PORSCHE

Test 2025 Porsche 911 Carrera 4 GTS

When you see the letters “GTS” on any Porsche, you know you’re in for something a little extra. Well, the latest “little extra” is something the 911 hasn’t seen before, a true hybrid powertrain. But, we’re not talking hypermiling here; as you’d expect from Porsche, this hybrid is all about adding performance.

Much like the airplane opened the entire world to globetrotting travelers, Porsche granted access to a whole new world of performance for driving enthusiasts when the first 911 arrived more than 60 years ago. And they’ve continued to elevate and rejuvenate the 911 ever since. 2025 marks the arrival of the 992.2, a mid-cycle refresh of the eighth-gen 911 which debuted for 2020. We’ve already hit the track in the standard Carrera, but this week we’re stirring up the alphabet soup with a 2025 911 Carrera 4 GTS at Summit Point Motorsports Park.

And any concerns we had about this middleweight’s all-wheel-drive system causing some understeer through the corners of the Summit Point Circuit were alleviated almost immediately. Things were very well balanced, with the front wheels eager to turn in, while the Good Year Eagle F1s provided the necessary grip to hold a steady line through the corners. Steering is perhaps not as lively as a rear-drive 911, but there’s great feedback and it promptly goes wherever you point it.

ower was more than plentiful, with big hits of immediate torque planted directly into the pavement, allowing us to exit turns with authority and without any drama. Which brings us to the heart of what this GTS is all about, and that is a first-ever production hybrid powertrain for Porsche. This 3.6-liter six-cylinder-based hybrid is known as the T-Hybrid, and the “T” doesn’t stand for typical.

The way Porsche does hybrid is, of course, different, and all about delivering more performance; mostly coming down to integrating an electric motor into the eight-speed PDK transmission, and sandwiching another between compressor and turbine wheels to drive the single turbocharger electronically. The result is a combined 532 horsepower and 449 lb-ft of torque. An added 1.9-kWh battery is about the size of a standard 12-volt battery and stored up front. The hybrid system also allowed Porsche to eliminate the alternator and starter, as well as power the A/C compressor electrically.

The GTS is not a plug-in and it’s not designed to run on battery alone, just add a hint of that EV-like propulsion into the mix and spin the turbo up without waiting around for exhaust gases to do it. After a brief pit stop for some liquid gas, it was off to Mason Dixon Dragway where the GTS sprinted to 60 in a neck-snapping 2.8 seconds. That’s two-tenths quicker than the last 911 GTS we tested. Here, that instant thrust was even more noticeable, with PDK launch control perfectly managing traction to get to ludicrous speeds in a blink. Power delivery shuffled around between all four wheels almost the whole way down the track as the car searched for ultimate traction, finishing the quarter-mile in 11 seconds flat at 129 mph.

Early in our second season of MotorWeek a road test of Porsche’s 944 served as a pleasant appetizer for 1983’s 911 main course. Sure, it was a convertible, but with a quarter-mile time of 14.5 seconds, we’d never gone so fast. We equated the acceleration experience to getting a swift kick in the backside from a foot encased in several pairs of heavy socks.

Autonews