SCOOP! New Porsche 718 Boxster and Boxster S. Prices + specs for SA below…

After the recent announcment that the Porsche Boxster will be facelifted, swap its 6-cylinder engines for boxer-4 turbo, and be renamed 718 Boxster, prices + specs for SA have been revealed.

New name, new look

The Boxster rename to 718 Boxster co-incides with a facelift.  The new car gets new-look headlights with the 4-dots Porsche headlights look and the new slimline LED daytime running lamps in the front bumper

The instant tell-tale is in the tail:  it gets the new Porsche look (think Macan and 918 Spyder) with an inset across the rear deck for reading wide-spaced P O R S C H E lettering and the Porsche-style cursive font model name:  718 Boxster or 718 Boxster S.  The taillights are revamped to new twin-LED bar for that modern crisp bright visual.

718 Boxster Boxer 4 turbo

The Porsche Boxster roadster had a 2.7-litre boxer 6-cylinder engine, non-turbo, which made 195kW at 6700 and torque of 280 at 4500-6500 for a 0-100 time of 5.8 seconds with the manual or 5.7 seconds (5.5 with Sports Chrono package optioned), while the Boxster S had a bigger 3.4 engine of 232kW/360Nm and times of 5.1 and 5.0 (option 4.8) and top speeds just a smidgen under 280km/h.  The boxer 6 engine had a sonorous pleasure, reaching a certain point in the rev range where it suddenly opened what sounds like another throat, and started howling deliciously.

The Porsche 718 Boxster swaps the 6 for a 4 with turbo, making Subaru and now Porsche the only 2 car makers with boxer 4 turbo engines.

The new 718 Boxster gets a 2.0 turbo 4, good for 220kW at 6500 (nice to see, despite the turbo, it keeps the free-revving Porsche spirit) and 380Nm across a wide 1950-4500 revs (thanks turbo) with acceleration improving to 5.1 for the manual or 4.9 for the 7-speed PDK auto (or 4.7 with the optional Sports Chrono package).  This means the new base model is quicker than the previous S model, and actually leapfrogs it to be on par with the outgoing Boxster GTS model’s performance (5.0 manual, and identical 4.9/4.7 for PDK).

The Porsche 718 Boxster S gets a bigger 2.5-litre displacement, and bigger power of 257 kW also at 6500, and Nm of 420 from 1900-4500.  Performance?  Beating the previous Boxster GTS by quite a margin, the times drop to 4.6 for the manual, and with the 7-speed PDK dual-clutch auto, to 4.4 in standard or 4.2 sec with Sports Chrono fitted. 

718 Boxster S = 911 fast

That means the Porsche 718 Boxster S is now Porsche 911 Carrera S fast!  And yes, we are talking the new 3.0 turbo 911 Carrera S.

Also, crucially, it is faster than any rival roadster:  BMW Z4 sDrive35is, Mercedes-AMG SLC43 (upcoming SLK facelift becomes SLC), Audi TTS (still no new TT roadster or TTS roadster in SA), Jaguar F-Type S convertible (in fact able to match the F-Type R convertible 5.0 V8 supercharged time of 4.2 seconds) or the Alfa Romeo 4C Spider.

718 Boxster prices for SA

Your local Porsche Centre will sell you a Porsche with their standard 5-year Driveplan maintenance plan, but you could opt for the reduced time and thus R 50 000 cheaper 3-year plan.

The prices are equal for manual and PDK auto, with SA cars arriving as standard with PDK:

Porsche 718 Boxster 2.0 turbo (3-year Driveplan)	R 797 000
Porsche 718 Boxster 2.0 turbo (5-year Driveplan)	R 847 000
Porsche 718 Boxster S 2.5 turbo (3-year Driveplan)	R 870 000
Porsche 718 Boxster S 2.5 turbo (5-year Driveplan)	R 920 000

Prices compared to the previous Boxster is just R 26 000 more for the 718 Boxster, and R 55 000 higher than the preceding Boxster S, which, with the extra performance and new looks, make these good value.

Why the change to the 718?  Read about this Porsche heritage name in this article
See more on Porsche local website