The future of automobiles is here! And it’s terrible! Volkswagen recently unveiled the ID.3 Pro and Pro S vehicles, which on the surface appear to be fairly normal EV hatchbacks. If one rolled down the street, you wouldn’t look at it twice.
But there’s a truly depressing twist hidden under the hood. In its default settings, the car is capable of a maximum of 201bhp (brake horsepower). However, if you choose to pay for the $20 a month (or a lump sum of $760) subscription service, you get the “privilege” of unlocking the car’s full power of 228bhp.
Volkswagen has released a vehicle that gates its full horsepower behind a paid subscription
— Dexerto (@Dexerto) August 17, 2025
Users have to pay a monthly fee of around $20 to drive the car at top speed pic.twitter.com/TMCh3748pb
Just to underline, no physical change to the car takes place, the onboard software is simply letting you drive the car at full speed. The car you paid for. That you own.
Do they think we’re morons?
Anyone with a functional brain should be able to figure out this is some executive’s genius idea to squeeze yet more money out of their customers. However, Volkswagen’s PR department has gone into overdrive to explain that, actually, this is a great thing for their customers and we should be overjoyed that the company has come up with this wonderful plan.
As Volkswagen explained to Autoexpress UK:
“Offering more power to customers is nothing new – historically many petrol and diesel vehicles have been offered with engines of the same size, but with the possibility of choosing one with more potency. These traditionally are higher up in the product range, with more specification and a higher list price.
If customers wish to have an even sportier driving experience, they now have an option to do so, within the life of the vehicle, rather than committing from the outset with a higher initial purchase price. The car is presented on the configurator with [201bhp], with the option made very clear to customers
Objection! Now hold up here, Volkswagen, the customer who wishes to have “an even sportier driving experience” just bought an automobile that literally offers that experience, but you’re artificially preventing them from accessing it! And, even though this option is going to be made “very clear” to customers, we don’t envy the salesman having to explain to a potential buyer that they’ll have to open their wallet once more to get the most out of their vehicle.
To be fair, car companies locking built-in features behind a subscription isn’t entirely new. For example, BMW attempted to push a subscription for heated seats and access to Apple CarPlay/Android Auto, but widespread consumer backlash forced a reversal.
Even so, limiting a car’s top speed for extraordinarily flimsy reasons and trying to play this off as some kind of benefit to the customer is going above and beyond when it comes to diabolical corporate evil. Huh, I wonder what the origins of this particular car company are anyway. *Checks Wikipedia*. Oh yeah, that tracks.
