Attitude & Atmosphere: 2025 Aston Martin Vantage Roadster Loses a Roof, and Little Else

For most of automotive history, sports car drivers who opted for drop-tops had to accept a degree of compromise: The credit of open-air exhilaration was offset by a debit to agility and outright performance. If you wanted sun and wind and sound, you had to pay with more weight or less structural rigidity—frequently both—not to mention the typically higher price tag attached to roofless variants.

But cars have become so refined that today’s customers demand—and can rightly expect—such tradeoffs to be all but solved. The latest entry in a long line of roofless Aston Martins proves that a driver’s decision to ditch the roof is an almost completely aesthetic one now; you can have all that classic visceral ‘vert fun without leaving much of anything on the table or spec sheet.

To be clear, the 2025 Aston Martin Vantage Roadster is 132 lbs heavier than the hardtop, and the weight balance has shifted from a perfect 50:50 to a 49:51 (rear bias) thanks to that extra heft behind the headrests, but at these levels of performance, it would take a very keen driver pushing both versions back-to-back to the edge of their envelopes to discern any difference.

A large part of that is because the Roadster was developed in tandem with the Coupe, rather than being a roofless retrofit aimed at bon vivants rather than bona fide sports car enthusiasts. And the benefits of that simultaneous origin story extend to the car’s looks, too. With the convertible roof closed, the Roadster obviously can’t compete with the Coupe’s rakish roofline, but when you stow the top, you aren’t left with a bulbous blob of bodywork on the rear deck. In other words, the Roadster’s appearance doesn’t give away the fact that a hardtop version exists.

Besides the roof—which is a Z-shaped design that Aston claims is the fastest automatic folder on the market and able to transform in 6.8 seconds at speeds up to 31 mph—the Vantage Roadster’s lines are all but identical to its hard-hat sibling. Which is to say, it’s a very well-executed mixture of classic Aston and modern bravado.

Specs: 2025 Aston Martin Vantage Roadster

• Price: TBD (base/as-tested)
• Powertrain: twin-turbocharged 4.0-liter V-8
• Output:  656 hp @ 6000 rpm, 590 lb-ft of torque @ 2750-6000 rpm
• Layout: two-door, front-mid-engine, rear-wheel drive convertible
• Weight:  3670 pounds dry
• 0–60 mph: 3.5 seconds (manufacturer-claimed)
• Fuel economy:  23.0 mpg combined / 12.4 mpg low-speed / 28.5 mpg high-speed
• Competitors: Porsche Turbo, Mercedes-AMG GT, C8 Corvette

Marek Reichman, Aston Martin’s Chief Creative Officer, has been with the company for more than two decades, and he’s evolved the brand’s look in accordance with Aston Martin’s move toward the higher-performance side of the luxury sports car market. That means more aggression, more swagger, and of course, bigger grilles. This is not a stealth wealthmobile, but it’s also not ostentatious enough for the people you pass on the highway to mutter assumptions about the person behind the wheel.

And that’s despite some very overt musculature throughout the design. The distinctive Aston Martin grille appears to be straining forward like the second mouth of a Xenomorph from the Alien franchise, pulling and widening the rest of the front end’s bodywork in the process, while the side profile is defined by a taut positive arc connecting the head- and taillights. That line is reinforced by a more overt one cut into the upper rocker area, plus a distinct slash extending back from the front fender gills.

The car has arresting presence from any angle, but the rear end possesses the majority of the Vantage’s ability to impress as it takes the prime spot at the valet. The somewhat evil-looking taillights merge with the trunk’s ducktail shape in an echo of the front grille, which is met by the inverse shape making up the carbon-clad exhaust and diffuser area. It’s as though the outer edges of the rear end have been pinched together, but the massive fenders ensure that the visual weight isn’t too concentrated around the license plate and logo.

Reichman and his team have gone to great lengths to keep the downforce-producing aero elements within the form rather than tacking on a bevy of canards and lips and wings, but we’d spec our Vantage without the optional highlighter-yellow trim details to up the stealthiness. This detail seems like a clear nod to the Aston Martin F1 liveries of late and the color accents that Aston’s been sporting in endurance racing for years, but our immediate impression called to mind the lip protectors often left on Dodge Challengers post-delivery. Our test car’s Satin Titanium Grey base color, on the other hand, a green-tinted mix of matte and metallic, captivated under piercing high-altitude sun and pine-tree-provided shade alike.

The Vantage Roadster looks great, but what’s it like to drive? In short, it’s just like the coupe. Our test car was optioned with carbon ceramic brakes, with the rest of the ticked-boxes focused more on appearance and comfort (like ventilated seats, a premium Bowers & Wilkins sound system, satin paint from Aston’s Q division, carbon fiber pieces inside and out, and 21” Y-spoke wheels with a nifty black satin finish plus machined metal). Exact pricing for the car and its options is forthcoming, but don’t expect to pay or finance anything less than $200k.

The AMG-sourced and Aston Martin-tweaked twin-turbo 4.0-liter V-8 (Aston’s added larger turbos, different cam profiles, and adjusted the compression ratio to bring total output to 656 hp @ 6000 rpm, and 590 lb-ft of torque @ 2750-6000 rpm) is a proper walloper, and it sounds like one, too. Lower in the rev range, it’s grumbly but subtle, and thankfully devoid of obnoxious off-throttle pops and burbles if you select one of the quieter exhaust modes. When you put the pedal to the cut-pile carpet and leave it there, however, you’re treated to an auditory experience that pairs gloriously with the open-air setting.

You hear half a dozen different pitches as the tach sweeps upward, the basso grunt evolving into a screaming treble that sounds like it’s coming from an entirely different car than the one you launched from the stoplight a few seconds ago. The best part? The transmission, while acceptably snappy, isn’t focused on smacking your skull back with each shift, and the typical fart sounds that we associate with high-performance German V-8s going through the gears is absent in most drive modes most of the time. The roadster, like the coupe, will do 0-60 in 3.5 seconds, but the eight-speed automatic seems refreshingly unconcerned with shaving off the milliseconds that don’t really matter in a road car.

Make no mistake, it’s not a Rolls-Royce that wafts you down the road, but it’s not a track car for stat wonks, either. It would be nice if a manual transmission option were offered, but the way this automatic is calibrated is close to divine, and its operation fades into the background whether you’re cruising around town or testing your appetite for moving violations in the mountains. It holds gears in accordance with the selected drive mode (options are: Wet, Sport, Sport+, Track, and an Individual mode for custom blends of the various chassis, drivetrain, exhaust, and steering options), and we found ourselves rarely using the paddles.

On the handling front, the Vantage Roadster feels, in a word, energetic. It’s not a lightweight at 3670 lbs (dry), but the front end is eager to change its vector, thanks in part to the bespoke compound used in the Vantage’s Michelin Pilot Sport S 5 tires. That said, it’s not a darty little deviant that’s trying to be smaller and lighter than it is. Changes in velocity are similarly confidence-inducing and grin-generating, with our tester’s optional carbon ceramic brakes (410mm discs and six-pot clampers up front with 360mm and four-pots in the back) doing a deft job of moving the speedo needle counterclockwise. Brake feel through the pedal is firm, linear, and easy to transition on and off.

With the engine snuggled up to the firewall and largely behind the front axle, the added weight to brace the Roadster’s rear end makes a negligible difference in how the car rotates around its center mass, and although some steering feel is lost due to the electric rather than hydraulic system, there is enough communication to keep your hands stimulated and your head in the game. The driver is not a passive part of the process.

The Aston Martin Vantage might lack some of the Porsche 911’s precision, but one gets the distinct feeling that that was never the goal, and that’s OK. Though the two may get cross-shopped, any trade-off in front-end sharpness is more than made up for in presence and character. Besides, the Vantage is plenty fun at all speeds.

Driving on your local fun road, you will feel the weight moving around when you start to push towards ticket territory, and the Vantage leaps from one apex to the next with a playful, deft attitude. I expected something with 650+ horsepower, eight forward gears, and sticky Michelins to be kind of detached-feeling below the speed limit, and was pleased to be proven wrong.

No matter how you drive it, the Vantage is a nice place to spend time. The cockpit is the same as the coupe’s, which strikes a nice balance between digital and analog. The gauge cluster is a 10.25” unit that’s easy to read and flanked by some handle-shaped carbon fiber elements that give the cluster the look of a HiFi unit meant to be slotted into a rack. And speaking of, our test car was optioned with a Bowers & Wilkins system developed for Aston Martin (a 390-watt 11-speaker audio system comes standard), which sounded sublime even with the top down.

The infotainment system is Aston’s in-house creation (replacing the dated Mercedes system), and interfaces with the driver via another 10.25” screen. The touch functions work well enough and were glitch-free during our few hours in the car in the mountains surrounding Palm Springs. We liked that the screen was integrated into the console rather than unceremoniously plonked there, tablet-style, and there are tons of physical controls to use as well, which control all the important on-the-fly stuff like HVAC, volume, roof toggle, manual-shift mode, hazards, and the like.

The stars of the controls are the rotating drive mode selector, the “PRND” selector, and the quartet of rollers used to control fan speed, volume, and driver and passenger temperature. These units are the most satisfying controls I’ve ever used in a car, with a weight and sureness that reminded me of the awe I felt playing with the knobs and toggles on my parents’ old amplifier when I was a kid. I rarely fidget with the vents and prefer steering wheel-mounted volume control, but it was hard to keep my hands off this stuff. Below and on the driver side of those awesome rollers are buttons for the Vantage’s chassis, exhaust modes, and traction control modes. Fittingly, their backlight colors get increasingly red as you ratchet up the intensity of each, a nice touch that’s both attractive and informative.

It’s the sum of little details throughout—from design to tuning to a functionally opulent interior—that make this Vantage Roadster a success. Other companies might sell more cars or have an edge in outright capability (though the roadster will hit 202 mph just like the coupe), but the Vantage Roadster is proof you don’t have to dial out the playfulness in pursuit of total precision. Top down, wide-open throttle, volume spun to 11, it’s punk rock at high speed. Moseying around town, it collects its manners, leans into old money feel, and is a perfectly good luxury car, if a bit stiffer than a sedan. Truly, the Vantage Roadster is a convertible in more ways than one.

2025 Aston Martin Vantage Roadster

Highs: More fun than its German rivals, at least as good-looking as its Italian ones, and fast enough to hang with the modern marvels of American muscle.

Lows: Less practical than its German rivals, not as attention-grabbing as its Italian ones, and a lot more expensive than the Americans that can keep up with it.

Takeaway: Aston Martin is moving up-market in price and performance, and the “entry-level” Vantage proves it belongs there.