VW Beetle DUNE – Volkswagen’s ‘off-road’ Beetle – on sale from £21,300

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The VW Beetle Dune – the Beetle with added off-road butch – is going on sale in the UK priced from £21,200 with a choice of diesel or petrol engines.

You might expect that the Volkswagen Beetle Dune, first seen as a concept at the 2014 Detroit Motor Show and revealed as a production car in Los Angeles last year, would be what it looks like – an off-road Beetle harking back to the original Beetle-based VW buggies. Which it is. Sort of.

In fact, the Beetle Dune is all about the show, not the substance, and although it gets a raised ride height. bigger wheels, new bumpers, some scuff plates and a general air of ‘butch’, the Dune doesn’t actually get a drivetrain to match – it’s still only available as a FWD.

Now about to go on sale in the UK (next week – April 5 2016), the Dune can be had with either a 1.2 litre petrol with 104bhp or a 2.0 litre TDI diesel with 148bhp, mated to either a six-speed manual or seven-speed DSG gearbox.

The headline £21,300 is for the 1.4 litre TSI, with the 2.0 litre TDI costing £23,805, and if you want to take the roof down (the Beetle Dune can be had as a Coupe or Convertible), prices rise to £24,255 and £26,875 respectively, although a DSG ‘box adds a further £1,360 to the price.

Standard kit includes auto lights and wipers, 18″ alloys, front and rear wheelarch extensions, new bumpers, black honeycomb grill, side trim strips, ‘Tumeric’ stitching on the inside, 6.5″ touchscreen with Bluetooth and parking sensors.

The VW Beetle Dune will be available to order from Tuesday at VW’s UK dealers, with first customer cars expected in June.