The Volkswagen Passat W8 was a weird car when it was first introduced, and it’s even weirder now that most of the W8 Passats have either grenaded themselves or became too expensive to maintain and ended up getting lost. This one, however, is an impossibly well-kept and low-mileage example of one of Volkswagen’s most peculiar decisions, and it’s currently listed for sale with no reserve on Bring A Trailer.
Volkswagen’s mid-size Passat sedan was meant to compete with America’s favorite family cars like the Toyota Camry and Honda Accord, but it wasn’t enough for the evil mastermind behind Volkswagen’s most absurd vehicles, Ferdinand Piëch, the grandson of Ferdinand Porsche. Piëch believed VW needed to move upmarket, and he was the orchestrator of other unprecedented Volkswagens like the S-Class competitor Phaeton and the fancy and excessive Touareg SUV. The W8 Passat was brought along to offer buyers a step below the Phaeton executive sedan, but time hasn’t been kind to the W8 motor.
The Passat was the only car ever produced with this wacky W-shaped eight-cylinder engine, and it was the first of the VW Group’s W-shaped line of engines that eventually grew to include a W12 and a W16. The W8 was a bit of a Dr. Frankenstein project, formed by taking two of Volkswagen’s revered narrow-angle VR6 engines, lopping two cylinders off each one, and melding the two halves together.
It was offered from 2001 to 2004, with standard all-wheel drive and either a 5-speed automatic transmission or a 6-speed manual transmission like this example. The 4.0-liter W8 engine produced 270 horsepower and 273 pound-feet of torque, which wasn’t particularly remarkable and didn’t result in especially strong performance numbers. The W8 was well regarded for its silky smooth operation and rev-happy demeanor, but it cost an absurd amount of money, around $40,000 when new in the early 2000s. Accounting for inflation, that’s about $68,000 in 2024 for a Passat.
So even when new, the W8 Passat was an expensive, rare and unique car with a one-of-a-kind engine. Fast forward 20 years, and the thought of maintaining an eight-cylinder German car with such a bespoke motor has my wallet trembling. This particular car, though, is an exceptionally well-kept, low-mile example, so maybe it’s the only W8 Passat worth buying? Check it out on Bring A Trailer.
