Report: Never Say Never for a V-8 Dodge Charger, Shares Dodge CEO

Let’s just call it like it is: Dodge and V-8s go together like baseball and hot dogs. The former is made better because of the existence of the latter. When former CEO Carlos Tavares was at the helm of Stellantis, Dodge’s parent company, he had a remarkable disdain for the V-8—some reports even said the only reason it disappeared was because of how out of touch he was with the North American market.

With Tavares in the rearview mirror, it feels like we’re watching many of the brands at Stellantis cautiously reemerge from their hidey-holes and try to pick up the pieces. Only now, those pieces occasionally have to fit into places that are different from where they were before Tavares departed.

Take Dodge, for example. When the company rolled out the new Charger in March of last year, it was clear that the STLA Large platform on which it was based was going to utilize a multi-pronged approach to propulsion. There would be all-electric models with big batteries and all-wheel drive, as well as gas-powered versions that utilized the new Hurricane twin-turbo straight-six. But the V-8 was nowhere to be found, much to the chagrin of fans everywhere.

If you’ve all but given up hope for a new V-8-powered Dodge muscle car, we have some good news: It’s not off the table yet.

Speaking to The Drive recently, Dodge’s CEO Matt McAlear hinted (amidst layers of careful corporate speak) that there was still a chance we’d see a V-8 under the hood of the new Charger.

“If you look back across the last generation, you go through the engines between the Charger and the Challenger and the Magnum, we started out with a 3.5-liter V-6, 6.1-liter V-8, then a 3.6-liter V-6, 5.7-liter V-8, 6.2-liter V-8, 6.2-liter Demon, 6.2-liter Demon 170,” he told The Drive. “You know, how many different powertrains, RWD and AWD, did we have on those engines? [The new Charger] is a multi-energy platform that can accommodate all of that. This is just the first year, and you’ve got four powertrains that outperform every one that they’re replacing, with standard AWD? We’re just getting started. We’re going to have a lot of fun.”

Pressed further on the potential for the V-8 to find its way back in some way, McAlear said, “We’re always looking at ways to find best-in-class performance, to build on performance, and to push the boundaries … There will be powertrain variations that continue to come. We haven’t even launched the SRT yet, so we still have to get into that.” And then the big one: “And who knows where we go if the business case makes sense [for a V-8] and there’s potential,” said McAlear.

He continued, noting how different this new era feels for the brand: “One of the things that’s encouraging is that with the change in leadership, you know, V-8s are no longer a bad word around the company.”

McAlear did admit, however, that Dodge—and the broader Stellantis portfolio of brands such as Jeep, Chrysler, and others—is still mindful of the complexities a V-8 poses from a regulatory standpoint. Even as the new administration has suggested rolling back environmental regulations in the auto industry, banking on that as the new normal to continue for decades wouldn’t be a smart move. “We still have to find ways to keep the engines compliant,” he continued. “And just because there’s a change in the administration right now, that’s only a four-year deal, right? So you have to be careful and balance it across the entire portfolio in the long run.”

Spinning up a V-8 version of the new Charger isn’t just a light-switch ordeal, of course. Immense amounts of cash and planning are required, no matter what the powertrain in question consists of, and since the new Charger wasn’t initially engineered with a V-8 in mind, that will also require additional time. “You can’t just turn something on that wasn’t there before,” McAlear said. “Even if we were to say we wanted to do it today, pick any engine. A V-10. A four-cylinder. It’s a year-and-a-half, two-year development cycle, right?”

Clearly, the rebirth of the V-8 Charger isn’t something that would happen overnight. Even if the idea has begun kicking around boardrooms and engineering meetings, we’re still probably looking at several years of waiting. But should something like that return, you’ll find us at the front of the crowd, applauding.