The BMW Group enters a new era in 2025 with the all-electric Neue Klasse models. The company is changing fundamentally for this. From design to development and production to distribution – almost everything will be new. The Neue Klasse is the result of the company's ongoing transformation with the aspiration to make individual mobility more human, intelligent and responsible.
Electromobility, digitalisation and circularity are at the heart of what is probably the biggest transformation in the long and distinguished history of the BMW Group. Transformation already permeates many areas of the BMW Group. Initial statements from the management and key milestones up to the premiere in 2025 underline the importance of the Neue Klasse for the BMW Group.
Neue Klasse: the future of BMW.
A Neue Klasse for a new age.
With the Neue Klasse, the BMW Group is developing a fundamentally new, fully-electric architecture for the model portfolio of the BMW brand. The Neue Klasse connects the successful history of the brand with a technological quantum leap into the future.
The Neue Klasse will start out in the high-volume core of the BMW brand with a sports activity vehicle and a saloon in today’s BMW 3 Series segment. In total, production of at least six Neue Klasse models will begin across the worldwide production network of the BMW Group in the first 24 months.
A new kind of interaction between human and automobile.
The vehicles of the Neue Klasse are characterised by a newly designed user experience: The vehicle becomes a digital experience space. This is facilitated by the new BMW iDrive, which enables intuitive interaction between the driver and the vehicle. At the heart of this concept is the BMW Panoramic Vision. It enables information to be displayed across the entire width of the windscreen. Complemented by the new BMW 3D Head-Up Display, information such as assisted driving or traffic guidance can be projected three-dimensionally into the driver's visual axis. In combination with the newly designed multifunction steering wheel and the Central Display as well as the tried-and-tested voice control with the BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant, driving is more intuitive and at the same time more individual than ever before.
Neue Klasse milestones.
The BMW i Vision Circular, BMW i Vision Dee and BMW i Vision Neue Klasse vision vehicles offer the first glimpses of the innovations of the Neue Klasse.
BMW iFACTORY: The target image of vehicle production.
The Neue Klasse is the largest project the BMW Group has ever had for the future. Its new, fully-electric vehicle architecture offers the BMW Group a unique opportunity to completely rethink automobile production in all its dimensions. The Debrecen plant of the future is an exemplary symbol of the strategic target image of production with the BMW iFACTORY and its lean, green and digital principles. As well as resource-saving production all planning is also done in advance using a digital twin on the computer.
Efficient round cell batteries for more range and faster charging.
The BMW Group has set up corresponding centres of excellence to rapidly and comprehensively develop battery cells and electric drive technology for the Neue Klasse even further. At the end of 2022, the competence center for battery cell production in Parsdorf near Munich has started its commissioning. Here, more than 80 experts will soon be researching the near-series production of lithium-ion battery cells. For large-scale production of the round cells developed specifically for the Neue Klasse, the BMW Group currently contracted five battery cell factories with partners worldwide with a total annual capacity of 70 gigawatt hours.
New standards in digitalisation, electrification and circularity.
In May 2021, the BMW Group described the technological dimension and future product range of the Neue Klasse for the first time: Electric. Digital. Circular. This is what sets the Neue Klasse apart. It will produce a variety of very different as well as surprising vehicles. A decisive step in the transformation of the BMW Group.
