Porsche 911 GT3 RS (991.1, 2015-16): Stuttgart's answer to the McLaren 675LT

The latest Porsche 911 GT3 RS claimed the evo Car of the Year trophy for 2023. It’s an accolade that its 991-generation predecessor didn’t quite manage to acquire (it was beaten by the original Cayman GT4 in 2015), but it is nevertheless a formidable track car in its own right – and one you can actually buy without begging and pleading with your local Porsche Centre. 

Rolling up to a trackday in a bewinged Porsche requires a certain level of confidence, but the GT3 RS has been designed to flatter drivers of all skill levels, while offering heart-pumping thrills when exploring the last few per cent of its potential. 

> Porsche 911 GT3 RS 2024 review – is this peak 911 road car?

The original 991 RS (2015-16) generates 493bhp and a modest (by supercar standards) 339lb ft of torque, and while it’s breathtakingly fast around a lap, its straight-line speed isn’t as otherwordly as you might expect. The delivery certainly is though: the naturally aspirated 4-litre flat-six spits out a multi-layered wail on its way to an 8800rpm rev limit, and the PDK gearbox punches shifts home with lightning speed. The powertrain is pretty much faultless, and like the rest of the car, it reeks of motorsport. 

While the RS is wonderfully communicative and intense at road speeds, it needs a circuit to deliver its knockout blow. With a swollen body derived from the 911 Turbo’s and wider tracks than a 991 GT3, grip is sensational – the RS stays flat and poised even under enormous cornering loads, but there are still remnants of its rear-engined balance when you dig deeper. Rather than sapping confidence, this adds another dimension to the experience, and so vivid is your connection to the car that you rarely miss having a manual gearbox.

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The Gen 2 version (2018-20) stepped up to another level with detail changes to the chassis, engine and aero. Porsche squeezed an extra 20bhp from the flat-six and raised the rev limit to a nice, round 9000rpm, while recalibrating the PDK gearbox for even quicker shifts. The 991.2 also uses stiffer springs and revised dampers, but while the facelifted car is undoubtedly more competent, it’s the original 991 that presents the best value today. 

What to pay?

The world was in a Porsche frenzy when the 991 RS launched, with some nearly-new cars commanding £100k premiums. Prices have long since cooled off – expect to pay around £130,000 for a sub-30,000-mile car, with the cheapest Gen 2s at circa £175,000.

With frequent servicing you’re unlikely to run into many reliability issues, even with repeated track use. Given regular oil changes the flat-six can withstand serious exercise, but be sure to check for bodywork scars from trips to the gravel trap – the RS’s front wings, bonnet, rear spoiler and engine lid are made from carbonfibre, so repairs aren’t cheap.

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What's it like to drive?

The RS’s 4.0-litre engine has its red line at 8800rpm compared to 9000rpm in the standard GT3, and although the screaming top end is still very definitely worth reaching for you don’t get the GT3’s final 500rpm banzai flourish.

However, the trade-off is that the RS’s acceleration feels much stronger from lower down the rev range, giving a greater sense of flexibility and muscularity that is much closer in feeling to the old Mezger engine. With the intakes now positioned to take advantage of the vents in the hips, there is also a ram air effect at high speed, pushing the power above the quoted 493bhp.

With outright performance a priority in the GT3 RS it’s no surprise to find a seven-speed PDK ‘box the only option and while we still miss the interactivity of a third pedal and a manual gearlever, there can be no complaints about the way PDK goes about its business. Shifts are ruthlessly fast, yet so clinically smooth that they never unsettle the car and the excitement of a full-bore upshift punching through, sustaining the onward rush almost seamlessly, is something I think it would take a long time to get bored of. Ferrari’s dual clutch ‘gearbox might still be the most entertaining, but in this iteration Porsche’s PDK feels like the fastest.

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The RS was initially launched at the inordinately fun yet extremely demanding Bilster Berg circuit in Germany. The numerous crests (there is one that makes Laguna Seca’s corkscrew look like child’s play), compressions and cambers could and should unsettle a 911 horribly, yet the RS is staggering in its stability and in the confidence it inspires.

With the same huge wheels and tyres as the 918 Spyder, not to mention the wider front and rear axles courtesy of the engorged Turbo body, the new RS has simply monstrous amounts of grip. The turn-in grip is staggering, the grip and poise under braking (even trail braking) is ridiculous and the way it digs in and fires out of a corner under full accelerative load is sensational.

And yet while talk of huge grip can sometimes feel negative and dull, in the case of the RS it simply translates to breathtakingly exciting agility (and speed). You still have to drive it like a rear-engined car, you still enjoy the unique balance and the terrific traction inherent in a 911, it’s just that you feel like you can take previously untold liberties.

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Perhaps the biggest surprise, however, was how well all this translated to the road. With the monstrous lateral grip that it can generate you might think it would be simply too fast to enjoy on the road, but that isn’t the case. Certainly if you drive it to its limits you are going ludicrously fast, however it is still a rewarding car at legal speeds because of the way the whole car talks to you. With the clonks from the rose-jointed suspension, more noise reaching you from the engine and the immediacy of all the controls you feel constantly in touch and involved as the RS travels down the road.

The electric power assisted steering has taken another leap on too, giving much more textural feedback to your hands. Finally this is a 991-generation 911 with real steering feel. Given the alacrity of the chassis’ responses to inputs we also think the smaller 360mm diameter wheel (first seen in the 918 Spyder) is a good addition to the car. Even the ride is perfectly acceptable in the softer of its two settings, because while it is no feather bed it doesn’t beat you up and actually feels marginally more forgiving than the standard GT3.

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Interior 

There’s an element of Porsche 918 Spyder to the interior of the latest GT3 RS. It starts with the fixed-back bucket seats – long a GT3 RS feature. Their design and shape is very similar to that of the 918, but they’re effective as well as beautiful.

It continues with the 360mm, three-spoke steering wheel, a little smaller than that of other 911s. It’s refreshingly unadorned with buttons, hides a pair of metal paddles to operate the standard PDK transmission, and is swathed in tactile Alcantara – with a brief flash of yellow at its zenith acting as a position marker.

Little familiar details are still there, like the fabric door-pulls and bigger details like the half cage behind the seats. Yet in spite of this it still feels remarkably civilised. Things that used to be no-cost options, such as air conditioning and a radio, now come as standard.

They can of course be deleted, but the change in emphasis from the stripped-out standard is interesting and is perhaps a result of the number of miles that Porsche has found a lot of 991 GT3 owners are covering. In some specs, could this possibly be the first everyday RS?

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Design

Porsche’s Rennsport models are always just that fraction more deranged, more track-ready, more boisterous than the models on which they’re based, and the latest GT3 RS is no exception.

At a glance, you might not spot the alterations. But peer closer and you’ll spot the alloy wheels, larger than before at 20in front, 21in at the rear. They barely clear the arches that shroud them – particularly once the 265/35 R20 front and 325/30 R21 Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2s at the rear are taken into account.

Then there are the vents – from motorsport-inspired slats above the front wheels to the gaping intakes on the rear arches, which deliver a ram-air effect to the intake at speed. The front splitter is deep and jutting, the rear spoiler as tall as that on a race car.

Peer even closer and you’ll spot the sculpted, reprofiled, shallower bonnet, and huge meshed air ducts. Inside, there’s a similar hint of the extra-ordinary, in the 918-sourced seat and steering wheel designs and the ever-present roll cage in your rear-view mirror.

Above all though, it’s a Porsche 911. If you’ve not grown to like the half-century old silhouette by now, not even Porsche’s motorsport modifications are likely to convince you otherwise.  – Henry Catchpole

Porsche 911 GT3 RS (991.1) specs

This story was first featured in evo issue 318.