You just keep telling yourself that, if it makes you think Audis are better cars.

For what I desire, the Audi is a far better car in almost every way than a Skoda. If people wanted to buy the best, they would not be on here raving about the handling and performance of Fabias and Octys. Sadly not many of us can afford Ferrari's and McLarens etc and live in the real world with a wealth of choices. Fwiw, I hope to be able to afford to go back to BMW next time I change (funds permitting) but I am sure that won't be good enough as a car for several peeps on here

Oh yeah... forgot about the 2.0 Petrol model.

You see that's because as an Audi driver you are obviously not a petrol/derv head/ Sorry to break this to you

I am always amazed that peeps on here like to bash VW and Audi. If those two didn't push forward with many new options and do-dads, then there would be much less nice 'stuff' to filter across to Skoda. People should be careful what they wish for, because if they get their way, VAG will keep Audis and VWs as overpriced cars with lots of nice toys and remove anything but basic kit and engines from Skoda..

I actually think most Audis look quite bland & dull, a very long term fault of the brand (the goatee beard look of the front is a styling no-no too), and the A4 is no BMW challenger, never has been, and sadly never will be. Same goes for the A6..It aint no 5 series rival. They need a rear wheel drive option to compete on equal terms.

And all the Q series make me want to vomit due to their vulgarness.

It also seems the A1 is dying on its backside, as I have yet to actually see one on the road.

All VAG group cars have one major fault. They have the designed by a committee of accountants look about them. If I wanted a mid range exec, I would actually go with something with style & flair, which means only one country, and one brand...Yup Alfa Romeo. I know they depreciate faster than a Steinway falling towards a Marina, and are a bit fragile, but styling wise, engine note & feel...Ze Geormanz need to learn a trick or two, or buy Pininfarina!

Edited 18 March, 201115 yr by FellyMagic

I actually think most Audis look quite bland & dull, a very long term fault of the brand (the goatee beard look of the front is a styling no-no too), and the A4 is no BMW challenger, never has been, and sadly never will be. Same goes for the A6..It aint no 5 series rival. They need a rear wheel drive option to compete on equal terms.

And all the Q series make me want to vomit due to their vulgarness.

It also seems the A1 is dying on its backside, as I have yet to actually see one on the road.

All VAG group cars have one major fault. They have the designed by a committee of accountants look about them. If I wanted a mid range exec, I would actually go with something with style & flair, which means only one country, and one brand...Yup Alfa Romeo. I know they depreciate faster than a falling Steinway towards a Marina, and are a bit fragile, but styling wise, engine note & feel...Ze Geormanz need to learn a trick or two, or buy Pininfarina!

Ah a Fiat Romeo, great choice :D Engine note (4 pot!) and feel!!! Well if understeer is your thing, you might as well hang onto your Skoda.

As for the Quattro giving equal terms? I wrote an account of how I recently dropped a 330D M Sport whilst driving in a spirited manner cross-country , so perhaps unequal would be fairer.

Q series is probably the best looking 4x on the market, at least only the entire motoring press seems to think so. And please don't just say well they are all pigs ears no matter what, it is rather childish just to rubbish something just for a spot of trolling. I could just as easily say that most Skodas are pug ugly and have been designed by people who had been simultaneously hit with the ugly stick, whilst crashing face first into every branch as they fell out of the tree of ugliness and who's only consolation in their sad and deprived lives, is to heap misery on people who don't drive Audis and VWs by designing bricks.

I have never read or seen an article that said the A4 wasn't a handsome car, although there may be one out there, it is a tiny minority if it exists. Personally I think the family look hasn't made the A6 a stunner as it looks very similar to eh A4 and so in a similar way to all DB9 derivatives are good looking, they aren't always fresh.

Audi is a different brand to Skoda. It's like comparing Lotus and Porsche, they both makes cars albeit very different ones at different price ranges.

I wouldn't want to buy a £20k Audi as I'd be much happier in an Octavia vRS for example. Nor the flip side is it even possible to spend £80k on a Superb but if you could obviously you'd buy an A8 instead although not enough change to buy the W12....

I'd argue from the outset that I don't automatically think Audis look better than Skodas. I think the Octavia looks better than the A4, the Fabia looks better than the A1 by quite some way (although I think the Polo looks better than both), the Yeti looks better than a Q5, and I'd have a Superb over an A6 anyday...though I'd have a Passat CC or especially a Phaeton over both of them

I now see Audi as a poor relation to Skoda and VW (though for how long remains to be seen, with the talk of Skoda's quality being reduced by VAG). The only thing that sets them apart for me is the increased interior quality in the Audi, but I don't think it's worth the increase in price. I see Seat as a poor relation to all of them though, they haven't got their game sorted at all, with the exception of the Bocanegra (posh Fabia vRS) and the Exeo (old A4...)

Let the flaming commence, I don't care :p

That said, I want an RS6, very very badly...

Audi is a different brand to Skoda. It's like comparing Lotus and Porsche, they both makes cars albeit very different ones at different price ranges.

I wouldn't want to buy a £20k Audi as I'd be much happier in an Octavia vRS for example. Nor the flip side is it even possible to spend £80k on a Superb but if you could obviously you'd buy an A8 instead although not enough change to buy the W12....

As the thread was origionally about looks, I am honestly amazed if many people think Skodas look better than Audis. Skodas are great cars in general, but they are aimed at a slightly different market. I think most people would agree that Stilettos and sling backs etc look better than wellies. but there are many times I prefer wellies. I really rated my Octy, but it was in no way as attractive to look at or sit in as my A4. Having said that I have obviously paid quite a premium for the privilege and that is hard to justify on a cost alone basis.

I'd argue from the outset that I don't automatically think Audis look better than Skodas. I think the Octavia looks better than the A4, the Fabia looks better than the A1 by quite some way (although I think the Polo looks better than both), the Yeti looks better than a Q5, and I'd have a Superb over an A6 anyday...though I'd have a Passat CC or especially a Phaeton over both of them

I now see Audi as a poor relation to Skoda and VW (though for how long remains to be seen, with the talk of Skoda's quality being reduced by VAG). The only thing that sets them apart for me is the increased interior quality in the Audi, but I don't think it's worth the increase in price. I see Seat as a poor relation to all of them though, they haven't got their game sorted at all, with the exception of the Bocanegra (posh Fabia vRS) and the Exeo (old A4...)

Let the flaming commence, I don't care :p

That said, I want an RS6, very very badly...

Skodas only look nice when they are made of cake

Personally, I don't like the looks of the Audis - too bland in standard form. The RS's and A8's however. . .

I don't think Skoda make a single nice looking car at all atm apart from the Suberb estate. All current VW's are ugly IMO, esp the Golf, Polo and Rocco. I think most SEATs look better than all other VAG models even in standard/non sporty trim.

If looks were all I cared for in a car, I doubt I'd be buying anything VAG at all except for the Audi RS's or an A8.

Skodas only taste nice when they are made of cake

Edited

Amanda I find it very narrow minded of you, when you are not allowing me to have my own opinions about a car brand I find boring. I have driven 2 generations of the A6, and talk about yawnfest.(both were mid range diesels belonging to my uncle, who bought both at 3 years old for next to nothing) For something to go up & down an Autobahn all day, they are ok, but as drivers cars, give me a BMW 5 series any day. All the magazines say exactly that too, unless it is Autocar & Audi have spent a fortune that month on advertising and BMW haven't.

Even you have admitted if funds allow, you are going to BMW next time. That actually says a lot Amanda, that you aren't overly impressed with your car. If you were, you would be getting another.

Q series a looker? Not in my book. The back end to me looks like a squashed frog's arse. It is a car range vulgar beyond belief. Sadly in that market of luxury soft roaders, vulgarness seems to sell. I've always preferred Range Rovers, but now they have become crass & vulgar too.

I just said exactly what I think about Audi's and you flew off the handle and accuse me of trolling. That is severely out of order, and I think you should calm down.

Even Audi's range names makes them sound like the choice of photocopier salesmen from Slough, naming them after paper sizes. There is no passion, and no soul put into VAG cars as a whole any more. The new Polo is taking blandness to a new level. The dark interiors VAG use make them look stark & clinical too, and sadly many manufacturers have followed this, namely Ford & Vauxhall.

And Skoda's Octy has now got that minicab tag, thanks to thousands of them being used as taxis in every town & city in the UK, just like the E class Merc has the nickname of Stuttgart taxi. The chrome conk on the Octy seems to be getting bigger & sillier too. Just no need for it.

Skoda's have their own individual character for now, but sadly as the years progress, they are starting to look just like another bland Euroclone. The new Jetta, looks very Skoda like, just with a VW nose, which under the skin it just about is an Octavia with a boot instead of a hatch. The Superb with the numberplate in the bumper..Very VW Passat, and not practical if you have a towbar.

And you will find Amanda, that many a true car enthusiast actually love Alfas (especially car journalists), and the Alfa V6 engine is an absolute gem. The looks, and sounds of it...It just makes you want to give it the beans on a good A road.

You might like Audi's, but personally, and that is the whole point here, I don't, and I know I am not the only one here who feels this. Let us have our own opinions, & not shout us down because you don't agree.

I actually hated the interior of my old Mk1 Fabia, because that grainy dash top gave horrendous night time reflections on the screen, and I used to do many thousands of miles a year driving in the early hours/late at night. Also the dull blacks & greys...At least the seat fabric was jazzed up, to try & liven up the dull interior.

In my humble opinion, the best car ever to come from any VAG group was the original mk1 Golf GTI. It was a car that launched an entirely new breed of hot small cars.

I also saw two of those new Peugeot coupe's today & thought they look way better than the bland looking TT too. I know the Pug will be an unreliable heap, but at least it actually looks good.

I think they both look 5h*t. Not a patch on BMW design......

Edited 18 March, 201115 yr by Royston

I think they both look 5h*t. Not a patch on BMW design......

Amanda I find it very narrow minded of you, when you are not allowing me to have my own opinions about a car brand I find boring. I have driven 2 generations of the A6, and talk about yawnfest.(both were mid range diesels belonging to my uncle, who bought both at 3 years old for next to nothing) For something to go up & down an Autobahn all day, they are ok, but as drivers cars, give me a BMW 5 series any day. All the magazines say exactly that too, unless it is Autocar & Audi have spent a fortune that month on advertising and BMW haven't.

Even you have admitted if funds allow, you are going to BMW next time. That actually says a lot Amanda, that you aren't overly impressed with your car. If you were, you would be getting another.

Q series a looker? Not in my book. The back end to me looks like a squashed frog's arse. It is a car range vulgar beyond belief. Sadly in that market of luxury soft roaders, vulgarness seems to sell. I've always preferred Range Rovers, but now they have become crass & vulgar too.

I just said exactly what I think about Audi's and you flew off the handle and accuse me of trolling. That is severely out of order, and I think you should calm down.

Even Audi's range names makes them sound like the choice of photocopier salesmen from Slough, naming them after paper sizes. There is no passion, and no soul put into VAG cars as a whole any more. The new Polo is taking blandness to a new level. The dark interiors VAG use make them look stark & clinical too, and sadly many manufacturers have followed this, namely Ford & Vauxhall.

And Skoda's Octy has now got that minicab tag, thanks to thousands of them being used as taxis in every town & city in the UK, just like the E class Merc has the nickname of Stuttgart taxi. The chrome conk on the Octy seems to be getting bigger & sillier too. Just no need for it.

Skoda's have their own individual character for now, but sadly as the years progress, they are starting to look just like another bland Euroclone. The new Jetta, looks very Skoda like, just with a VW nose, which under the skin it just about is an Octavia with a boot instead of a hatch. The Superb with the numberplate in the bumper..Very VW Passat, and not practical if you have a towbar.

And you will find Amanda, that many a true car enthusiast actually love Alfas (especially car journalists), and the Alfa V6 engine is an absolute gem. The looks, and sounds of it...It just makes you want to give it the beans on a good A road.

You might like Audi's, but personally, and that is the whole point here, I don't, and I know I am not the only one here who feels this. Let us have our own opinions, & not shout us down because you don't agree.

I actually hated the interior of my old Mk1 Fabia, because that grainy dash top gave horrendous night time reflections on the screen, and I used to do many thousands of miles a year driving in the early hours/late at night. Also the dull blacks & greys...At least the seat fabric was jazzed up, to try & liven up the dull interior.

In my humble opinion, the best car ever to come from any VAG group was the original mk1 Golf GTI. It was a car that launched an entirely new breed of hot small cars.

I also saw two of those new Peugeot coupe's today & thought they look way better than the bland looking TT too. I know the Pug will be an unreliable heap, but at least it actually looks good.

I can't stop you having your opinion. I disagree with it especially when you use overpriced Fiats as an example of a better car.

I am a car enthusiast and so are many of my colleagues. Very few of them would ever buy an Alfa, or certainly wouldn't buy one again. And the current V6 is far too much a GM engine for any true Italian surely

I would like to go back to BMW as the next series of 330D will have been out for a couple of years and so should not only be current, but should have decent discounts by then. The A4 will probably be due for a face lift only, so I would get a faster and more economical car as well as hopefully an X Drive version. I say if I can afford it as the BMW will cost probably a little more than my A4 and that is quite a lot of money, at least for me. For the record I love my A4. You should try one with the full ADS and Torque Vectoring rear diff. I believe the term power oversteer relates to what happened to me last year....... in the dry.

Edited 19 March, 201115 yr by Lady Elanore

I think they both look 5h*t. Not a patch on BMW design......

+1 BMW M3 rules the affordable sports car world.

I couldn't buy an rs4 etc, knowing I could have had an m3.

Skoda's are pretty ugly but I would still rather be seen in my skoda than an Audi!

People always comment on my car, saying "good car these."

People just ignore my mates Audi a4 s-line and it kills him.

Edited 18 March, 201115 yr by Fabla

I think they both look 5h*t. Not a patch on BMW design......

It's funny how the proper Bangle cars still look fresh and the softening look of BMWs now looks a liitle unadventurous :(

LE getting her facts wrong again. I said BETTER STYLED! And yes they sound massively nicer than the boring over-silenced German drone. Honestly!

Audi's share too many oily bits and interior parts as VW's,(and Skodas for that matter) and even VW don't think Audi has the cache to go upmarket, that is why the Phaeton is purely a VW, which in turn shares its oily bits with the Bentleys. The Phaeton even gets its own uber posh factory where buyers even get tours round.

Audi's aren't posh anymore, and do not deserve the over inflated price tags.

Got to say that I've had a 58 plate Audi A4 se Avant and now I've got a 59 Octy vRs estate, so im probably in a good position to offer an opinion.

Audi- dull drive,

no poke,

flat seats,

handbrake button(just wrong!!)

Push in key(again wrong)

Holding in clutch and pressing brake and pushing key,pain in arse!!

Hence got rid after six months.

I do like the look of s line but memory's like above put me off.

Skoda.

None of the above problems.

Plus-

Nicer to look at in my opinion

Faster

Better seats( lots more supportive)

People comment on it's looks and say " skodas come a long way etc" all the time(never got one comment about Audi!!)

Before people say I can't compare an se model to a vRS, your probably right.... The vRS is cheaper!!!

By the way I'm looking at a Seat Exeo sport tech next which is effectively a rebadged A4!!

As Americans say.... Go figure!

Edited 19 March, 201115 yr by taff170

Just so happens the majority find Audis attractive compared to Skodas.

But it's pretty easy for the manufacturers to know which of two designs will be perceived as the most attractive, so with that in mind, which one are they going to use for the premium car and which for the value brand?

yep Skoda's do not look as good as an audi................but I'd rather keep the extra £10k for similar spec and have a slightly ugly car.

I am a car enthusiast and so are many of my colleagues.

The way I see it is that few true enthusiasts own modern day Audis or BMWs. I don't call myself an enthusiast, even though I live and breathe cars. An enthusiast to me is someone who goes the extra mile and modifies, repairs, restores or collects cars. If someone merely drives a car to and from work, can they really call themselves an enthusiast?

Admittedly, if I had the money to buy a new Audi, I wouldn't buy a Skoda. I wouldn't buy an Audi either, unless I wanted something reliable to commute in. Audis are the unimaginative choice, bought without passion or a true love of cars. They are a bit like a DFS sofa in terms of the general public will be impressed, but a real petrol head won't be.

There are plenty of more interesting cars out there for new Audi money, but they take a bit more commitment to own them. Yes your Italian choice may leave you stranded on the M1, but at least there's some soul there. Germanic cars rarely have this, but you are pretty much guaranteed to get to your destination.

I'm not out to pick on anyone for owning a particular car. We all buy our vehicles due to various constraining factors and need to consider many variants before we buy. If I was to be so bold as to call myself an enthusiast, I wouldn't drive my vRS, it would be something more left field and most likely less reliable or expensive to run.

As for Audis looking better than Skodas, I'd say for the most part that it's true.

Rubbish. Out of the four brands at the moment, the best looking car in production is the Superb Combi!

Can we have a bit of decorum in this thread, please, with sensible arguments on either side

Failing that........

Not many of my major oily bits are shared with other VAG models. A few VWs have the engine, none of them have the transmission or Sport Diff I have. I can also honestly say that nobody ever complimented any of my other VAG cars on their appearance until I got the A4 and I never buy cars for look, otherwise I wouldn't have bought the Octy.

I think that cars such as Alfa are dressed up Fiats and represent a more cynical version of marketing than Audi does to say VW. Alfas have so many Fiat oily bits it is depressing and when they do bother with a V6, it's a GM lump It wold be an improvement if it learned to drone. Alfa have about as much soul as Jeward singing Otis Reading songs. At least Alfa are going to get some devent engines in the futre from Porche.......oh hang on, they're German.

As an enthusiast (previously I had owned such things as 2 x early Scoobys, Strada Abarth 130TC, Beta Coupe etc which all had their faults, but were never mainstream cars), I find that having a car that can not only deliver me to a long days work after driving perhaps 200+ miles is a boon and the fact it can do it whilst entertaining me if I so desire, to be an added bonus. The interior is a great place to be and is currently nicer to sit in than an equivalent Merc or BMW. The styling is universally praised in the press and the build quality is pretty good. I say pretty good, as I remember the old E class Mercs and they were made by basically taking a solid lump of metal and removing all the bits that didn't look like an E Class. What you had left was your incredibly well built E Class

As for things like poke, well the car is around 6.0 to 62 and is limited to 155, it is averaging about 42mpg since I got it, can outpace a 330D cross country in difficult conditions and has a better resale value. The starting procedure isn't exactly rocket science though. I mean doesn't everyone with a manual car start with the clutch in?? and putting your foot on the brake at the same time isn't that difficult. Perhaps men really can't multi task? The handbrake is a bit of an oddity though, somedays I love it and then every so often it does something a little annoying. But with the hill hold function it really is leave it alone and forget type of deal.

But this is away from the point of looks. The only place I know of that has so many detractors form the looks of Audis, is here on Briskoda and I imagine on the SEAT sites too etc Audis have long had a very German look, but part of their physical appeal is that strength of line and decent shut lines. I assume Skodas look less attractive because they put their money into other things other than the styling and I guess you all hope so too, as you wouldn't want to pay the extra 10K just to make it look prettier.

Edited 19 March, 201115 yr by Lady Elanore