Weight saving and aero optimization feature in the 2025 Porsche 911 GT3

Among the changes are better aero, shorter gearing, and the return of the Touring.

See full article...

 

[SpecTP]

The article is rather lacking in detail but I guess it doesn't matter since none of us can get an allocation.

I own a 997 GT3, a manual turbo 997, plus two other 911's and as much as I enjoy them I'm kind of done with modern Porsche.
Years of being told that I'm not "loyal enough" to get an allocation but if I were to buy a few Taycans that would change things...has soured my view of the brand.

definitely 1st world problem.. I'm trying to justify a Lotus Emira as a DD to replace my 718

 

[FreeRangeOrganicSoyLatteCappuccino]

I don't think I necessarily want to know, let alone hang out with someone who can blow a full quarter-million on a car, at this point in history. Amazing engineering that should not really exist.

Fair enough. You do you. Really, probably for the best.

Pretty sure the people that can spend a quarter-million on a car aren't going to want to know or hang out with you either.

But try to take a step back ... You realize what "Ars Technica" translates to?

 

[wxid]

definitely 1st world problem.. I'm trying to justify a Lotus Emira as a DD to replace my 718

I’m still holding out hope the BEV718 actually arrives this year and isn't too compromised by the weight of the batteries...

 

[Aurich]

"People are allowed to have happiness over the next 4 years, this is off topic"

Seriously, Ars (Conde Nast)? You've read the temperature in the room. If you go down the AI summary path it's not going to end well.

Uh ... what?

This particular room is for talking about cars. Not AI summaries (what??) and not what's happening with Guantánamo Bay. Which is a thing, that is happening. But it has absolutely nothing to do with cars, this car, or anything being discussed here. So no, people can't just be mad that bad things are happening in every corner of our comments. That's trolling.

What I am asking—for you and every one else—is you read the room. Stop trying to turn every discussion into "the world is awful". People cannot live that way. It will not solve any problems. Being mad in the comments of a car discussion is noise at best, and turning people off and driving them into depression at worst.

FFS, we ran at least three different stories entirely focused on Donald Trump, or his policies, or Elon Musk, today alone. Nobody has their head in the sand. But you can't just trauma dump everywhere.

 

[JustReadingArs]

The article is rather lacking in detail but I guess it doesn't matter since none of us can get an allocation.

I own a 997 GT3, a manual turbo 997, plus two other 911's and as much as I enjoy them I'm kind of done with modern Porsche.
Years of being told that I'm not "loyal enough" to get an allocation but if I were to buy a few Taycans that would change things...has soured my view of the brand.

So uhh need a friend to 'test drive' any? I'll change the oil + filter.
Recently had to 'repair' the coolant vent tube system, brittle plastic tubing between valve covers, on a 19' Macan S (3.0).
Luckily the Macan forums had a workaround... better than OEM it seems, and saved ~$1,500. (per quote)

 

[noteonleaf]

First just to be clear, I personally believe we have at least this galaxy to ourselves, in terms of we will never meet another technological civilization.

However, one thing I think would be fun if we did, would be to put a ship each other examples of the objects our respective civilizations are most proud of. Initially with zero explanation, and just have the other side’s scientists and engineers try to figure them out. As a fun little “cultural exchange” program.

If we ever do have the opportunity for such an exchange, I nominate the 911 as our first offering.

Hmm.......
This little Miata may have a word to you

 

[whquaint]

Great article. I hope cars like these never die.

 

[bigcheese]

Development would be easier at the consumer level if electric super cars were promoted over ICE ones. It filters down.

Ffs, this isn’t some great conspiracy. In this case the product is clearly superior, that is why it is promoted. These cars are nimble, lightweight and engaging in a way that no electric car can currently match.

Imagine carving down a canyon road heel-toeing downshifts with that visceral experience of a howling flat six behind you. Compare that to a completely silent two and a half ton point and shoot rocket. These are completely different experiences.

However, if we were to apply your comment to huge, heavy SUVs with automatic gearboxes and supercharged v8 engines, I’d agree with you.

 

[bigcheese]

Good. We tried electric vehicles and it brought us deranged billionaires, felon presidents, a cabinet of crooks and clowns and of course Freedom(TM) to reject science because it hurts "conservative" viewpoints otherwise. I never enjoyed my German sedan more.

So EVs are to blame? Interesting take.

 

[bigcheese]

BTW, since when is a paid for holiday, accommodation and probably food and entertainment not paid for content. This always makes me laugh because you and they know as soon as you slate something you won't get the perks again so if course it isn't them writing the article....

It might incur bias yes, but it’s not paid for content. Paid for content pays your salary. Food, drinks and entertainment does not.

Besides, for 99% of people reading these articles they are entertainment, not purchasing advice.

 

[dragoninnaMINI]

Hmm.......
This little Miata may have a word to you

Heh....as a life-long gearhead from toddlerhood*, I kind of hate to admit that if I had all the money I could hope for, the Miata would be the best choice for a fun car....but I'd also prolly buy some level of Porsche as well. Because, to be frank, Porsche wouldn't even offer me a new 911 GT3, much less anything else that's not already sitting in the display of a local Porsche dealer.

*one of my earliest memories is sitting on my dad's shoulders at the local dirt track, watching his friend's quarter midget car racing on the weekends. I was probably 18 mos old at the time but I will never forget the sounds, sights, and smells of a race track....and I've been chasing that feeling ever since.

 

[sorten]

How on earth do you read Aurich's comment and get "we're giving you AI summaries"? Are you calling me an AI bot?

If you don't want to read our car reviews, the new site redesign made it even easier than ever to ignore everything that gets posted to that section if you are a subscriber, which you are.

Sure, that would suck to be me in that case, since my performance is measured by traffic, but no one is forcing you to read every story we post. But actual human Ars readers came out to meet me in actual real life human space and said, to my face, "please write more ICE reviews." And so I'm going to be doing more of those.

Dr. Gitlin -

My apologies for not being more clear in my post. It seems quoting the text in question wasn't effective. I was responding to these weird yellow boxes above some of the posts. It looked and read like an AI chatbot summary.

Don't know what else to say about it. I appreciate your reviews, and at one point in my young life I had a stack of Porsche books next to my bed. I've been an Ars lurker for two decades and a paying subscriber for a bunch of years now. shrug

 

[tutis]

and despite all of this, it's down on power and no faster than the 2024 one. Chris Harris has a video on this from 203 months ago

 

[menom]

I'll likely never be able to get a car like this and my next car (if I continue to own one at all) will almost certainly be fully electric but I sure like reading about high-end car-tech like this, thanks!

 

[Sprigganmaster]

A touring with a manual is probably my dream car. I’m sure a single acceleration to 9k rpm would be enough to put a huge smile on my face and have a good day.

 

[mynameismud]

"...sports exhaust in fruity mode."
I gotta imagine that 9k redline flat six screams, but what does this mean?

Besides a sports bike with unnaturally high rpms (17k), the only normal car I've driven near that redline is an S2K, and that's a blast.

I believe Dr Gitlin is referring to lychee juice

 

[jonah]

The “ICE cars are killing everyone” mantra in the comments section of every ICE car article are getting really tiresome.

We don’t need that performative, virtue signaling, bullshit commentary every single goddammed time.

If you don’t like that ICE cars are still a thing, feel free to fuck off to EV articles.

 

[GaitherBill]

What a bargain, dare I say, thrifty price.

I’ll take two!

 

[cpkennit]

Hey, Valencia is my hometown. Did you like it?

 

[Sylro]

There is a 1967 911 SWB sitting in a workshop a few miles away, waiting patiently for a ground up restoration.

I bought it ten years ago with the intention of having a rolling resto, but that never happened.

My plan is for it to become a BEV.

This is my inspiration.

Should be done by the end of the decade. I hope.

 

[Penforhire]

Talk about "read the room," why don't you notice the up/down votes for an indicator of our temperature here? I drive a PHEV, nearing ten years old right now, but I enjoy all manner of sporting vehicle news and discussion, even ICE.

Where's the guys who always chime in with "ride a bicycle" or "use public transportation?" Most of us who enjoy these articles (and machines) are 'on your side' but you can step off that high horse any time now.

 

[remytron83]

I’m so jaded in life that I see luxuries of all kinds as distractions.

 

[Dachshund]

I think the electronic dashboard display was a major mistake.

Analogue dials are timeless, classic, and most importantly will still actually work in 20 years time.

Hero cars like the GT3 are jewels that need to remain relevant for decades after they are first sold. The electronic glass display will look increasingly cheap, dated and tacky as the years pass.

This!!! The digital/screens are cold and soulless. They merely “display data”. I’m not buying this class of car just to “display data”, it’s far more than that and you said it well.

 

[elh]

If money was no object, 911 GT3 Touring would be my daily.

 

[NinJake]

Thank you for this article, Dr Gitlin!

 

[2TurnersNotEnough]

The “ICE cars are killing everyone” mantra in the comments section of every ICE car article are getting really tiresome.

We don’t need that performative, virtue signaling, bullshit commentary every single goddammed time.

If you don’t like that ICE cars are still a thing, feel free to fuck off to EV articles.

…where they can complain about how personal vehicle ownership is evil, and we should all just be using mass transit.

 

[CrazyHarry1]

Since that first post is likely to get hidden due to downvotes, I'll post this here as its own comment. At the Ars event in Washington DC a few months ago, at least four readers independently asked for more ICE reviews so we’ll be doing more of those from now on. Some will be aspirational stuff (naturally aspirational stuff? Pun intended). Some will be affordable stuff, but I'm going to try and keep the big SUVs to a bare minimum.

The automotive reviews, aspirational or not, are part of why I subscribe. Thank you. I drive (older, purchased used) electric for my daily commute, but I think there's a place in the world for off-road toys (track or trail).

Please keep these coming.

 

[poke 532810]

I don't think I necessarily want to know, let alone hang out with someone who can blow a full quarter-million on a car, at this point in history. Amazing engineering that should not really exist.

When I was a kid, I did some yard work for a guy - mowing the lawn, raking leaves, landscaping around his duck pond. He and his wife were very kind, caring, generous, and humble. They lived in a modest house and drove average cars. They were also stinking rich. They could have bought a hundred 911 GT3s had they wanted to, with piles of money left over. And that is not an exaggeration. Not every extremely wealthy person is an asshole.

Also, I would love to have one of these in my driveway. Alas, I am not stinking rich.

 

[noteonleaf]

Heh....as a life-long gearhead from toddlerhood*, I kind of hate to admit that if I had all the money I could hope for, the Miata would be the best choice for a fun car....but I'd also prolly buy some level of Porsche as well. Because, to be frank, Porsche wouldn't even offer me a new 911 GT3, much less anything else that's not already sitting in the display of a local Porsche dealer.

*one of my earliest memories is sitting on my dad's shoulders at the local dirt track, watching his friend's quarter midget car racing on the weekends. I was probably 18 mos old at the time but I will never forget the sounds, sights, and smells of a race track....and I've been chasing that feeling ever since.

Don't worry, Porsche, especially 911 have their own very respectful world. I love it. Very beautiful car but unobtainable for me and that's okay.

Miata something more accessible for me. Not now of course but that's okay too.

Both are very beautiful in genuine human craft of art and engineering. Along with Ferrari

 

[Snark218]

Funny how sports car interest is inversely proportional to distance from the Miata formula…

With respect, that's usually because comparatively few people have driven or will own 911s.

Because I care about the planet? About humans?

But do you? Do you really? Or is this just you pounding the SELF-RIGHTEOUS DOPAMINE button in your brain? Because you fucking well know that bitching about a site running a review of a limited-production supercar doesn't do shit for the planet or humans. This is just you performing a shitty charade of climate praxis because it's how you justify being an asshole to people, and that makes you feel good.

 

[Snark218]

Shame on petroleum hogs and their nzi-preferred brand of hyper-luxury co2 spewers. DDD.

Pound that dopamine button. Hammer that shit. Feels good man.

 

[Snark218]

I’m so jaded in life that I see luxuries of all kinds as distractions.

Why should I give a fuck?

 

[Dr Spiff]

I think the electronic dashboard display was a major mistake.

Analogue dials are timeless, classic, and most importantly will still actually work in 20 years time.

Hero cars like the GT3 are jewels that need to remain relevant for decades after they are first sold. The electronic glass display will look increasingly cheap, dated and tacky as the years pass.

I agree. The same goes for the EVs, in my view. It is possible to have analog instruments in all cars, still. Though a GPS is useful, of course, but then make it a smaller screen.

 

[Snark218]

The “ICE cars are killing everyone” mantra in the comments section of every ICE car article are getting really tiresome.

We don’t need that performative, virtue signaling, bullshit commentary every single goddammed time.

If you don’t like that ICE cars are still a thing, feel free to fuck off to EV articles.

I realized it was nothing but performative virtue signaling bullshit when I noticed that any and every car got an equal degree of bitching and whining. If it's a sports car, they bitch about how it's a carbon-spewing luxury for the rich. If it's a luxury car, they bitch that it's a bad value. If it's an SUV, they bitch about all the pedestrians it's mowing down in every intersection. If it's got too much power, they bitch that it's too powerful. If it's a subcompact hatch with an ICE, they bitch that it's not an EV. If it's an EV, they bitch that it's too expensive. If it's somehow none of those things, they bitch that it's a car at all, because we should immediately convert all American cities to dense, walkable neighborhoods served with bike paths and mass transit.

The bitching and whining is the point.

 

[Aurich]

Is it pointless to reply to an article with some "I don't care" comment? Yes. Is it just as pointless to actually reply to that person? Also yes.

Look, here's the bottom line: we don't pick what stories we cover based on comments. We just don't. Someone doesn't like that we covered something? Okay. It's not a factor in our future decisions, ever. Never has been, never will be.

Someone taking the time to come up to you in person and tell you something? That actually does count for a lot actually. There's an effort scale at play here. Nobody cares that someone was Mad On The Internet. There always is.

 

[KenM]

Anyone got a link to a good video of this car so I can hear it? Really want to hear 9k RPM.

(No way I'm ever going to be able to afford one, and the one friend I had who could afford Porsche and I aren't friends anymore)