► The Alfa mob has spoken – and it doesn’t care about EVs
► Alfa Romeo’s current V6 flagships will live on until 2027…
► … and both will be offered with Akrapovic exhausts
Hurrah! Alfa Romeo is bringing back the Giulia and Stelvio Quadrifoglio, extending their life another year or so as the brand wrestles with its electric (or, we suppose, not electric) future some more. The brand is listening to those crying out for engines in their Alfas – preferably V6 ones with 500bhp.
To get those buyers back on side, Alfa has confirmed it’ll relaunch the Giulia and Stelvio Quadrifolglios in March. The brand had already made plans to discontinue both to meet its electrification targets, but now both will remain on sale until 2027. As you can imagine, the announcement was met with rapturous applause in the CAR office.
If we’re honest, though, this news didn’t come as a huge surprise. Alfa Romeo is governed by some of the biggest petrolheads in the business – and they aren’t shy about their opinions on electrification. For example, at the Junior Ibrida’s international launch event, Cristiano Fiorio, the man in charge of Alfa’s communications department, told us:
‘Personally, I do not see a Quadrifoglio EV. I see a Quadrifoglio which has the sound of a real engine. As of now. Maybe in five years things will change. But as of now, the Quadrifoglio to me – to us – should be something with a roar.’
Even Alfa’s boss, Santo Ficili, recognises the importance of his performance petrol cars – and the dwindling importance of EVs. At the 2026 Brussels Motor Show, he told CAR:
‘We are going to sell Giulia and Stelvio until the end of 2027. We are receiving strong requests from the [dealer] network asking to reopen Quadrifoglio, so we invested the money in it, respecting regulation and homologation.
‘[Previously], we were only going BEV. But now we are changing everything because we are again running for ICE, PHEV, MHEV and HEV… so we need time in this sense. We are imagining the future of Alfa Romeo.’
The trouble is, Alfa’s passionate engineers are constantly having their enthusiasm extinguished by nervous accountants with one eye on the EU’s emissions fines. It’s heartening to watch the engineers (and customers) finally get their own way – we just hope the momentum can last into the next generation versions of the Giulia and Stelvio.
Still, though, it’s nice to see two cars we enjoy very much get a stay of execution for a little while longer.
Luke is the Deputy Editor of our sister site Parkers, but he spends plenty of time writing news, reviews and features for CAR. He's been a motoring journalist since 2018, learning his craft on the Auto Express news desk before joining the Parkers/CAR team in 2022. When he isn't yoked to his laptop, he's tearing his hair out over his classic Mini restoration project or pinballing around the country attending heavy metal gigs.
By Luke Wilkinson
Deputy Editor of Parkers. Unhealthy obsession with classic Minis and old Alfas. Impenetrable Cumbrian accent
