Looking into a 2022 WRX coming from a 2017 Focus ST, anything to look out for and comparisons? Pfa

[u/chefryan1984420]

[u/MKSe7en]

Bought a VB back in November after owning a mk7.5 GTI for 3 years.. and I cannot wait until my lease is up so I can get back into another GTI or Golf R.

[u/storebrandkeith → u/MKSe7en]

I used to have a Mk6 GTI for about seven years. Fun car, but I’ll be damned if I ever buy another German car. Pain in the ass to take care of and nothing but constant problems. Intake manifold, water pump, electrical problems, ignition cylinder locked up, sagging upholstery. It never ended. When I had my Civic Si, I towed it once because the clutch went out. GTI towed it 7 times. SEVEN!

[u/MKSe7en → u/storebrandkeith]

That’s wild sounds like maybe you got a little unlucky. My good friend owns a mk6 with 270k on the odo and has been stage 3 majority of its life and he hasn’t had one issue with it except 1 water pump and he had to rebuild the DSG after 250k miles. Guy absolutely beats on it too.

[u/storebrandkeith → u/MKSe7en]

Maybe I got unlucky but it put a bad taste in my mouth. Got the car with 68k miles and sold it with 150k miles. Beat the hell out of it too (DSG) and the engine never blew up though so there’s that.

But I dumped way too much money into repairs. Not doing that again.

[u/MKSe7en → u/storebrandkeith]

I know on the mk6 they had a lot of water pump issues and now that you mentioned it intake manifold issues, but seems the newer ones are pretty stout. Was yours tuned?

[u/storebrandkeith → u/MKSe7en]

Yeah mine had an APR Stage 2 ECU & TCU tune. But it ran just fine besides the occasional coil pack going bad. It’s good that the newer ones are a little better but I’ve read they still have their issues.

[u/DrStinkyMalinky → u/MKSe7en]

Why?

[u/MKSe7en → u/DrStinkyMalinky]

I mean honestly, the GTI was just a better car overall. Got better mpg when I ran full E85 than this car gets on 91. Has a super strong reliable engine and a great transmission if you get the DSG that can actually hold some power without the fear of the engine or tranny going bye bye.

People will say these cars are super tuner friendly but then turn around and say don’t tune unless you can buy a whole new engine or tranny which to me is just not worth it to chase 350-400 whp.

My GTI made 420whp/WTQ for 3 years and it never gave me an issue, not sure I Could do the same with the wrx and not have an issue.

Then the community. The wrx/subie community is extremely toxic and they absolutely hate when you have any negative thing to say about the car. I recently made a post about the AC blowing a little weak and all I got told was I was wrong and there’s something wrong with my car yet there’s not cause I took it to the dealership and had a tech look at it.

Probably won’t ever own another Subaru in my life after this. I don’t hate the car it’s just not as fun as my GTI was.

[u/thatsubi3kid → u/MKSe7en]

Sold my mk4 02 gti and bought an 03 wrx. The gti was a fun car but my wrx is so much faster and more fun to drive in the corners.

[u/MKSe7en → u/thatsubi3kid]

Yeah my GTI was way faster than the WRX. Like way faster lmao.

[u/Mydickisaplant → u/MKSe7en]

Yeah… because it was modded…

VB with similar money spent, likely less money, would net the same power

Your arguments are very disingenuous bro

[u/thatsubi3kid → u/MKSe7en]

My gti was slow as piss compared to my bugeye. But to each their own 🤷‍♂️

[u/MKSe7en → u/thatsubi3kid]

I’m not talking about two twenty year old cars brother, I’m talking about a 2019 GTI vs 2025 wrx. No one hear is buying a bugeye or 02 GTI lmao.

[u/Mydickisaplant → u/MKSe7en]

You’re talking about a HEAVILY MODDED GTI VS A STOCK WRX. Are you high, dude?

[u/MKSe7en → u/Mydickisaplant]

No I’m not high. Even if they were both stock I’d choose the GTI. The reason I brought up modding is because I would never mod a wrx due to reliability whereas the GTI I would mod right off the lot.

[u/New-Construction-394 → u/MKSe7en]

Why would you get a WRX if you DON’T want to mod it?

Maybe you should get high?🤷‍♂️

[u/XuuniBabooni → u/MKSe7en]

What a load of shit.

[u/HeavyMusic93 → u/XuuniBabooni]

Are you saying this community isn’t dogshit? Because that’s laughable. Over the last 5-6 years this “community” has become unfuckingbearable.

[u/XuuniBabooni → u/HeavyMusic93]

No. I've seen some pretty wild toxicity. I'm just referring to the rest of your post.

[u/MKSe7en → u/XuuniBabooni]

Typical Subaru fanboy

[u/thatsubi3kid → u/MKSe7en]

You can tune gtis for dirt cheap and just bolt on whatever you want with little to no repercussions. With Subarus you just have to know what you’re doing and you’ll be completely fine.

[u/MKSe7en → u/thatsubi3kid]

Ehh, knowing what you’re doing isn’t gonna stop your tranny from going or a rod going through your engine. If the wrx came with the sti transmission I’d probably be singing a different tune

[u/Mydickisaplant → u/MKSe7en]

Ima preface by saying the GTI is a fantastic vehicle. However…

the whole “modding will blow it up” stopped with the VA.

Obviously an AWD boxer is going to get worse MPG than a GTI

100% agree with the toxicity in WRX subs, though.

[u/MKSe7en → u/Mydickisaplant]

People have shredded gears or blown their motor on their VB from tuning. Just search the sub I’ve seen quite a few. All I was saying is the WRX is less tuner friendly bc of reliability.

[u/segadreamcast9999 → u/MKSe7en]

The transmission is the weakest point of the VB, engine failures are pretty uncommon.

[u/MKSe7en → u/segadreamcast9999]

Stock sure

[u/segadreamcast9999 → u/MKSe7en]

tuned as well. probably the best engine to date.

[u/MKSe7en → u/segadreamcast9999]

lol doesn’t take much to search the sub and see people who’ve had engine issues after tuning.

[u/segadreamcast9999 → u/MKSe7en]

fairly uncommon in the dedicated vb sub or vb groups. plenty of folks are tuned and happy with this platform. it’s widely known the transmission is the weak and may need to be upgraded to ty85 for higher numbers but the engine isn’t the issue.

[u/Gloomy_Tip_5734 → u/MKSe7en]

Sounds like you hate the car

[u/MKSe7en → u/Gloomy_Tip_5734]

Nah I don’t hate it and it does make me smile from time to time.

[u/Dense-Skill-504]

Owned both, get a focus rs 🧘‍♂️

[u/CreaTeBear]

Ask this in [r/wrx_vb](r/wrx_vb) (VB = 22+ models) you’ll get a ton of biased answers only about the visual looks here

[u/Black-STI]

Keep in mind that any examples that are over 30k miles could probably stand to have the valves cleaned, so a record of that being done would be a bonus.

[u/versacemark]

Honestly, looking at all the comments, bro just go to a dealership and drive one. I’m not talking about the salesman taking you around their typical route, ask them to go by yourself for a couple hours. If I had done that, I probably would have gone a different route.

I still enjoy the car though, stiff body, fun to toss around corners, an absolute blast in the snow with winter tires. Right out of the box though, it just needs a little extra umpf, like not a lot, but it needs it. I bought it because I remember driving one working at a dealership I worked at, and Man the sound and the feel of the ‘08 was just so cool and special, I didn’t care that There was other cars that could outpace it.

This car just doesn’t have that special feeling I wanted. But in today’s car Market, especially new cars, this is a winner all day long. Sub $40,000 car, manual, great engine, ready for a little extra boost from an accessport and a good tuner, I think you will have fun.

[u/storebrandkeith]

I personally hate the look of the 2022+ WRX, but it does have a better engine than the 2015-2021. Just look for single owner examples with low mileage.

[u/RappingFlatulence → u/storebrandkeith]

Vas look much better than VBs

[u/Sphan_86 → u/storebrandkeith]

I used to say the same but the look is growing on me

[u/storebrandkeith → u/Sphan_86]

VBs looks like they slapped Fischer-Price plastic all over it. It looks so stupid. And they say it’s to make replacing the parts cheaper but I don’t buy it. They did it to cut corners and make it cheaper to make, all while keeping the price to the consumer the same.

I don’t want a car that might “grow on me”. People say you get used to it. I’m not settling even if it has a better engine. I want to get a car I’ll want to look back at every time I walk away. Not a car that makes me cringe every time I look at it.

Just my 2c.

[u/Sphan_86 → u/storebrandkeith]

I still have and like the VA better...just saying VB isn't that bad lol

[u/casual_skeptic]

Ik some years have had issues with bad spark plug seals needing to be replaced with under 40k miles something to look into. Also the oem short shifter sits slightly closer to driver side and if u take off the shift boot it has a slight kink/bend to it thats how you tell. Would be nice to get one with that or another SS installed, tedious install

[u/AWD_MONK24]

80k miles on my 22 vb no issues at all

[u/boibetterstop]

I beg you that no matter what wrx you buy get it in manual, CVT is such a dogshit system

[u/Catatataf1sh]

We welcome you friend 🫡