The VW Jetta SportWagen Is Dead, Long Live The Golf SportWagen

The Volkswagen Jetta and Golf have had a rather interesting relationship over the last decade. First, the Jetta shared all of the components, body panels, and styling of the Golf, but added a trunk to make for a three-box sedan body style. The vehicle was essentially the sedan version of the Golf… or the Golf was a hatchback version of the Jetta, however you want to look at it. Adding a wagon variant to the Golf lineup was the Golf SportWagen; it was — you guessed it — a Golf hatchback but with a longer hatch/boot. But there were two very odd, if not peculiar, exceptions.

First, for reasons unbeknownst to us, Volkswagen decided to sell the Golf SportWagen as the Jetta SportWagen in the United States. Second, the sixth-generation (A6, Typ 1B) Jetta that launched in 2011 split the Jetta from the Golf not only in name, but also in styling. Underneath, the sixth-gen Jetta was still a Golf with a trunk… but it looked somewhat different thanks different sheetmetal from the Golf — a decision whose purpose we’re still having some trouble understanding. But that’s not what we want to point out today.

Notice the styling differences between the sixth-gen VW Jetta Sedan and seventh-gen VW Golf GTI Hatchback

Instead, we’d like to call attention to the fact that that the wagon version of the all-new, seventh-generation Golf will (finally) not be called Jetta SportWagen in the US of A. Instead, it will finally be called Golf SportWagen, finally delivering a dose of rationality to the already-irrational Jetta/Golf naming disparity.

VW gave the Jetta Sedan its own sheetmetal for the sixth-gen model when compared to the 2014 VW Jetta SportWagen, which was aligned in styling with the Golf. For some reason, the Golf SportWagen was called Jetta SportWagon only in the United States, with the seventh-gen Golf family changing the name back to Golf SportWagen.

Next on our wishlist is for VW to unify the styling and features of the Jetta with that of the seventh-gen Golf. Here’s to hoping that will be the case for the next-generation (seventh-gen) Jetta that’s due sometime around calendar year 2016.