You may be shaking your head at TFL buying a Tesla Cybertruck in the first place, let alone trading it for this…but hear us out.
After several months and more than 10,000 miles clocked up, our team filmed a host of different tests with the Tesla Cybertruck, and it’s time to move that on for the next addition to the fleet. Months of planning brought about our latest purchase, and apparently inspired Roman to rock his ’70s wardrobe for the big reveal. If the silhouette above and the decade we’re referencing here is any indication, we juts bought a car that is about as big a throwback as we’ve ever seen: the new 2025 Volkswagen ID.Buzz!
Specifically, working with the folks at Garnet Volkswagen of Reading in Pennsylvania, we ordered an ID.Buzz First Edition with 4Motion — a top-spec dual-motor trim — for right around $72,000 including dealer preparation fees. The MSRP for the full ID.Buzz lineup starts off at $61,545 for the Pro S, including VW’s $1,550 destination charge, and runs up to $71,545 MSRP for this specific model.
The 2025 Volkswagen ID.Buzz finally hitting our shores is the culmination of nearly eight long years since the concept initially made its debut at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit way back in 2017. It’s a three-row electric take on the old-school Type 2 Microbus/Transporter/Kombi from the late 1960s. Overall, as you’d probably expect, the modern “bus” is significantly larger than its ancient forebear, measuring out to 195.4 inches in length and 78.1 inches in width. However, it’s actually a bit shorter than the old Microbus (by 0.2 inches), at 76.2 inches. The ID.Buzz also has a far longer wheelbase of 131.1 inches, that measures out a full three feet longer than the original Type 2. In the modern context, VW’s funky van is about 10 inches shorter and a bit narrower (but also taller) than a Honda Odyssey. Not that Honda, or any of the conventional minivan competition, has anything on this in terms of cool factor.
Like Volkswagen’s other EVs, the ID.Buzz does share the MEB platform with the ID.4 and Audi Q4 e-tron. It’s fully electric, of course, so you’re not going to be able to relive the days of the old rear-engined Transporters. That said, you can get a single-motor model with a rear-mounted electric drive unit, putting out 282 horsepower. Going for this 4Motion all-wheel drive model adds in another motor, bringing the total horsepower up to 335. With an 86.0-kWh battery onboard, expected EPA range sits between 231 miles for the 4Motion and 234 miles for the RWD version, so you aren’t losing much by getting an extra motor. That said, the estimated range still isn’t great against most of the competition…and we’re road-tripping the car back from Pennsylvania to Colorado to see how it actually does in the high-speed cruise.
Looking inside the new ID.Buzz
Both inside and out, VW baked in plenty of cool-looking touches while also making it a remarkably practical people hauler (it does mimic the loaf-like Microbus, after all). All ID.Buzz vans come decently well-equipped for the $61,545 base price, including features like the 20-inch “disc” alloy wheels, 12-way power sets and a 12.9-inch center infotainment display. You also get Volkswagen’s IQ.Drive driver assistance suite, as well as wireless Android Auto and Apple CarPlay and power operated sliding doors and tailgate.
Beyond the base model, Volkswagen breaks out the different ID.Buzz trims in the same vein as the ID.4. There’s the base Pro S, then there’s the Pro S Plus and the launch-only First Edition, which will go away after the 2025 model year.
All that said, one little detail I’ve enjoyed since the ID.4’s launch is the “play” and “pause” icons on the pedals. That is a nice touch. What isn’t a nice touch, though, are the frustrating inclusion of VW’s capactive touch controls. They still grate on your nerves even with the automaker’s refinements over the past few years, to the point that the company actually went back to standard buttons on the steering wheel for other revamped models like the new Golf GTI, Tiguan and Taos. Clearly, that didn’t filter down to the ID.Buzz before it finally arrived in the U.S.
Even at first glance, the 2025 Volkswagen ID.Buzz is as cool a halo model as you can get among the current crop of EVs. It’s not exactly a revolution in electric cars on a technical level, since it brings all the technology we already expect from vehicles like, say, the ID.4, rather than pushing the envelope like the polarizing Cybertruck.
We’ll have deeper impressions of the ownership experience once we complete the road trip back to Colorado, and film plenty more videos with VW’s funky new van besides the initial drive home. Stay tuned for all that, and check out more on the ID.Buzz we bought below:
