Here’s your first look at McLaren’s new hybrid supercar

By topgear, 07 October 2020

Not just another McLaren supercar, but a harbinger of change. This is your first look at McLaren’s upcoming ‘high-performance hybrid’ that’ll be shod of its camouflage and fully revealed next year.

What it also does is signal the end of McLaren’s ‘Sports Series’ range; indeed, the 620R will be the last car from that tier built before it’s wound down at the end of 2020.

This car will slot in between the McLaren GT and 720S, and sit on an entirely new carbon fibre structure that will exploit “the company’s advantage in super-lightweight engineering”.

Built at McLaren’s £50m Composites Technology Centre in Sheffield, this new base will underpin the next generation of the company’s hybrid supercars. The first one – this one – will get a brand new V6 petrol engine nestled inside, claimed to deliver “astonishing levels of performance and a uniquely intense driver experience”.

Being a hybrid, it’ll be able to drive ‘medium-range’ on electric power alone, and McLaren boss Mike Flewitt reckons “light-weighting and high-performance hybrid technology go hand in hand to achieve better performance as well as more efficient vehicles”.

You’ll see this V6-engined advocate of McLaren’s new philosophy in the first half of 2021.