2025 Porsche 718 Cayman

The volume 718 Cayman carries the 2.0L turbocharged flat-four at 300 hp, unchanged for 2025 and unchanged since the 982 launched in 2016 — a modest headline figure against a 495 hp Corvette, a 480 hp Mustang GT or even a 400 hp Nissan Z, all of which cost less. The 718's case has never been peak output; the flat-six cars at the top of the range are where the power lives, and both of them are low-volume and priced far above the base car.

280 lb-ft is mid-band for a coupe in raw terms, but the delivery flatters it: peak arrives at 1,950 rpm and holds to 4,500, so the base car pulls hard in the mid-range where the naturally aspirated flat-fours it replaced were thin. The number still trails the big-displacement Americans by a wide margin, and against a 3,000 lb curb weight it is the specific output rather than the absolute figure that does the work.

Porsche quotes 4.7 seconds to 60 for the base car with the 7-speed PDK that became the standard transmission for 2025, dropping to 4.5 with Sport Chrono — and as usual the claim is conservative, with Car and Driver clocking a manual-gearbox base Cayman at 4.4 seconds. That is quick without being remarkable in a segment where a base Corvette is under 3 seconds, but the mid-engine layout means the figure is repeatable rather than a once-per-session launch-control trick.

The 2.0T is a responsive turbo engine — Dynamic Boost holds the throttle open during brief lifts so the boost is still there when you get back on it, and the mid-range pull is strong and linear — but it is not a smooth one. There is real hesitation below about 2,000 rpm, and the flat-four's coarse, thrashy voice at load is the single most criticized aspect of the 982, which is precisely the "coarse notes under load" the middle band describes. The naturally aspirated flat-six in the GTS 4.0 and GT4 RS is a 95-point engine by this measure; the volume car simply doesn't get it.

Both gearboxes are benchmarks. The 7-speed PDK — standard across the range for 2025 — shifts imperceptibly fast, picks the right gear without hunting, and unusually for a dual-clutch is genuinely smooth at parking speeds. The 6-speed manual is a no-cost option on every trim and comes bundled with Sport Chrono and its rev-matching, which is a rarer and more generous arrangement than the 911's, where the volume Carrera has no manual at all. Held just below the 911's 8-speed PDK, which is a generation newer with an extra ratio.

There is no all-wheel-drive 718 and never has been — every Cayman from the base car to the GT4 RS is rear-drive only, so unlike the 911 there is no "4" model to step up to at any price. The mid-engine layout puts roughly 55% of the mass over the driven axle, which buys real traction off the line and makes the car far less compromised in the wet than a front-engine RWD coupe, but the item measures availability and this is a hard zero. Scored alongside the other RWD-only sports cars in the set rather than below them.

Four genuinely distinct engines are on sale under one nameplate for 2025 — two turbo flat-fours of different displacement and two states of tune of the naturally aspirated 4.0L flat-six — layered over a real transmission choice, with the manual a no-cost option on every trim. That is more mechanical variety than most rivals offer and well clear of a one-engine car like the Nissan Z or Audi R8. What caps it in the middle band is that there is nothing electrified anywhere in the range: no hybrid, no PHEV, no EV, and the promised battery-electric 718 has slipped past this generation entirely. The two flat-six cars are also low-volume and priced far above the base car, so the practical choice for most buyers is narrower than the trim sheet suggests.

24 MPG combined is respectable for a 300-hp mid-engine sports car and is the best figure in Porsche's two-door range — better than a 911 Carrera's 21 and well clear of a Corvette or AMG GT — but the coupe normalization band runs to 60 MPG because it also holds hybrid-capable cars, so a number just above the 22 MPG floor scores near the bottom. The downsized turbo flat-four is doing exactly what it was adopted for; it simply isn't enough against a band calibrated on absolute efficiency.

21 MPG in town sits barely above the coupe band's 20 MPG floor. There is no stop-start-and-coast electrification to lean on in traffic, so the flat-four's city figure is close to its worst case — though it still beats every other Porsche two-door and most of the sports-car field.

27 MPG on the highway is the payoff for a 2.0-litre engine, a tall seventh PDK ratio and a ~3,050 lb curb weight — the base Cayman cruises more efficiently than anything else Porsche sells with two doors. Against a coupe band topping out at 58 MPG it still lands near the floor, because the band is set by economy coupes and hybrids rather than by sports cars.

The efficiency gain is undone by the tank: the base 718 carries only 54 litres, so 24 MPG combined buys roughly 341 miles — less than a 911 Carrera manages on worse economy because the 911 has a larger tank. The 64-litre extended-range option pushes it past 400 miles and is the single cheapest fix for the car's one real touring weakness, but the volume configuration is the smaller tank.

$3,150 a year lands above the coupe band's $2,800 ceiling and scores zero, which is the arithmetic of premium fuel more than of consumption — at 24 MPG the car burns fewer gallons than most of its rivals, but every one of them is an expensive gallon. EPA's own comparison marks it as $4,750 worse than the average new vehicle over five years.

Premium is required, not merely recommended — EPA lists the fuel type as Premium Gasoline and Porsche specifies 98 RON / 93 AKI for rated output, with 95 RON / 91 AKI the minimum. There is no E85, no diesel and no charging alternative, so every mile is bought at the most expensive pump on the forecourt. The one mitigation is the small 14.2-gallon tank, which keeps the sting of an individual fill-up modest even as the per-mile cost stays high.

NHTSA has never run an NCAP test on the 982-generation 718 Cayman and 2025 is no exception — the agency's ratings API returns zero results for the model, and the safercar model list carries the 2025 "982 718 CAYMAN" only as a recall/complaint entry with no VehicleId and no stars. Estimated at the segment-typical 4 from the car's dual-stage front, knee, thorax and head airbag complement and stiff mid-engine structure, but there is no tested figure behind the number.

IIHS has never crash-tested any model year of the 718 Cayman, so there is no Top Safety Pick, no TSP+, and not one individual crashworthiness result on record — low-volume six-figure sports cars sit outside the test program. Untested with no known structural deficiency, and with a full POSIP airbag system (dual-stage front, driver and passenger knee, seat-mounted thorax and door-mounted head airbags) behind it, earns the middle of the no-award band. Scored a shade under the 911 (58) because the 982 bodyshell dates to 2016 against the 992's 2019 architecture, and level with the other untested sports cars in the set.

Of the five features this item measures — AEB, adaptive cruise, lane keeping, blind-spot monitoring, rear cross-traffic — the 2025 718 Cayman has none standard, and only two of the five exist anywhere on its order sheet. Porsche's own US assistance-systems page for the 718 lists exactly three items: adaptive cruise control with Porsche Active Safe (optional, PDK only), Lane Change Assist (optional, alert-only), and ParkAssist plus reversing camera (standard). There is no lane keeping assist, no lane departure warning, no rear cross-traffic alert, no traffic-sign recognition and no surround view offered at any price. Three separate 2025 window stickers confirm the standard safety block is airbags, belts, TPMS, parking sensors and a back-up camera — no driver-assistance content at all. That is the thinnest ADAS provision of any car in this segment, below even the 911 (55), whose Warn and Brake Assist is at least standard; just above the Corvette (15) only because the 718 offers ACC as an option.

The only collision-braking function on the 718 is Porsche Active Safe, and it is not standard, not available on manual cars, and not a modern AEB system. PAS ships only bundled with the optional adaptive cruise control, which Porsche restricts to PDK — order the 6-speed manual and there is no forward-collision intervention available at any price. Where fitted, PAS gives an audible and visual warning, a brake jolt and targeted braking with driver brake-force boosting, all vehicle-to-vehicle; Porsche's description names no pedestrian or cyclist detection and no low-speed city function. IIHS has never run front crash prevention on the 718 in either protocol. Well below the 911's standard pedestrian-capable Warn and Brake Assist (62), above the Corvette's nothing-at-all (5).

Blind-spot coverage on the 718 is Lane Change Assist — radar-based, mirror-panel warning only, explicitly non-intervening, active above 19 mph — and it is a paid option, bundled into the $2,050 Premium Package on the GTS 4.0 rather than sold as standard safety content despite dealer marketing that calls it standard. Rear cross-traffic alert and safe-exit warning are not on the 718's option list at all. Optional alert-only monitoring with no cross-traffic function is the top of the bottom band, level with the 911 (42) and well behind the Corvette (60), which offers cross-traffic coverage. The thick rear buttresses that make blind-spot monitoring genuinely useful here are what keeps this from scoring higher.

The 718 Cayman has no lane assistance of any kind — no lane departure warning, no lane keeping assist, no centering, and no traffic-sign recognition, on any trim, at any price. Porsche's own 718 assistance-systems page runs to three entries and none of them touches lane position; the 911 at least sells optional Lane Keeping Assist, and a parts-catalogue listing suggesting LDW is standard on Porsches is contradicted by all three 2025 window stickers. Floor of the band alongside the Corvette (5) — this is an outright absence, not a weak implementation.

Adaptive cruise control is a competent full-speed-range radar system on the 718 — 650 ft of forward scan, coasting permitted while active, PAS distance warning layered on — but it is optional, and Porsche gates it behind the PDK, so a buyer choosing the 6-speed manual that defines this car gets plain fixed-speed cruise control and nothing more. No highway assist exists because there is no lane-centering function to combine with it, and Porsche InnoDrive is not offered on the 718. A capable option that a large share of the volume configuration cannot even order lands in the basic-cruise band rather than above it — behind the 911 (58), where ACC is at least available on every car and InnoDrive sits above it, and well ahead of the Corvette (8).

No hands-free highway driving system is offered on the 718 Cayman in 2025 or in any prior year, and Porsche sells no BlueCruise or Super Cruise equivalent anywhere in its range — the 718's assistance list tops out at hands-on adaptive cruise. Floor of the band, matching the other sports cars in the segment.

In 2025 the 718 Cayman still left the factory on Bi-Xenon HID headlights — Porsche's own copy says all 718 models are so equipped — with LED daytime running lights and dynamic cornering lighting. That is a generation behind essentially every rival in this price class, where LED is standard and matrix systems are common, and it is why this sits at the bottom of the middle band rather than in it. The mitigation is real but has to be paid for: LED headlights with Porsche Dynamic Light System Plus, which add camera-based automatic high-beam dipping and intersection illumination, cost $680 on both 2025 stickers examined — cheap enough that most cars are so equipped. IIHS has never rated 718 headlights, so there is no Good/Acceptable result on either configuration.

Forward and three-quarter visibility is a genuine strength — the mid-engine layout gives a short nose, a low cowl and slim A-pillars, and the car is easy to place on a road in a way the long-hood AMG GT and the C8 Corvette are not. The penalty is behind: thick rear buttresses and a shallow rear window create real over-shoulder blind zones, which is exactly why reviewers single out the optional blind-spot monitor as worth having, and Porsche offers no surround-view camera on the 718 to compensate. Standard front and rear ParkAssist sensors plus a standard reversing camera cover the parking case well. Better than the Corvette (58) and AMG GT (55), a little short of the 911 (70) and GR86 (68).

The mid-engine layout puts the flat-four directly behind the bulkhead, so unlike the 911 there is no rear bench to option — every 2025 718 Cayman is a two-seater, which clamps this item to the floor of the 4–5 seat coupe band.

Porsche does not publish US interior dimensions for the 718 and the aggregators carry the field blank, so this is estimated from the car's 51.0 in overall height and its very low seat mounting — packaging that reviewers consistently say clears tall drivers despite the low roof. It lands mid-band for coupes.

Again unpublished, so estimated from the 718's long footwell and generous seat travel — the driving position is a recurring praise point and accommodates a wide range of body sizes. Mid-band, and marginally behind the front-engine two-seaters whose footwells sit further forward.

Two separate luggage compartments front and rear are the mid-engine layout's one genuine practicality dividend, and 15.0 cu ft combined is the most usable luggage space of any two-seat sports car in this dataset — comfortably ahead of the Corvette's 12.6 and the Supra's 10.2, and more than three times the 911's frunk. The rear compartment sits over a warm engine, which is the practical caveat.

The dual-trunk packaging is the clever part and it is genuinely useful — a carry-on fits up front and a weekend's worth of soft bags goes behind. Inside the cabin itself the provision is thin: narrow door bins, a shallow lidded console cubby, a modest glovebox and the fiddly pop-out dash cupholders Porsche has used for a decade. There is no rear parcel shelf and no fold-down seatback to extend the cabin, which is exactly what the 911 uses to beat it on flexibility.

The driving position is one of the best in the segment and the standard sports seats are firm but well shaped, holding up over long stints; the option book runs to 14-way and 18-way adaptive sport seats with memory and ventilation. What keeps it just under the 911 and the Corvette is that the base car's seats are comparatively basic — the adjustment range and lumbar support most owners want are paid-for upgrades on a $72,800 car.

For a car this focused the 718 rides remarkably well — the standard passive steel setup is firm but supple over broken pavement and body control is exemplary, which is a large part of why a Cayman works as an everyday car. It falls short of the 911 because PASM adaptive damping is a paid option rather than standard equipment, and on the PASM Sport setup fitted to most press cars larger impacts come through hard.

This is the 718's clearest comfort weakness. The turbocharged flat-four sits immediately behind the bulkhead with only a thin firewall between it and the occupants' ears, and its coarse, boomy voice was criticized more or less universally by the motoring press. Wind isolation is genuinely good and there is no rear-seat cavity to drum, but road roar on coarse asphalt is intrusive and the engine is never out of earshot.

Two-zone automatic climate control is standard and the option book covers heated and ventilated seats and a heated steering wheel, so a well-specified 718 wants for nothing. The score is capped because almost all of it is extra-cost on the volume car — heated seats only become standard at the S — and the packaging rules out a rear climate zone or any remote pre-conditioning on a gasoline-only model.

The entry 718 Cayman opens at $72,800 before Porsche's $1,995 delivery/processing charge, up roughly $4,500 on 2024 largely because the 7-speed PDK became standard equipment for 2025. That is about $20,000 past the top of the coupe pricing band, so this item bottoms out — though it is still the cheapest way into a mid-engine Porsche and roughly $50,000 below a base 911.

The base Cayman is the volume car, but essentially none leaves a dealer at sticker — Porsche's a-la-carte structure means metallic paint, the Premium Package, Sport Chrono, PASM, Bose and heated seats each bill separately, and a normally specified car lands right about where a stripped Cayman S starts. Because 2025 is the final ICE model year, remaining US inventory is pre-built and buyers take the options that are on the car rather than the ones they would have chosen.

The 4-year/50,000-mile warranty absorbs repairs for most of the window, so the bill is dominated by Porsche dealer service — roughly $1,000–$2,500 in a routine year and $2,000–$4,500 in a major-service year — plus two sets of performance tires and a brake job at 15,000 miles a year. It lands past the top of the coupe band but modestly under the 911, whose larger rotors and staggered tires cost more per replacement.

This single line is what keeps the category from collapsing. The 718 Cayman already has the strongest measured 5-year retention of any vehicle sold in America, and 2025 is the last ICE model year — combustion 718 production ended in October 2025 and the replacement is electric — so a final-year car with an available manual and, in GTS 4.0 form, a naturally aspirated flat-six is exactly the profile that resists depreciation. Projected above the top of the coupe band, so the item maxes out.

Porsche's New Vehicle Limited Warranty is 4 years / 50,000 miles, matching the German luxury norm and Lexus and beating the 3/36 that Ford and Chevrolet give the Mustang and Corvette. Mid-band, unchanged for 2025.

Porsche does not offer a standalone extended powertrain warranty in the US — drivetrain components are covered by the same 4-year/50,000-mile New Vehicle Limited Warranty and nothing beyond it. That falls below the 5-year floor of the band, so the item scores zero: a flat-six or turbo flat-four is out of warranty at four years while a Corvette's LT2 is covered for five and a Lexus LC's V8 for six.

Porsche includes no complimentary scheduled maintenance in the US at all — every service visit from the first one is billed, which at $1,000–$2,500 a pop is the most expensive version of that policy in this segment. What is included is 24/7/365 roadside assistance for the full 4-year/50,000-mile warranty period and a Porsche Connect services trial, which is real but thin. That is the bottom edge of the prompt's 'basic roadside only' band rather than the 'no complimentary coverage' floor, and slightly under the 911 because the 718's older PCM 6.0 connected-services bundle is narrower than the current 992.2's.

$85,000 volume-trim price minus its estimated resale value after 5 years (70% retained, or about $59,500) leaves about $25,500 in depreciation. Add the projected $9,900 in 5-year maintenance and repairs, and owning this vehicle for 5 years costs about $35,400 in total.

A best-case reliability profile for a German sports car: the 982 has been on sale in the US since MY2016, so 2025 is the tenth and final model year of a fully mature design with no new hardware introduced — the only changes for 2025 are the 7-speed PDK becoming the standard-fit transmission (6-speed manual still a no-cost option, now bundled with Sport Chrono), refreshed lights/bumpers, wheels and colors. J.D. Power publishes an 86/100 Quality & Reliability score for the 2025 718 Cayman, and Consumer Reports' 2025 brand work placed Porsche in the top four for reliability with every tested model, the 718 included, earning a Recommended rating. Scored above the 2026 911 (82), whose 992.2 cockpit and T-Hybrid variants are only two model years old, and well above the Corvette (70), Nissan Z (65) and AMG GT (65); held under the Lexus LC because sports-car survey samples are thin and the 2.0T carries the documented wastegate and carbon-buildup wear items noted in 6.1.4.

Porsche is the German luxury brand that actually earns its dependability reputation rather than borrowing it from desirability. It ranked third among premium brands in the J.D. Power 2025 U.S. Vehicle Dependability Study (186 PP100) and third again in the 2026 VDS (182 PP100), took the top spot overall in the 2026 U.S. Initial Quality Study (138 PP100, best of all brands and best premium brand), and has been the most appealing premium brand in APEAL three years running. Consumer Reports put Porsche in its top four for reliability in 2025. Held identical to the 2026 Panamera, Taycan and 911 (all 86) — this is a brand-level judgment and must not diverge between Porsches. Materially better than BMW (76), Mercedes-Benz (65) or Audi (65) as scored elsewhere in this dataset.

The cleanest recall record of any car in this segment's calibration set. NHTSA's recall database returns zero campaigns for every 2020–2025 718 Cayman variant (base, S, GTS 4.0, Style Edition, GT4 RS, Cayman T) — six consecutive model years with nothing filed. Everything on the 982's record is front-loaded into 2016–2019: two airbag campaigns, a passenger inflator, and fuel-line/fuel-system actions, all resolved and none reaching the 2025 car. The one recent Porsche campaign that touches this nameplate is 24V809000 (Oct 2024, 1,851 US vehicles) for out-of-spec center-lock wheel bolts that could fracture and let a wheel detach — genuinely severe, but it applies only to center-lock-wheel cars (718 Cayman GT4 RS, Spyder RS and certain 911s), not to the volume Cayman on conventional bolt-on wheels. Marked down from the high 80s only because that campaign's build window (Sept 2023–Oct 2024) overlaps early 2025-model-year GT4 RS production, and because a final-year low-volume car generates too little field data to prove a clean TSB record outright.

Proven but not spotless. The volume car's 2.0L turbocharged flat-four has been in service since MY2016 with no systemic failure mode, and the 7-speed PDK is among the most durable dual-clutch transmissions in production — none of the IMS-bearing or bore-scoring history that dogged the older M96/M97 Porsche sixes applies here. What keeps it out of the high 80s is a pair of well-documented, engine-specific wear items: the low-mounted turbo's wastegate actuator corrodes and develops play (the metallic rattle that is the single most common 718 forum complaint, largely handled under warranty with a superseded part), and direct injection means intake-valve carbon buildup on higher-mileage cars, with scattered reports of exhaust manifold and catalyst cracking. Buyers stepping up to the GTS 4.0's naturally aspirated 4.0L flat-six get the more robust and better-regarded engine. Scored below the 911's 3.0L twin-turbo six (88) for those four-cylinder-specific items but above the Corvette and Mustang entries in this set.

Excellent materials wrapped around visibly old architecture. Reviewers are consistent that the surfaces, switchgear weighting and craftsmanship are exemplary — leather throughout with Alcantara, carbon-fiber and brushed-aluminum upgrades — but the cabin design, switch panels and PCM hardware are inherited from the 981 era and read, in KBB's phrasing, as distinctly last generation next to the 911's Porsche Driver Experience cockpit. The base car ships with partial leather and more hard plastic in low-touch zones than a $75k Porsche implies, and the richest finishes sit behind expensive options. Scored eight points under the 2026 911 (88) on the strength of the 911's newer, better-materialed cabin, and below the Lexus LC, which is the class benchmark for a coupe interior; still comfortably above the Corvette, Mustang and Nissan Z.

The strongest item in the category. Ten model years of build refinement on an unchanged body, tight and consistent panel gaps, strong paint and very low rattle/squeak reporting, backed by Porsche ranking highest of all brands in the J.D. Power 2026 Initial Quality Study — exactly the initial-quality signal this item asks for. Scored three points under the 2026 911 (93) for one concrete reason rather than sentiment: 2025 718 production had moved out of Porsche's own Zuffenhausen line to the Volkswagen plant at Osnabrück, which took over 982 assembly from mid-2023 through the model's end in 2025. Osnabrück has built Porsche two-doors for more than a decade with no notable quality fallout, so this is a small deduction, not a red flag.

Quality over coverage, with a small end-of-life caveat. Porsche runs roughly 200 US dealers — the thinnest network of the German luxury brands, well behind Mercedes-Benz (~380), BMW (~350) and Audi (~300) — so owners outside major metros travel real distances for service. Offsetting that, Porsche consistently ranks at or near the top of luxury brands in J.D. Power's Customer Service Index, and the 718 shares its service infrastructure, technicians and parts channel with the 911. Scored a point under the 2026 911 (74) because the 718 is the discontinued model in the showroom: with the nameplate ending in October 2025 and its successor going electric, dealer familiarity and technician focus drift toward the 911 and the EV lineup over the ownership horizon.

Expensive to keep, and Porsche's own numbers say so. Consumer Reports ranked Porsche second-to-last of all brands for maintenance and repair costs in its 2025 analysis; RepairPal puts the Cayman at roughly $1,135/yr against a Porsche brand average of $1,192, and real-world guidance for a 718 runs $1,000–$2,500 in routine-service years and $2,000–$4,500 when a major service lands. Porsche includes no complimentary scheduled maintenance in the US at all, so the owner pays from the first visit (see 5.3.3). Parts are Porsche-priced and largely dealer-gated, and mid-engine packaging makes clutch and several driveline jobs engine-out labor. The mitigations are real but partial: the base 2.0T runs smaller brakes and tires than a 911 Turbo-class car, and Porsche has a genuine independent-specialist network. Scored two points under the 911 (52), which has by far the deepest enthusiast aftermarket in the brand; far below the cheap-parts Corvette and the mass-market coupes in this segment.

The 982 launched with a 7-inch PCM screen in 2016 and never grew it — 2025, the generation's final model year, still ships the same 7.0-inch display on every trim from the base Cayman to the GT4 RS. It is the smallest center screen of any coupe in this dataset and sits at the absolute floor of the segment normalization band.

PCM 4.0 is quick, logically organized and — unlike almost every rival — backs the screen with a full row of physical climate controls and hard shortcut keys, so the fundamentals of daily use are sound. What sinks it is age and size: a 7-inch display with 2016-era graphics running a generation of software Porsche has already replaced with PCM 6.0 everywhere else in the lineup.

Apple CarPlay is standard, but wired only — the 718 Boxster/Cayman are the last holdouts in a Porsche lineup that is otherwise wireless throughout — and Android Auto is not offered at all, at any price, on any trim. Half the phone market gets nothing, and iPhone owners have to plug in, so this lands below the wired-standard band rather than in it.

Native navigation is an extra-cost module rather than standard equipment, so a volume-spec 2025 718 Cayman leaves the showroom with no built-in maps at all — and because Porsche Connect is bundled to that same navigation option, most US cars have no connected search or live traffic either. Voice is the old PCM 4.0 command-word system, not the natural-language "Hey Porsche" assistant the rest of the range moved to; in practice owners use Siri through CarPlay.

The one category-7 area where the 718 is genuinely competitive: the optional Burmester High-End system is a legitimately excellent 12-speaker, 821-watt fully active setup, and the Bose Surround Sound option is strong. The standard 8-speaker Sound Package Plus is only adequate, and both good systems cost extra, which keeps this below the Mercedes and BMW coupes that ship branded audio as standard.

The 718 keeps the classic Porsche three-dial cluster: analog center tachometer flanked by an analog speedometer and a single 4.6-inch TFT screen on the right. Enthusiasts like it, but as a technology item it is mostly analog with one small auxiliary display, and no full-digital cluster is available anywhere in the 2025 range — where the 992.2 911 now ships a standard 12.6-inch curved digital display.

There is no meaningful over-the-air update path on the 718's PCM 4.0-generation electronics. Software and map updates are dealer-installed or side-loaded from downloaded media, not pushed to the car, and no vehicle-function updates are delivered remotely — the 982's architecture predates the OTA capability Porsche built into PCM 6.0 cars.

Connectivity is optional rather than built in — Porsche Connect rides on the extra-cost navigation module, so the typical US 718 has no app pairing at all. Where it is fitted, the My Porsche app covers vehicle status, remote lock/unlock and vehicle finder, but there is no remote engine start, no remote climate and no phone-as-key, and owners of older 982s have hit Remote Services outages tied to the 3G sunset.

Outdated even allowing for a strict two-seater with no rear row to serve: the 2025 718 still uses USB-A ports rather than USB-C, wireless phone charging is not offered as a factory option in any form, and there is no household outlet or onboard power. Buyers routinely retrofit aftermarket chargers to fill the gap.

The volume-spec 718 still uses a traditional key inserted into a slot left of the steering column and twisted to start — Porsche Entry & Drive proximity entry with push-button start is a cost option, not standard equipment. There is no phone-as-key on the 982, and no remote start on the gas engine. Being a two-door with no liftgate, hands-free tailgate functions are moot.

The strongest of the convenience items: ParkAssist with both front and rear sensors plus a reversing camera is standard equipment across the 718 range, which matters in a low, wide mid-engine car with poor over-the-shoulder visibility. It stops there, though — Porsche never offered Surround View or any automated parking system on the 982, both of which the 911 and the German coupe rivals have.

No head-up display is offered on the 718 Boxster or Cayman at any trim or price — the 982's low cowl and cockpit packaging leave no room for the projector unit, and Porsche never engineered one for the platform. A total absence, not a trim restriction.

Every 2025 718 Cayman is a strict two-seater with no rear bench, so no LATCH lower anchors or top tethers exist anywhere in the car and the front passenger seat is the only possible child-seat position. Wide frameless doors and a low sill make loading a child awkward rather than easy, and the two lockable trunks are the only stroller space.

There is no crash-test evidence at all — neither NHTSA nor IIHS has ever rated a 718 Cayman — and the driver aids families rely on are almost entirely optional or absent: no standard automatic emergency braking, no lane keeping or lane centering at any price, and adaptive cruise with Porsche Active Safe available only as an option bundled with PDK. ParkAssist with a reversing camera is the one meaningful standard item.

With two seats there is no second row to assess — no rear vents, no rear amenities, no entertainment — so a family road trip is physically limited to one adult and one passenger. The 15.0 cu ft split across a frunk and a rear trunk is genuinely the most cargo of any two-seat sports car in the segment, which is the only thing keeping this above the floor.

The 718 is one of the easiest mid-engine cars to live with daily: the 7-speed PDK became standard equipment for 2025 and is seamless in stop-and-go, the 2.0 T's torque plateau arrives from low revs, and outward visibility is unusually good for the layout. The persistent drawback is noise — reviewers single out the flat-four's coarse drone as the car's least refined trait — and the low nose demands care at every driveway.

At 24 MPG combined the base 718 is the most economical car in this peer group and its 18-inch base wheels wear far cheaper rubber than a 911's staggered 20/21s or a Corvette's, but every mile is bought with required premium and Porsche shop rates. The roughly $3,150 annual fuel bill is only part of it — scheduled service and brakes run near $10k over five years.

The best urban sports car in this set: 172.4 in long on a compact footprint, a 36.1 ft turning circle, and — unusually for the class — ParkAssist with four front and four rear sensors plus a reversing camera as standard rather than an option. The low front splitter still scrapes steep driveways unless the optional front-axle lift is specified.

Porsche publishes no towing capacity for the 718 Cayman in the US market and sells no factory hitch, and a two-seat cabin with no folding surfaces rules out payload or work-gear duty. The only thing separating it from the segment floor is that its 15.0 cu ft of lockable, weather-sealed trunk space is genuinely more than any rival two-seater offers.

The 982 chassis and the PDK gearbox are proven hardware with a strong track-abuse record, so this is no fragile exotic, but nothing about the car is built for work abuse: leather and Sports-Tex interiors, no washable surfaces, low-slung bodywork that meets curbs badly, and a parts-and-labor structure that makes any incidental damage expensive.

There is no 120V household outlet, no hitch, no bed access hardware and no tie-downs beyond a luggage net. The one provision worth crediting is a real factory roof transport system — a rarity in this class — but it is a lifestyle carrier rated to 165 lb, not a work upfit ecosystem.

Two-up touring is one of the 718's better missions — the sport seats draw long-distance praise, PASM keeps the highway ride settled, and roughly 341 miles of range stretches to about 406 with the optional larger tank, the longest legs in this peer group. It is held back by the base flat-four's coarse drone at cruise and by adaptive cruise being an option rather than standard, with no lane centering available at any price.

Rear-wheel drive only in every 2025 configuration, roughly 4.3–4.7 in of ground clearance behind a low splitter, summer performance tires and no tow rating make this a pavement car. The genuine adventure credit is the factory roof transport system with ski, snowboard and bike modules — something the Corvette, Supra and Z simply cannot fit — plus Porsche winter wheel-and-tire packages.

Best-in-class for a two-seat sports car: 15.0 cu ft split between a deep, squarish frunk that swallows two carry-ons and a rear hatch trunk that takes another plus soft bags, both lockable and weather-sealed, with a 165 lb roof carrier available on top. What it lacks is flexibility rather than volume — no seats to fold, no pass-through, no hitch, and the rear compartment's shape around the engine punishes hard-sided luggage.

The 982's mid-engine layout puts the mass between the axles and gives the 718 a rotational balance the front-engine field cannot match and that a fair number of reviewers rate above the 911's own. Body control is exceptional even on the base car's passive setup (PASM adaptive damping with a 10 mm drop is optional, 20 mm on the GTS 4.0), turn-in is immediate, and grip measures at the top of the segment despite the base car's modest 235/265 18-inch rubber. Held level with the 911 rather than above it because the 992 counters with optional rear-axle steering and PDCC anti-roll control that the 718 never offered.

The 718's electromechanical rack is the reference point for how good EPAS can be: quick and linear off-center, weighting that builds honestly with cornering load, and enough texture coming back that you can feel the front tires reaching their limit. Having no engine over the nose helps — the 718 arguably reads the road better than the 911 does. It sits just below the handling score only because no electric system fully recovers the granularity of the older hydraulic Porsche racks.

Four-piston aluminum monoblock fixed calipers on 13-inch front / 12-inch rear cast-iron discs stop a 3,104 lb car from 70 mph in 148 feet, which is short even by sports-car standards, and the pedal is firm, short-travel and easy to modulate down to the last few feet. Fade resistance on road is a non-issue; the base car's irons are the component that eventually complains over sustained track laps, which is why PCCB carbon-ceramics remain on the options sheet.

Judged purely on calibration the base 718 is very good: the 7-speed PDK — standard across the range for 2025 — is the benchmark dual-clutch for both shift speed and low-speed creep manners, tip-in is crisp, and Dynamic Boost holds the throttle plate open through brief lifts so boost is still there when you get back on it. What keeps it out of the top band is genuine hesitation below roughly 2,000 rpm from the single-turbo 2.0-liter flat-four, a trait the naturally aspirated 4.0-liter flat-six in the GTS 4.0 and GT4 RS does not share. Sound character is scored separately in 9.2.2 and is not double-counted here.

This is the base 718's one real failing and it is the single most criticized attribute of the entire 982 generation. There is no vibration through the wheel or pedals and the engine is mechanically smooth, but the turbo flat-four's voice under load is coarse and boomy, and in a mid-engine car it is playing directly behind the driver's head with nothing to filter it. Scored at the bottom of the middle band rather than in the failing band because the objection is tonal character rather than mechanical roughness, and the optional sport exhaust helps — the naturally aspirated flat-six cars in the same range would score in the mid-90s here.

A 36.1-foot circle is mid-pack for a compact coupe — respectable in absolute terms but no better than a mainstream sedan despite the 718's 97.4-inch wheelbase and small footprint, because a wide front track and fat front rubber eat the steering lock a short wheelbase would otherwise buy. The 718 never offered the rear-axle steering that shrinks the 911's low-speed circle.

One of the best driving positions offered on any car at any price: you sit very low with the wheel falling straight into your lap, the pedals are squarely aligned for heel-and-toe, and the seat and column adjust through a wide range. The 982 kept an analog center tachometer and a bank of physical buttons and rotary controls for climate and chassis functions, so nothing needs a submenu — an ergonomic advantage over the newer 992.2. Points come off for the deep sill and low bucket that make ingress and egress awkward, over-shoulder blind spots from the rear buttresses, and near-zero cabin storage.

The 718 Cayman is the car enthusiasts reach for when the 911 is out of budget, and plenty of them argue it is the more rewarding chassis regardless of price — it is fast enough to be exciting on a public road at legal-ish speeds, rather than needing a track to come alive, and it stays playful without ever feeling nervous. 2025 is its final model year, which sharpens the case. It sits below the 911 for two reasons: the base car's flat-four soundtrack undercuts the occasion in a way the flat-six cars do not, and there is no back seat or usable practicality to make the long way home an everyday proposition.

For 2025 Porsche did genuinely sweeten the base car — the 7-speed PDK becomes standard equipment across the whole 718 Cayman line (a roughly $3,700 option in prior years), with the 6-speed manual retained as a no-cost swap that now includes the Sport Chrono package, and heated front seats are reported standard. Everything else is a 2016 car's equipment list at a 2025 price. A $74,795 sports car ships with Bi-Xenon headlights rather than LEDs, a 7.0-inch touchscreen with wired-only Apple CarPlay and no Android Auto at any price, an analog three-dial cluster, a twist key rather than push-button start, no built-in navigation unless you pay for the module, and — the real outlier — not one standard driver-assistance feature, with only blind-spot warning and PDK-gated adaptive cruise even available. Scored the lowest in this dataset's coupe field, below the 911, because at $75,000 the Corvette and BMW rivals it is cross-shopped against include far more for the money.

Two opposite readings that mostly cancel. On paper the base Cayman is poor value: $74,795 buys 300 hp and 4.7 s to 60 when $71,890 buys a 495 hp Corvette Stingray that does it in 2.9 s with a fuller spec, and Porsche's option book inflates a real-world car past $85,000. What redeems it is that the money buys chassis rather than content — Car and Driver's 10Best, an award restricted to vehicles under $110,000 and explicitly judged on value as well as driving, has gone to the Boxster/Cayman twenty years running — and that the 718 holds roughly 70% of MSRP at five years, the best retention in this coupe field, so cost-to-own over an ownership cycle undercuts the sticker gap badly. Placed clearly above the 911, which asks $50,000 more for a similar experience, and below the outright bang-for-buck plays.

Five US Cayman trims for 2025 — base, Style Edition, S, GTS 4.0 and GT4 RS — spanning $74,795 to $166,195 across four distinct power levels and two fundamentally different engines, with PDK standard and the 6-speed manual free on everything but the GT4 RS, plus Porsche Exclusive Manufaktur and Paint to Sample personalization no rival matches. The Style Edition slotted in below the S is a well-judged gap-filler. What holds it off the 911's score is the absence of the axes the 911 has: rear-drive only, one body style (the Boxster is a separate nameplate), and no entry point under $75,000.

Small absolute numbers on a sharply rising line, and the rise has an expiry date. The 718 range sold 5,698 units in the US in 2024, up 26% and its best year since 2016, then 6,399 in 2025 — outselling both the Toyota GR Supra and the Nissan Z — with the first half alone running 74% ahead of 2024. That is real market acceptance for a nine-year-old design, but the driver is a farewell rush ahead of the October 2025 production stop rather than underlying growth, and the volume is still under half the 911's. Scored as a healthy niche seller with strong terminal demand: above the Z, BRZ and Supra, well below the Corvette, Mustang and 911.

Among the strongest badge positions in the dataset, and unusually it is backed by hard commercial evidence rather than sentiment: ~70% retention at five years is the best in this coupe field, and demand actually accelerated as the car was cancelled — the mark of a nameplate buyers want rather than tolerate. Porsche is a perennial J.D. Power APEAL leader with a deep repeat-buyer base. Held just under the 911 for two reasons: the Cayman has always been positioned as the junior Porsche, deliberately kept from overshadowing the 911, and the turbo flat-four's widely panned engine note is a genuine image liability on the volume trims that the flat-six GTS 4.0 and GT4 RS do not share.

Scored on buyer benefit. Porsche puts no factory cash or subsidized financing on the 718 — Edmunds lists no incentives or rebates at all — but unlike the allocation-controlled specialty cars, the volume trims genuinely sit on lots and can be negotiated: buyers average about 5% under sticker, roughly $4,215, and base and Style Edition inventory turns slowly at over 140 days. Leftover final-year cars have been discounted harder still. The GT4 RS is the opposite case, moving at about 1.6% off with dealer markups common. Middle of the band: real dealer discounting, zero manufacturer help.

The oldest proposition in this coupe field. The 982 generation went on sale in 2016 and never received a facelift — the only significant change in nine model years was the 2020 arrival of the naturally aspirated 4.0 flat-six in the GTS, and the base car's platform electronics are unchanged since launch, which is exactly why it still carries a 7-inch screen, Bi-Xenon headlights and no driver assistance. 2025 is not merely late-cycle, it is the end: production stopped in October 2025 and the US order books closed, with no gas successor and the electric 718 still years out. The one mitigating factor, and the reason this is not scored at the floor, is that the redesign risk this item usually penalizes is inverted — nothing newer is coming to devalue the car, and last-of-the-combustion-Cayman status is supporting values rather than eroding them.

The most decorated car in this dataset and the reason the 718 survives every other criticism in this category. The 718 Boxster and Cayman took Car and Driver 10Best for 2025 — the twentieth consecutive year for the mid-engine pair, an unbroken run no other nameplate in the field approaches — and the Cayman remains the fixed reference point reviewers measure every new sports car against, with expert ratings around 4.7/5. The recurring criticisms in the press are exactly the ones the rest of this category already prices in: the flat-four's engine note, the ancient cabin technology and the option-sheet inflation. Nobody argues with how it drives.