The VW Golf

The Volkswagen Golf hatchback was created to replace the VW Beetle. It became an international best-seller in the ‘supermini’ sector, setting the standard against which other cars were compared, and in its GTI form the Golf was the quintessential ‘hot hatch’. Approaching 40 million Volkswagen Golfs have been produced since its launch in 1974, making it the best-selling VW model, and in 2024 the Golf celebrates half a century in production. Volkswagen calculate that a Golf is sold somewhere in the world every 40 seconds. There have been eight Golf generations since 1974, each one adding a little more sophistication to the package. The Golf platform was so well-designed that many other Volkswagen models were built on it, as well as other VW Group vehicles in the Audi, Škoda and SEAT ranges. The story of the Golf is told in these pages, along with many of the other cars built on the same platform.