The latest iterations Mercedes-Benz S-Class and Audi A8 are still pretty, in a business-y way, but their upcoming rival from BMW, namely the 7 Series, isn’t. That’s because the Munich auto firm’s designers went berserk on the styling, especially up front.
As a result, the company’s flagship sedan has been compared to an old Dodge Ram truck and even to a Hyundai Kona. It has split headlamps, scooped prototypes have revealed, with the upper clusters acting as the daytime running lights and the lower units being tasked with illuminating the road ahead.
These flank the even bigger kidneys, and a more controversial-looking bumper, which incorporates a wide lower grille, with big flaps on each side, replicated to an extent in the rendering made by SKR Designs. The digital illustration portrays the car with flush-mounted door handles, though these won’t be part of the makeover, spy shots have indicated.
Other changes include the redesigned back end, with slimmer taillights that might be joined by a light bar and/or chrome strip. The rear license plate holder now sits on the bumper instead of the trunk lid, with reflectors on each side that do not appear to be the production parts on the testers, at first glance at least.
For the brand new 7er, BMW is said to have used a new construction, which is highly versatile. The architecture is understood to underpin their entire future vehicle lineup, and to no one’s surprise, it supports electrified powertrains as well, in addition to the usual internal combustion engines. The latter could comprise inline-six and V8 units in the 2023 7 Series, likely joined by plug-in hybrids. A battery-electric assembly will be offered as well, albeit that variant will be christened the i7, taking on the likes of the Tesla Model S, and Mercedes-Benz EQS.
After a series of unfortunate events put an end to Cristian's dream of entering a custom built & tuned old-school Dacia into a rally competition, he moved on to drive press cars and write for a living. He's worked for several automotive online journals and now he's back at autoevolution after his first tour in the mid-2000s. Full profile
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