Golf R Was The Only Volkswagen To See A Q2 Sales Increase, Even Though There's No More Manual

There weren't a lot of smiles over at Volkswagen of America this quarter, as the company suffered declines across its entire lineup in Q2 — save for the Golf R. In its earnings report, VW quietly admits that sales are down a steep 29% year over year, plunging from 100,612 vehicles sold in the second quarter of 2024 to 71,395 in the one just past.

If you squint really hard and only look at the Golf R, things look much better, as its sales rose 12.1%. Squint a little less, and you realize that's only about a hundred more cars in all. This is all despite the Golf R losing its manual gearbox for the 2025 facelift, which is a shame, though in the hot hatch's defense, it's still a pretty great little car. That said, so is the Golf GTI, which fell 29.1% in sales. Oof.

The ID Buzz, the all-electric rebirth of the classic old VW bus, wasn't on sale a year ago, but it did manage to shift 564 cars in Q2. That's not a lot. Still, it's certainly more than 2, which was all the discontinued Arteon sedan managed as it fades from existence. If you bought an Arteon in the last three months, you were literally half of all American sales. Well done.

It's generally all bad news, though the first of the worst was the Atlas SUV, only declining by 5.8%, followed by its cousin the Atlas Cross Sport, which went down by 18.3%. The electric ID 4 fell a whopping 65%.

Volkswagen

As opposed to the likes of Mercedes and BMW, Volkswagen sits towards the lower end of the market, making affordable cars at a good value. But as everything gets more expensive and tariffs loom overhead, buyers really seem to be flocking to the cheapest offerings. Korean carmakers Kia and Hyundai each just had their best first halves of a year ever. VW might be getting pinched by their success.

But Volkswagen is spinning up a new business model with its ID Buzz AD, a Level 4 autonomous version of the electric bus that's starting to go out to big-fleet customers now. It'll be in Germany later this year and in the U.S. in 2026. If driverless really is the future, VW is at least in the mix for it. Hopefully sunnier days for the People's Car are ahead.