for Audi, including for Massimo Fascella, the brand’s head of design, who was responsible for the Concept C.

“In 1998, when the first Audi TT arrived at a dealership in Turin, I took a day off work to just look at the car in peace,” Frascella told Autocar. “I was there for hours, looking at the car from every angle, touching every surface.”