Maserati Bets the Grecale V6 Can Fill Porsche’s Gap

Maserati listed a 385-horsepower Grecale V6 at $79,895 for 2027, aiming it at petrol buyers Porsche can no longer supply. Stellantis shipped 7,900 Maseratis in 2025 and lost €198 million on the brand.

The new shark nose on the GranTurismo will not close that gap. The cheaper SUV is the wager, and it has a two-year window while Porsche waits on a petrol compact successor.

The Grecale V6 Is Maserati’s Volume Wager

On a California media drive of the 2027 cars, the Grecale Modena V6 was the one that had to do commercial work. The GranTurismo Trofeo in Giallo Modenese still rips through canyons, and it still starts at $166,000 before options. The tester’s coupe landed at $204,430. That is halo money. It is not volume.

Santo Ficili, who leads Maserati, has already said the brand sits on two pillars: sports cars and grand tourers on one side, large luxury vehicles on the other, with the Grecale in the middle “supporting the volume of the brand.” The 2027 refresh puts a detuned 3.0-liter twin-turbo Nettuno under that middle product and cuts the entry ticket.

U.S. list prices with the June 18 reveal put the new base Grecale V6 at $79,895, the Modena at $86,495, and the Trofeo at $117,495. In February, Maserati North America had already introduced the Grecale Modena V6 at $84,500, with 385 hp, 368 lb-ft, a 5.0-second run to 60 mph, and a 160 mph top speed. The 2027 base car keeps that engine and undercuts last year’s Modena.

Andrea Soriani, head of Maserati Americas, said a V6 at the heart of the range is what North American buyers expect: stronger pull, a richer sound, and a spec that stands up in daily use. The four-cylinder mild hybrid is gone. That is the point of the bet. A compact Maserati with a six now costs less than an outgoing Porsche Macan GTS, which started at $94,200.

The brand’s own film still sells the Grecale as a supercar with extra seats. A two-ton crossover with a racing engine still understeers if you treat it like an MCPura, and the first-drive cars needed a lighter hand before the all-wheel drive hooked up. The V6 soundtrack is what makes strangers look. Mass is what they will feel.

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7,900 Cars Left a €198 Million Hole

Stellantis’s annual report recorded 7,900 Maserati shipments in 2025, down from 11,300 the year before, a 30.1% drop. Net revenue fell to €726 million from €1,040 million. Adjusted operating loss was €198 million, against €260 million in 2024, for a minus 27.3% margin. The group also wrote down about €0.6 billion of Maserati platforms.

THE 2025 HOLE

• Shipments: 7,900 units, down 30.1% from 11,300 in 2024.
• Revenue: €726 million, down 30.2% from €1,040 million.
• Operating loss: €198 million, a 27.3% negative margin on that revenue.
• Cause named: fewer Grecale and Levante shipments, plus destocking in North America and China.

The filing says lower volumes and weaker net prices from destocking, U.S. tariffs, and thinner appetite for European luxury in China did the damage. Killing the Ghibli, Quattroporte, and Levante in 2023 and 2024 was supposed to clear the decks for Grecale. The compact SUV never became the volume car those exits assumed.

Sale rumors followed the numbers. Antonio Filosa, Stellantis chief executive, shut them down in Paris on October 14. Asked whether the group would sell Maserati, he said “Not at all.” He also ruled out splitting the European and American brands. Keeping the nameplate is the easy sentence. Funding the next cars is the hard one, and that wait now has a date: December, in Modena.

Porsche Opened a Two-Year Petrol Window

Porsche built the last petrol Macan at the end of July 2026. In the first half of the year it still delivered 19,695 petrol Macans against 15,620 electric ones, from 35,315 Macans in total. The combustion car was still the one more people took home. Leipzig stopped making it anyway.

A petrol and plug-in compact SUV is due in 2028, on an Audi Q5-related platform, and it will not wear the Macan name. The Macan badge stays on the electric car. Remaining petrol stock was meant to stretch into 2027 in markets such as the United States. After that, a buyer who wants a compact Porsche with a tank has to wait.

That is the gap Maserati priced the Grecale V6 to occupy. The math only works if shoppers will take Italian residuals and a patchy service record in exchange for a Nettuno six and a lower sticker than the last Macan GTS.

2027 GRECALE AGAINST THE LAST PETROL MACAN

The Trofeo Grecale still hits 177 mph and remains the fast one in the SUV stack. It does not undercut Porsche. The base V6 does. A non-Modena Grecale with the same 385 hp and fewer trimmings is the car that has to steal conquests, because the $166,000 coupe cannot.

What the 2027 Facelift Changes on the Road

Maserati showed the Grecale, GranTurismo, and GranCabrio together on June 18, 2026, in the year of the Trident’s centenary. Centro Stile took the more horizontal, sharper nose first seen on the MCXtrema, then on the GT2 Stradale and MCPura, and laid it on the three volume cars. Air intakes, an external air curtain, and a revised splitter are the functional bits. Clear rear lenses and optional Tridente wheels that add 10 mm of track are the rest.

The Grecale wears the new face less cleanly than the two-doors. Its upright body and rounded corners fight the shark nose. Inside, the changes are easier to feel. A racing-style wheel with flat top and bottom, an octagonal digital clock with a metal bezel, and a three-dimensional metal PRND selector replace the old flat buttons. Piano black plastic is still there. The metal gear unit on the drive cars moved as one piece, with a creak, and the left-rear window let in rush above about 50 mph.

HARDWARE THAT IS NOT JUST PAINT

• Nettuno in the SUV: Base and Modena Grecale share 385 hp and 32% more torque at 2,000 rpm than the old 2.0-liter four.
• Trofeo SUV: 523 hp, 3.6 seconds to 60 mph, 177 mph, with retuned shift logic that holds boost for the next gear.
• GranTurismo Trofeo: The June 18 release raised Trofeo power to 582 hp, up 40 hp, with 479 lb-ft and a top speed above 199 mph.
• Country mode: On 483 hp GT and GC cars, air springs rise 20 mm and dampers soften up to 75 mph.
• Grecale Off-Road: Ride can rise 45 mm above the 810 mm standard height, or 70 mm above Corsa.

The Trofeo Grecale still has the wide rear tires and short sidewalls if you want the steering to talk. The Modena’s extra mass saving, lighter brakes, and optional panoramic roof shrink the 523-versus-385 hp gap in a straight line. Sport mode pipes a lot of exhaust through the speakers. The old turbo hiss that defined Nettuno now plays second fiddle.

GranTurismo Trofeo, without a battery pack in the spine, still turns harder than any Grecale at just under 4,000 pounds, with electrically controlled center and rear diffs cleaning up throttle on the way out of a bend. Four real seats and a daily ride remain the case for the coupe. The price remains the case against it. A gas GranCabrio starts at $158,000. The Folgore cabrio starts at $149,595 and is the cheaper open car on paper.

Folgore Range Gains Leave Demand Untouched

Maserati did not pull the electric cars. It tried to make them less awkward. The GranTurismo Folgore keeps an 800-volt pack in a T-bone layout, three motors, and more than 751 hp. A new energy-management algorithm takes claimed range past 250 miles. Top speed is 202 mph for the coupe and 180 mph for the cabrio. AWD Disconnect can open the front half-shafts in 500 milliseconds.

The Grecale Folgore is the weaker product. Official figures still sit in a 239-to-268-mile band carried over from the 2026 car, with aero, tires, and software adding 6 miles on 20-inch wheels and up to 33 miles on 21-inch wheels. The California drive called it a parts-bin special from Stellantis EV shelves and left it parked. Extra miles do not fix a crossover that was already the last Folgore anyone wanted.

The electric supercar is not coming either. Maserati cancelled the MC20 Folgore in March 2025, citing insufficient demand for a battery flagship. Ficili later said the work was paused rather than shredded, and that it was not the right time to take that kind of supercar electric. The MCPura stays a V6. The Folgore GT and Grecale remain in the catalogue because the investment is already sunk, not because they are the growth plan.

December Concepts Sit Behind the Facelift

Filosa skipped a Maserati stand in Paris and pointed to Modena instead. He told reporters the December event would not be a slide show.

It won’t just be about slides, but a real plan that will secure the future for our beloved luxury brand. Maserati needs product, Maserati needs technology, and these will be extensively presented in Modena in December.

Antonio Filosa, Stellantis CEO, Paris Motor Show

Ficili has previewed the shape of that plan in public remarks. One concept is an E-segment SUV he is willing to call Levante, “just to say that we are coming back to the E SUV segment.” He has described it as electric. The other is a Quattroporte that is no longer a sedan in his mind, “something between a shooting brake and a crossover: a very low, big car.” A Maserati rep on the 2027 drive also teased two new models toward the tail of 2027 with electrified drivetrains, without naming them.

THE HOLDING PATTERN

1. March 2025: Maserati cancels the MC20 Folgore, citing weak demand for an electric supercar.
2. February 3, 2026: The Grecale Modena V6 arrives in the United States at $84,500.
3. June 18, 2026: The 2027 Grecale, GranTurismo, and GranCabrio facelifts debut with more Nettuno power and Folgore range tweaks.
4. End of July 2026: Porsche builds its last petrol Macan; a combustion compact SUV is not due until 2028.
5. October 14, 2026: Filosa says Maserati is not for sale and points to a December plan in Modena.
6. December 2026: Stellantis is due to show the Levante-class and Quattroporte concepts and the funding behind them.

Customers, Ficili said, are the ones asking to return to the Levante and Quattroporte segments. That is a polite way of saying Grecale never replaced both. The 2027 face on current metal is what dealers can sell while those concepts become cars, if they become cars. Alfa Romeo sharing is one cost-cutting path he has left open. Italian design, he argues, is what has to survive any sharing.

Cassino Is Already Running Short Weeks

The Grecale is built at Cassino. That plant has already been running short weeks this autumn on weak demand for the SUV and for Alfa Romeo’s Giulia and Stelvio. A new bumper does not fill a line by itself. The U.S. Grecale Modena configurator can show a nicer wheel and a metal clock. It cannot hide a 7,900-car year.

Build quality on the drive cars looked a step better in stitchwork and sound deadening, and still Italian in the details that creak. Anyone who buys one already knows the residual and reliability argument. The new bet is narrower: a 385 hp Grecale at $79,895, against a Porsche that has no petrol compact to sell after remaining stock is gone, for as long as that window stays open.

The 2027 cars are in the pipeline now. The December concepts are not. Cassino will keep building the SUV either way, on whatever calendar the orders support, until those two extra models exist or the volume bet fails in public.