Spyshots: BMW i8 Interior Revealed

Instead of the funky design seen on the i8 coupe and Spyder concept cars, the production car’s layout seems to be very conventional. To our eyes, most of the buttons on the radio are from the new 3-Series, and the air vents are from the Z4. There is nothing particularly interesting in the materials used either, just a bunch of plastics that you’d see on every car BMW makes. This is a bit strange, as we expected that they were going after luxury car buyers.

Still, the center console is angled towards the drive and very sloped, while the analog four-gauge cluster is sporty.

The i8 is expected to use a plug-in hybrid powertrain combining a 1.5-liter three-cylinder engine at the front producing 220 PS and 300Nm (221 lb-ft) with a single electric motor at the front pushing the combined output to about 350 PS. However, some reports suggested the car makes nearer to 400 horsepower and offers sprint times comparable to the outgoing M3.

But the main selling point of the car will be its advanced electronics and the way it sips fuel through a pipette. The i8 will be able to run in pure electric mode (FWD), pure petrol mode (RWD) and using both (AWD). It’s expected to achieve 3.0 lt/100km on the combined European cycle, equivalent to 78 mpg US.