2025 Subaru WRX tS Is Most of What an STI Is Minus a Wing and 30 or So HP

• The new performance-leader Subaru WRX tS arrives in showrooms in the first quarter of 2025 with more refined performance that might surpass the old STI.

• It gets the same 271 hp 2.4-liter flat-four as the rest of the WRXs.

• Beefy Brembos and more chassis control are some of the benefits.

With the arrival early next year of the tS there will be six—count ‘em, six—models of Subaru WRX, from the anonymous “base” model that no one buys all the way up to the GT. But none of those is an STI.

That’s frustrating for the hardcore rallyists and keyboard rally wannabes because the STI is/was the greatest Subaru WRX ever made. But starting early next year Subaru will offer what might be the second-best WRX ever, the WRX tS.

Just as WRX stands for World Rally eXperimental, the tS in this new model stands for “tuned by STI.” And just for the record, STI stands for Subaru Tecnica International. (The "i" used to be lower case but they changed it a few years ago.)

The first thing you will want to know is that no, the standard 2.4-liter turbo boxer flat-four doesn’t make the 300-plus hp you’ve been demanding in your comments. It makes 271 hp at 5,600 rpm and 258 lb-ft of torque from 2,000 to 5,200 rpm. As you may know, that is exactly the same power and torque as all five other WRX models. And all get that famous “symmetrical all-wheel drive” that helps eliminates torque steer and powers you out of corners exactly as you want to power out of them.

All six WRXs including the coming tS also get the following performance features as standard equipment:

• Active Torque Vectoring, which applies braking power to the inside front wheel in a turn for the triple-whammy of sharper turn-in, more neutral steering, and higher cornering limits.

• Vehicle Dynamics Control, which, Subaru says, in addition to assisting with ATV as noted above, utilizes sensors that constantly monitor wheel speeds, steering angle, brake pressure, vehicle yaw rate, and lateral g-forces and, when it detects a difference between the driver’s intended path and the one the vehicle is actually taking, applies braking power and/or reduces engine torque to help correct vehicle path. It has three settings: Standard, Off, and performance-oriented Traction modes.”

• Traction Control System is part of VDC and incorporates an all-wheel, all-speed traction control system that when sensing a loss of traction reduces engine torque and applies braking force to the slipping wheel or wheels as necessary to maintain vehicle motion.

So with all that, and the same power and torque, that $33,855 base-model WRX is starting to look pretty good, isn’t it? Well let’s look at what the tS offers.

Let’s start with the high-performance Brembo braking system, with big, gold-colored six-piston aluminum monobloc calipers on the front clamping down on cross-drilled rotors with Brembo low-metallic pads. The cast iron disc is 340 mm in front, too. In back are two-piston aluminum monobloc calipers gripping 326-mm cast iron discs with the same material low-metallic pads.

Subaru didn’t release any braking stats on those discs, but the Brembo people seemed pretty proud of them. When we all got to drive them around Sonoma Raceway with little to no adult supervision for about three laps or so they never faded and felt just fine—smooth and predictable with no noise and not a hint of fade.

Owners of the tS will also get Drive Mode Select, shared with the WRX GT, that features electronically controlled STI-tuned dampers that, as Subaru says, “can tailor the dynamic performance to the driver’s preferences between Comfort, Sport, and Normal settings.

Inside you get the GT and TR models’ Recaro performance-design front seats from which you can admire the new 12.3-inch digital gauge cluster. In the center of the dash is the latest version of the Subaru Starlink 11.6-inch Multimedia Plus system that offers Apple and Android interfaces, Bluetooth, AM/FM/HD/SiriusXM satellite radios. Eyesight Driver Assist is also standard with all its safety offerings.

And it comes standard with a six-speed manual.

Thus equipped, as I mentioned, they let us loose on Sonoma’s 11 turns to go as fast as we wanted to. How was it? It wasn’t the same as driving the STI, from what I remembered of the last time I drove one of those. Subaru did not provide an STI to do back-to-back comparisons, so going by memory, the STI felt more harsh, there was a lot more “information” coming through the steering wheel and the seat of the pantalones. There was more noise, more banging and crashing, less smoothness and quiet.

The new WRX sits on a new, tighter platform. With less chassis flex, engineers can tune the suspension more precisely. On the track I had it in Sport the whole time. All the AWD controls Subaru has programmed in did their tasks automatically, with no intervention from me.

The toughest corner at Sonoma for me is Turn 1, which I think is also the fastest (though some of you go through 9 and 10 pretty quickly). One guy said you could take Turn 1 “flat out” in the new tS. I asked resident pro Scott Speed about that and he said, “No, you can’t.” Maybe he was being nice, but I didn’t feel so bad about lifting going in. But nowhere on the course did I feel spooked, except T1, but that wasn’t the car’s fault.

If you were to compare lap times, aw, who knows? The STI had more horsepower to counter its somewhat less-refined chassis tuning. But even with a mere 271 hp, I bet you could get close to the old STI. But maybe not close to any new STI that may or may not be coming, with what may or may not be 300-plus hp.

Suffice to say the tS is a refined performance ride, one with solid braking, excellent, quick-ratio (13.5:1) dual-pinion electric power steering, and as much power and torque as I felt I could use out there on Sonoma. It’s the current pinnacle of performance in the Subaru lineup. Until the next STI, of which there is no word.

Look for the tS in showrooms in the first quarter of 2025. Pricing will be released closer to the on-sale date. Or consider that base model. Heck, any WRX would be fun!