Volkswagen rules out Jetta 4Motion, Jetta R

The company doesn't believe there's a market for either variant.

Volkswagen turned the performance dial up when it developed the 2019 Jetta GLI; the idea was to create a GTI with a trunk. The company has confirmed it won't keep the momentum going by releasing a Golf R with a trunk.

The Jetta now rides on the same modular MQB platform as the Golf, so it could easily receive the R's 300-horsepower turbo four, its 4Motion all-wheel drive system, plus the suspension hardware that makes it go as well as it does. Technically, a Jetta R is possible. Everything fits. It wouldn't make sense from a business standpoint, though. The Golf pulls it off but it's the exception, not the rule.

"Golf R customers aren't typical Volkswagen customers. The Golf R customer is much wealthier. They can buy an Audi but choose to drive a Golf R," Serban Boldea, Volkswagen's director of product marketing, told Carbuzz.

He even ruled out adding 4Motion to the standard Jetta. "I don't think there would be enough of a market for it," Boldea told CarBuzz. An all-wheel drive Jetta would compete against the Subaru Impreza, which comes standard with the technology, and the latest Mazda3, which offers it at an extra cost. The rest of the Jetta's competitors are all front-wheel drive.