Bentley announced the end of production of its iconic W12 engine in April 2024, by that time more than 100,000 iconic W12 engines will have been handcrafted in the company’s Dream Factory in Crewe, England.
The brand has now decided to move towards becoming the leader in sustainable luxury mobility and the 12-cylinder W12 engine line will become an expanded area for V8 and V6 Hybrid. The decision came as a part of Bentley’s acceleration towards a sustainable future through its Beyond100 strategy to make the company’s entire line-up fully electric by 2030. With the release of the Bentayga and Flying Spur Hybrid models, this trip has already begun.
In the meantime, an engine that was first made accessible in the industry-defining Continental GT and has been powering Bentley for the past 20 years will be committed to history.

The latest W12 engine to be featured in Bentley Batur

Each W12 engine is hand-built by a team of craftspeople for over 6.5 hours. Then it undergoes a highly sophisticated test of over an hour via three specialist diagnostic machines. One engine is run through an extensive test cycle each week before being fully stripped for inspection. The updated W12 engine has been proven to be as reliable as ever and will be featured on the most powerful road-legal Bentley ever built.
Bentley has decided to give the Iconic W12 a Grand farewell with the most powerful version of the W12 engine ever created to be featured in the upcoming Bentley Batur. The ultimate iteration of this mighty 6.0-litre, 12-cylinder, twin-turbocharged engine, which is limited to just 18 examples of the Bentley Batur to be handcrafted by the Mulliner Engineering Team, and generates 740 horsepower and 1,000 Nm of torque.
While all the Baturs are sold, a limited number of the 649 horsepower version of the W12 engine offered in the Speed versions of Continental GT, Bentayga, Flying Spur, as well as Continental GT Mulliner and Flying Spur Mulliner can still be ordered by customers before December 2023.
For the final and ultimate version of the W12, the Mulliner engineering team has reworked the intake, exhaust and cooling systems to liberate more power and torque than ever before. The upcoming Batur features newly designed turbocharger compressors and 33 per cent larger air intakes.  At peak power, the new 6.0-litre W12 engine is capable to ingest more than a ton of air (1,050 kg) per hour.
Limited to just 18 units, The Bentley Batur with the iconic W12 can be ordered till December 2023.

A word from the Bentley Officials

Bentley’s Chairman and Chief Executive, Adrian Hallmark, commented, “Our progressive journey towards sustainable luxury mobility means making changes to every area of Bentley Motors. When we first launched the W12 back in 2003, we knew we had a mighty engine that would propel both our cars and the brand forward at speed. 20 years and more than 100,000 W12s later, the time has come to retire this now-iconic powertrain as we take strides towards electrification – but not without giving it the best send-off possible, with the most powerful version of the engine ever created.”