The upcoming 2020 BMW M340i Touring just may be the ultimate version of the new BMW 3 Series, at least for anyone who can’t afford the rumored manual M3. It’s fast. It’s a wagon. That’s it, that’s all you need. Sadly it’s not coming stateside, but one can dream.
First, let’s watch and listen to what appears to be the M340i Touring testing at the Nürburgring:
That sounds fantastic, and the swept-back lines of the new 3 Series really balance out the wagon body style.
I drove an M340i prototype last year while testing the new 3 Series, and it is a lot of car. The one I drove had 382 horsepower and 369 lb-ft of torque from a turbocharged 3.0-liter inline six. In Europe, it only gets all-wheel drive, but you can push a series of buttons to make it get a little sideways crazy, which is how I enjoyed it (safely on a track).
While we’ll only be getting the M340i sedan in the U.S., it’s kind of nice to think about all the buyers out there who will live out perfect lives bombing down the Autobahn with a smiling retriever in the back, or whatever.