Porsche 718 Spyder RS review

What you’re looking at might just be the most significant Porsche Boxster since the first-generation car was launched in 1996. Why? Well, because the Porsche 718 Spyder RS will be the last combustion-engined Boxster.

That’s right, the next time we see a 718 roll out of the Porsche factory gates it will be powered by electrons rather than fossil fuel. However, rather than wallow in this finality, Porsche's GT Department has seized the opportunity to give its mid-engined drop-top sports car a proper send-off by bestowing it with the full RS treatment.

So the 718 Spyder GT gets carbon-fibre panels, carbon-fibre-backed seats, a fiddly carbon-fibre convertible roof, revised aerodynamics and tweaked suspension. The Weissach package – which we think is a must-have addition – gets you magnesium wheels (reducing the car's weight by 10kg) and titanium tailpipes for the stainless-steel exhaust.

The result is a 1,410kg weight figure, which is very impressive when you consider that Porsche has also managed to shoehorn the full-fat 4.0-litre flat-six engine from the Porsche 911 GT3 behind the bulkhead. We know the motor well: its manic howl and 9,000rpm red line need to be experienced to be believed.

Rivals for the Porsche 718 Spyder RS are few and far between. You could, of course, look at a Mercedes-AMG SL but that's more of a cruiser than an out-and-out sports car. And while a McLaren 750S Spider is in another performance league, so is its price tag. In reality, the Spyder RS’s closest rival is its hard-top cousin, the 718 Cayman GT4 RS. Read on to find out how they compare...

It would be easy to look at the Porsche 718 Spyder RS and conclude that it's simply a GT4 RS with the roof cut off, but that would be to oversimplify matters. While the basic engine, gearbox, brakes and suspension are shared, Andreas Preuninger (the Director of GT Product cars) and his team have worked hard to round off some of the GT4 RS’s harsher edges.

Where the GT4 RS is concerned with lap times and excelling on your annual trip to the Nürburgring Nordschleife, the Spyder RS is intended to be enjoyed on the road.

To this end the suspension has been softened considerably (as have the adaptive dampers) and the steering has been recalibrated to make the front end a touch less darty. The results, we’re pleased to report, are apparent within the first few miles.

On bumpy, acned B-roads a GT4 RS too often feels skittish and unsettled, but the Spyder RS sits more resolutely on the tarmac.

Thanks to greater wheel travel, the tyres stay in contact with the road surface more of the time, giving you greater grip and traction in all conditions. That means you get thrown about less when you’re really motoring and gives you the confidence to carry more speed into corners.

In colder conditions you have to work hard to get temperature into the Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 tyres, but with steering that has that perfect marriage of weight, pace, feel and animation, you’re acutely aware of the conditions under foot. The only rival that gets close to delivering the same kind steering feel is the McLaren 750S Spider but in that car you have to put up with more kickback through the wheel, which can feel a little disconcerting.

Perhaps somewhat disappointingly, the Spyder RS is not available with a manual gearbox so if you want to pair the flat-six with a third pedal you’ll need to consider a GT3 instead.

However, the seven-speed PDK auto gearbox feels well suited to this application, allowing you to keep the screaming 9000rpm flat-six on the boil at all times. If you keep the accelerator buried it will fire you from gear to gear with almost no interruption in torque as you ride a wave of sound to the next horizon.

At first it’s overwhelming. You listen in disbelief as the revs keep going higher and higher, thinking: “This is gonna go pop!” But once that subsides, you simply end up smiling – so hard your cheeks tingle. 

You’ll get a similar experience in the GT4 RS, because like the Spyder, it breathes through a pair of intakes mounted just behind the seats, only inches from your earlobes, creating an intense yowl under hard acceleration.

However, in the Spyder – especially with the roof down – the noise is more cultured and it doesn’t generate the same resonant frequencies that can become tiring in the closed-cockpit GT4 RS. This is a car that has been built to celebrate the end of Porsche’s iconic flat-six engine and it does so masterfully. 

As standard, the Porsche 718 Spyder RS features lightweight carbon-fibre seats. They're quite tricky to get into and out of due to their aggressive side bolstering, but once you’ve slipped down into them you’ll find they’re perfectly comfortable. You can even have them tailored to your own body shape should you want to find that perfect blend of fit and firmness. 

Considering the effort Porsche has gone to to save weight in the Spyder RS we reckon it would feel perverse to specify the non-cost option Comfort Seats with their 18-way electric adjustment, but we’ve sampled these in lower-spec Boxsters and we must admit they do improve access. Plus, on a longer journey it feels something of a luxury to have adjustable lumbar support. 

We suspect most buyers would specify the Weissach package (we would) which introduces a dashboard wrapped in Race-Tex suede and a couple of Weissach badges on the headrests. Other than that, it’s mostly left to the 9,000rpm rev counter and manual-like PDK gear shifter to confirm that you're sitting in an RS product.

Despite sitting so low behind the steering wheel, visibility with the convertible roof down is not a problem, but with it up the narrow plastic rear window isn’t the easiest to see out of. Mercifully, rear parking sensors and a reversing camera are fitted as standard just in case you have to park the car with the roof up.

You get a relatively crisp-looking 7.0in infotainment touchscreen with Bluetooth, a DAB radio and sat-nav. It also comes equipped with Apple CarPlay so you can mirror your iPhone to the screen. It’s an easy system to use, with quick responses, logically laid out menus and a handy row of shortcut buttons below the screen to help you find the major functions.

The Boxster has always featured a surprisingly accommodating, well-packaged interior for a two-seat sports car and the Porsche 718 Spyder RS doesn’t change that. There's a decent-sized glovebox, a couple of cupholders and several cubbies, including two in the doors and one in the centre armrest, each of which is big enough to take a mobile phone.

The Spyder RS offers plenty of space for tall adults and is wide enough to avoid and elbow-clashing. There's also a choice of two boots for your bags: one in the nose, the other in the usual place. It's not a huge amount of boot space but will allows for weekend trips away. 

We also need to talk about that roof. This is no conventional Porsche 718 Boxster and therefore it does not have a conventional roof. The reason is two-fold. Firstly, the retractable roof of the standard Boxster was simply too bulky to fit above the RS’s taller engine. And secondly, the RS’s roof weighs just 8.5kg – or around 16.5kg less than a regular Boxster’s roof. 

It is also a work of engineering art and comes in two parts depending on how wet the weather is. There’s a Bimini top to protect you from rain and a separate rear window for a deluge.

The main roof structure clips on to the top of the windscreen and the rear section clips into points on the carbon-fibre rear deck. Once removed, the fabric stores neatly under the deck, just behind the bulkhead.

The 718 Spyder RS is expensive compared to a regular Porsche 718 Boxster but relatively speaking it’s a bargain, undercutting other hardcore two-seater convertibles such as the Lamborghini Huracán Spyder and the McLaren 750S. 

And you're unlikely to lose a bean to depreciation when you sell it. Traditionally, Porsche RS products go up, not down, in value – although that brings us to the bad bit. It’s not a limited-run model as such, but it is produced in very limited numbers, so it will be very tough to get your hands on one. 

Running costs are not for the faint-hearted either. Servicing costs are higher than for regular Boxsters and, while Porsche says the 718 Spyder RS can average around 22mpg, that’s more like 15 to 17mpg at a reasonably brisk, real-world pace. Still, this is all meaningless if you have the wherewithal to buy a Spyder RS in the first place.

As standard, you get some creature comforts, such as two-zone climate control, cruise control and bucket seats, but this car is about performance, so look elsewhere if you want your backside massaged by the seat and to gawp at pretty ambient lighting.

We'd recommend the Weissach package for the forged magnesium wheels, titanium tailpipe, suede-wrapped dashboard and lots of carbon-fibre goodies. We’d also suggest adding the front axle lift system and the ceramic composite brakes (which are brilliant for the track and prevent fade compared with cast-iron disc brakes).

Surprisingly, given its reputation, Porsche finished a disappointing 21st out of 32 brands in our 2023 What Car? Reliability Survey. The 718 Spyder RS has not been assessed for safety by Euro NCAP so we can't tell you how much protection it offers in the event of a crash.

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