Skoda Kodiaq 2025 News

After years of ruling out plug-in hybrid (PHEV) technology locally, Skoda Australia is gearing up to potentially roll out two PHEV models as early as the end of this year.The Czech carmaker is currently testing its new Superb PHEV locally ahead of a potential launch either in late 2025 or early 2026.Speaking to CarsGuide, Skoda Australia head of marketing and product Kieran Merrigan said local testing for this model has been underway for a month.“The Superb everyone’s asking about, the plug-in hybrid that’s available in Europe, is under evaluation ,” said Merrigan.“Maybe two things to note with that is, first thing we actually have a car here doing some local testing.“We’re about a month into that, and some really, really positive results so far. There’s probably a couple months to go.“Just to highlight … it is important for us to do local testing on our cars.“The second part is we need to evaluate and get the pricing nailed for the current market.“So those two things are happening in parallel, but we do hope to have Superb PHEV offered in market toward the end of this year or early next year," he said.In addition to the Skoda Superb PHEV, the brand is also currently evaluating the new Kodiaq PHEV as another model to launch locally.Both of these models are equipped with the Volkswagen Group’s second-generation plug-in hybrid system for vehicles built on the MQB platform.They have a 1.5-litre turbocharged petrol engine that’s capable of producing 110kW of power, as well as an 85kW electric motor integrated into the six-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission that’s fed by a 25.7kWh battery pack.Claimed range for both the Superb and Kodiaq PHEVs is over 100km.The reason why these PHEVs did launch at the same time as the turbo-petrol range is apparently down to lack of testing, according to Merrigan.“We did some overseas testing, and it’s just that our climate is different to some of the European markets,” he said.“So there was some testing done in South America or Central America, which … was the first tick, and then that gave us the ability to actually fly some cars out from … a European market and test locally.”Beyond PHEVs, Skoda has confirmed it’s currently evaluating mild-hybrid (MHEV) powertrains for a number of models and could launch them locally as soon as 2026.It’s these new powertrain technologies, along with a refreshed vehicle line-up that Skoda expects will help uplift its slump in local sales.In the first five months of 2025 a total of 1784 Skoda examples were sold in Australia, which is down 22.0 per cent year-on-year.The current best-seller is the Skoda Kodiaq (572 sales), which was recently launched in new-generation guise, followed by the Kamiq (311 sales) and Octavia (291 sales). The latter recently launched in mid-life updated guise.

Skoda’s second-generation Kodiaq mid-sized SUV is about to land in dealerships and the brand has just revealed details on the variants, standard specification and what’s new.