On March 29, 1974, the first VW Golf rolled off the production line. The car was nothing less than a last-minute savior. After sales of the Beetle gradually collapsed, the Wolfsburg-based company was under pressure to act. The solution was box-shaped and became a box office hit.
The intervals between when new generations of the Golf came out have always varied greatly – sometimes the production times even overlapped, especially if you look at all markets. The current generation – the Golf 8 – has been built since 2019. The latest model is the refreshed GTI Clubsport, which VW presented at the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring.
VW has now built over 37 million vehicles. This means that the Golf may not be the most-built vehicle in the world, but it’s close. First place goes to the Toyota Corolla in all versions, and second place goes to Ford with the F-series, the most popular pick-up in the world and omnipresent on the streets of the USA.
6.3 million vehicles on the first attempt
The first generation was a huge success. Volkswagen says that the first generation Golf was sold 6.9 million times. The second generation was also impressive – VW reports 6.3 million.
Things went downhill a bit with the third version, where there were noticeably fewer vehicles. With 4.8 million vehicles, the Golf 3 was still one of the company’s most important pillars.
About the same number of fourth-generation vehicles rolled off the production line, but the Golf V was much less successful. Volkswagen reports 3.4 million units. A similar picture emerges for the Golf VI, for which VW reports 3.6 million cars.
Only the seventh generation, and thus a completely new development of the engine, was able to build on the successes of its great-grandfathers: 6.3 million units of the Golf VII were sold.
The eighth generation of the VW Golf is the last for now
Production of the eighth generation is currently underway – and here too, Volkswagen has already been able to celebrate the title of “best-selling car in Germany and Europe”. It is uncertain how many cars will roll off the production line in total. In 2024, the model received a facelift and thus a comprehensive revision.
Now it is “well positioned until the end of the decade,” said VW brand boss Thomas Schäfer in an interview with “”. Nobody really knows what will happen after that. For a long time, a purely electric future for the company was discussed, but now more and more manufacturers are rowing back when it comes to the end of classic drives. Where VW will be in ten years remains to be seen.
It is therefore quite possible that the Golf will also be found in the range in a ninth generation, although all of Volkswagen’s electric cars currently go by the name ID. When and if, however, is not clear. Schäfer explained that a car would only be called a Golf if it was a worthy representative of the world-famous vehicles that have been shaping the streets for half a century.
Source: Stern
I’m a recent graduate of the University of Missouri with a degree in journalism. I started working as a news reporter for 24 Hours World about two years ago, and I’ve been writing articles ever since. My main focus is automotive news, but I’ve also written about politics, lifestyle, and entertainment.
