Lotus Evora GT vs Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 - Head to Head Review! 

You and me both

Dude , my dream "ex-"wife left me for my best imaginary friend 😢😢.....I'm sorry to put that on you brother, I've just been pretending to go through some rough shit lately and your comment almost triggered me 😂

@@Zygrene you forget Alpine

SAME! Nail on the head with this comment.

That's really because true steering feel, that which gives detailed sensations of the loss of grip at the front wheels when pushing too hard in corner has been almost entirely absent from cars for the last 20+ years, so the poor reviewers would have to go through every review saying "nope, no real steering feel" so eventually they just stopped doing it. These are two of the most driver focused sports cars from the two manufacturers whose cars traditionally always had the best steering feel of all (more recently apparently you can add McLaren to that list) and one has great feel, and the other, adequate or ok. It's always worth mentioning in any review and I like how Zygrene does it, and you know you can trust his opinions because he is visibly pushing the cars hard enough for it to be relevant, but the reality is that cars with decent steering feel are very very rare.

when you can get a C8Z for sticker?

Great honest review. As a GT4 owner the engine sold me. That said, with a numeric shift and cables, you’ll get that mechanical feel that the Evora has.

This

It has many of the same characteristics!

I will take them both! I have 981 gt4

I have a 2023 718 GT4 and the over axle pipes are night and day difference. Its actually pretty crazy how muted the gt4 is with the particulate filters.

Went JCR Superlight for mine

I'm not surprised the new Caymans are very similar to the 987 in sound. Porsche builds their exhaust to be very compliant. I didn't think the sport exhaust option was "rowdy" enough. I got sport headers and exhaust from Fabspeed on my 987 and it now sounds like a sports car should, but isn't too loud.

Lol was gonna say! That Evora stock has 3 mufflers, mine has a Larini valved exhaust that sounds like a supercar when it's opened up!

The 2GR in these is going through a tuning “renaissance” right now, and people are pushing them to 9500 RPMs and 400+ whp in NA form. The Evora/Emira should have a very bright future ahead in the engine department.

@@IS300Spartan Source on a 2GR Toyota engine doing 400whp NA revving to 9500rpm?

Frankenstein Motorworks has been tuning the 2GR in the mr2.

Rev limit in the Evora GT is 6800rpm in normal mode and 7000 rpm in all other modes. Never drive in normal mode.

​@@IS300Spartanyeah let's make the lotus even more unreliable by over revving the shit out of it. 😂😂😂 iq200 move.

Nah

Yep in a 20 min track session I couldn't get a single blip right. Very annoying. But I hear you get used to it.

I own a GT. The trick is to roll onto the pedal. It’s not ideal, ideally you’d just kick the pedal like in most cars, but you do get used to it.

The c8 is a completely different car it doesnt compete with the gt4 or emira, it weighs over 800lb more and is alot bigger aswell, its more of a cheaper alternative to a aventador, or other big supercars.

There aren't many more robots building the Emira than the Evora. Biggest change is AGVs move the cars around the assembly line rather than being pushed by people. Emira is still very hand made.

Also the C8 is just a lil too big, even the 911 is big.

@@clu4u the 911 isnt really big, its slightly bigger then a cayman, but it has a smaller wheelbase so it feels small still plus the rear wheel steer makes it feel even smaller.

My favorite growing up was the Lotus Elan, a virtual go cart!

@patrickbai4708 light weight bucket seats. The carbon bucket seats

I just reviewed a PDK 718 GT4 with OEM buckets today! Video will be out in a few weeks.

@@Zygrene damn. Weeks! I would love a ZCT on the process involved in doing the live takes to the editing then release. Would be cool to hear from the ZCT regulars as well!

Emira is an evolution of the Evora, it is not simply a rebody. What the Lotus has going for it is it uses a Toyota engine and gearbox... that is not a minus. The 2GR is a robust engine that costs less to maintain than a Porsche flat 6 and if you blow it up, there were literally millions of this engine made. It will be easy to keep it running. Porsche GT4 may be faster on the track, but it's not going to drive circles around an Evora. GT4 is more focused on track driving than the Evora, so it's not surprising. Also the Evora was the first lotus to use the 2GR, the V6 Exiges came out a few years later.

@@indianapwn3s If I'm paying 100k for a car (1) it has to have a quality engine (2) and it has to have a quality gearbox - these are two items that are missing from every Lotus for the last 20 years. The reality is is not even close between a GT4 or an Emira, the 4.0L GTS is better than both as a pure road going sports car. Its virtually impossible to get your hands on a new NA Porsche, again for good reason e.g. quality, precision and performance. "An evolution of the Evora" - same engine, same gear box, same wheel base, and a Geely "quality" interior. No thanks.

@VK6AB- there have been chassis and suspension geometry changes on the Emira from the Evora. The supercharged 2GR is quality. It might not have the same charisma as the Porsche flat 6, but it's going to also be less problematic than a Porsche flat 6. Porsche has battled engine fire issues on the 991 GT3, they had IMS bearing issues for way too long before Porsche fixed it. That does not scream quality. The gearbox in the Evora/Emira is fine, it's about the best you will get from a longitudinal cable actuated box. It isn't as easy as a Porsche box but it's not sloppy, and has tons of positive engagement. It's nothing like the Lotus shifters pre 2015. Porsche was a struggling sports car maker that almost went bankrupt before building SUVs to save the company. They are now a status/lifestyle brand. Of course they are going to have more demand than a niche low volume sports car maker.

@@indianapwn3s Its not quality, it was a cost saving measure and is a cheap repurposed blown Camry engine (they couldn't turbo charge the Camry unit because of space and heat), for a sports car that is a horrible combination, and then there is the gear box - its genuinely bad. Drive one hard round a track - its a mess and easy to miss changes (and they - specifically the linkages - just get worse with age). The Porsche engines you are talking about are both long gone, the problems were addressed and they built one of the best motorsports derived engines (widely acknowledged) which has been in the 991.2 and 992 generation GT cars for about 7 years (and Cup Car, R and RSR), the IMS bearing issue was dealt with for the 997.2 generation (and 981) so about 4 generations of car ago. In terms of the gear box, the Porsche unit was developed for Le mans in the 90s and derivatives of it are found in all modern Porsche sports cars - all gear boxes are PDK, the manual being the same gear box with stick and manually actuated clutch - the PDK gear box again is widely acknowledged as the best dual clutch transmission in wide production use. Porsche are a status lifestyle brand ok that sounds like you have an issue with marketing - so I can't really answer that (1) it was the Boxster/Cayman that saved Porsche before the Cayenne. (2) having done 5 seasons of Carrera Cup and owning a Cayman GTS, 991.2 GT3 RS, 720S with incoming 296 GTB I can tell you through ownership, competition and touring they build fabulous customer race cars and exceptional sports cars - they are probably the gold standard - Lotus aren't even close, they are barely a niche Sports Car manufacturer who keep getting bailed out because their product doesn't sell, mainly because they aren't that good (The Evora wasn't a good seller). Brits buy them because they're cheap - virtually no one else buys them because they are vastly over priced relative to performance, engineering, reliability and fit and finish. In terms of Porsche sports cars, close to 70% that have been built, are still on the road today. Moreover if you buy a GT division car you can drive it for as long as you like and then sell it for more than you bought it for (in a lot of cases). PS never hit a wall in a Lotus or anything for that matter. If you do and survive you will find you will have difficulty repairing the car - unless there are local sources for the clam shells (the moulds for the body parts) - this may not be the case for the Emira but its certainly the case for Exige and Elise. If you want to see an honest review of the EMIRA look up Jethro Bovingdons review (he was a writer for EVO magazine and is a pretty decent pedaler to).

@VK6AB- just because Lotus deciding to use the Toyota 2GR instead of developing their own engine or using a different engine doesn't mean the 2GR isn't a quality engine. It is a worry free, well engineered, low maintenance engine. The original supercharged engine in the Evora S was supercharged by Toyota for use in Toyota cars in Australia. It was not turbo charged because it was a Toyota developed engine. The newer Evoras with the Edelbrock superchargers don't really use much more boost than what Toyota developed, just with added benefit of denser and cooler inlet air temperatures thanks to the charge cooler. People have turbocharged Evoras, heat is an issue, but it can be done. But using an OEM supercharger setup from Toyota is simpler than developing a turbo charger. I own an Evora 400. I've driven Porsches. The revised gear linkage is fine. You just need to be deliberate with your shifts, it's a very old school feel.

As a recent owner of an Evora GT (6 months and 2.5k miles) your thoughts are also my own. I was cross-shopping with a 981 GT4 and R35 GTR, but there's just something about the Evora that captures pure driving excitement unlike any car i've experienced before. The people that I've met that also own a Lotus are a great bunch of folks that are passionate about driving, which is also a big positive in my book. Only around 450 Evora GTs were made with a manual, so I think you're absolutely right it's much more rare. It's just a great car with some comical quirks that I love (you mentioned some of them). The GT4 both 981 and 982's are fantastic and I would never fault someone from buying one, but my money is on the Lotus.

🥰🥰🥰

Does it take 5 hours to replace it? I almost bought one, but I was smart enough to watch a RU-vid video to see the install. Never thought an air filter change would be so time consuming 😂

​@jamesey76 it's tricky to get the airbox out but it's only an hour job.

@@indianapwn3s Did you have to remove the wheel? Stand inside the trunk?

​@jamesey76 you have to at least jack the car up to get to the access panel. I did not stand in the trunk.

987 Spyder have the hydraulic assist steering, my 981 Spyder is very good with the steering rack from the 911Turbo but not as lively as my old 987 S.

Yeah, even 991.2 GT3 engine makes the 718 GT4 engine sound a bit muted. I need to review a 4RS ASAP.

Forgot if I did during the video, but I've tried it with Sport on vs off and the throttle response is inconsistent in both.

Ah was wondering why he said the rev limiter was so low, I was like WTF is he talking about 😂

GRP has an auto-blip add on for the Lotus for about $500

Spot on.

The emira has stupid screens everywhere not real gauges.

Hit the race button once more, and ESC is all off 🎉

Yup, it's about as close as any modern car has gotten to capturing the feel of the original NSX.

They're very different experiences. Elise is far more raw, visceral, and unforgiving. The GT4 gives me a sense of satisfaction that's in part due to the cockpit design and build quality.

That would have been fun too, but 718 GT4 vs Evora GT is the one I wanted to cross off the list first.

Really depends on what you want. The Vette is a much heavier and bigger car but has more power. It also has adjustable suspension that can make it super comfy to daily. That said, the Evora wins for steering feel hands down. If you want something that is all about the drive and nothing else it's hard to beat. The downside of the Evora is the inconsistent build quality and general cheap feel compared to the others. The GT4 is easily the best build quality. I love the new Vette, but porsche is still the precision build master. The interior is fantastic, and the steering feel is somewhere between the lotus and the Vette. All three are fantastic though. You really need to test drive all three to figure out what speaks to you.

Hard to say without a back to back comparison, but the C8 might be easier to drive fast in the canyons due to its immense torque and DCT. GT4 and Evora GT feel more precise, and they make you work for the performance. They're all damn good cars.

In terms of GT performance, the C8 Z06 is fastest around the Nurburgring of all 3 by 18 sec. Not to mention it's MSRP new is $106K. That said, it's really a matter of personal taste. It may not be the fastest, but I prefer the flavor of the Lotus more than the others

@@Datsun510zen try to find a C8 Z06 at MSRP and not marked up $50k, goood luck! Completely pointless to mention MSRP without specifying ADM these days. Sure, you’ll next say, “there are dealers that sell at MSRP,” and sure, they do, and they’re happy to take your deposit $, along with literally hundreds of other people, put that $ in a bank, and let you wait a few years while they deliver a couple of cars a month. Right now, today, you can guy buy an Evora for cash, and the only other car cost comparison is what you would pay today if you go pay cash. Again, good luck going to buy anything halfway desirable at a dealership and not pay ADM on top of MSRP.

I'm a shell of my former self

Agreed. Alignment is huge for this.

Also definitely yes on alignment.

Lol where do I even start... The only pros for the GR86/BRZ are their approachable limits, how eager they are to go sideways, and interior space.

It's been a while since I've driven an earlier model year Evora. I believe the interior ergonomics and quality are even more compromised, but at 40k I wouldn't mind if the core driving dynamics are the same as the GT.

and yes Evora is a bit oldschool feeling - own now the new Alpine A110 which is way more modern feeling in all aspects

Steering feel is essential and a Toyota engine is reliable

Evora GT has more torque, double wishbone front suspension, normal length gears and imo sounds better.

Looks, steering, and sound for some...

@@rcDoomWould you choose a Toyota engine over a Porsche engine? Gawd no, 981 Spyder here 😂

​@@clu4u If I wanted it to last, yeah. Seems like basically every Porsche designed engine has some critical flaw that's going to cost you a bomb down the road if you long term their cars. The GT3 RS 4.0 engine is awesome but certainly the 991.1 cars have had a lot of issues with their engines and there are rumblings that even the .2 isn't safe from the same issues. The Toyota engine isn't the most characterful thing in the world, but I'll bet it keeps going, and going, and going.

Only if you're a fat boomer.

"Unfinished Lego" is so accurate lol

Just get the previous m2cs

The M2 is so fat and heavy it's slower than a honda civic type R.

@@LawrenceTimme The M2 is still the much better car. It’s not an economic daily with a lot of horsepower like a Civic

It's a sports car.