Potential Honda Civic Type R Facelift Spotted Without Boy Racer-Style Rear Wing
The internet mocked, Honda answered.
Spotted on a flatbed by a Dutch car dealer on Instagram is what appears to be the facelifted Honda Civic Type R sporting a much smaller rear wing as well as smaller wheels. Before you go writing this off as one owner's own efforts to tone down his or her own particular car, note the revised "fake vent" panels that feature the body-colored bar only seen so far on the facelifted, 2020 versions of lesser Civics. In other words, this looks pretty legit.
Since its introduction in 2017, the Type R's most common criticism concerned its looks. I personally (along with some others on The Drive's staff) never had an issue with how Honda's visually bold hot hatch was styled but many blasted it for apparently being over-designed. Too in-your-face and boy-ricer-y. "No one over the age of 25 would be caught dead driving something that looks like this," was an all too common refrain.
(If you ask me, in an era where the Toyota freakin' Camry looks how it looks, the Honda Civic Type R and its big-ass wing was just right.)
In any case, after nearly three years of borderline cyber-bullying, Honda has seemingly heard the complaints and will likely offer the small-winged Type R as an option or separate trim level rather than as the default going forward given how the company has always maintained that the big spoiler is indeed functional.
We obviously can't take a peek at this car's sidewalls or bust out a measuring tape to verify anything but the wheels on this thing also look much more sensibly sized than the massive 20-inchers that come on the current car. This should improve ride comfort and make replacing tires and maintaining the thing a bit less financially taxing.
Expect more details on the revised 2020 Honda Civic Type R soon. Haters, we hope you're happy.
