Mercedes is extending the life cycle of the A-Class at least until 2028, after rumors suggested that production of the brand’s most compact model would end in late 2025.
Mercedes CEO Ola Källenius has repeatedly stated that the A-Class and B-Class would not have successors, and that in the future, the new compact lineup from Mercedes—built on the multi-powertrain MMA platform—would consist of only four models: the recently unveiled CLA and CLA Shooting Brake, and the upcoming GLA and GLB.
Källenius has said that Mercedes will increasingly focus on luxury models in its Top-End lineup and will emphasize the electrification of the Maybach, G-Class, and AMG models—a process already well underway.
While the fate of the B-Class is sealed, with its production set to end in 2026 without a successor, Källenius has changed course regarding the A-Class. Its production will not end in 2025, but will instead continue at least until 2028.
The current A-Class generation (W177) debuted in April 2018 and received a minor facelift at the end of 2022. By 2028, the W177 generation will have been on the market for 10 years—a surprisingly long life cycle for a compact class model.Production will likely be moved from Rastatt, where the plant has been modernized for the new electric and mild hybrid CLA and CLA Shooting Brake models, to Kecskemét.
Källenius’s decision comes amid a 12% drop in sales in the Entry range during the first half of 2025, and with the sales gap to rival BMW widening to over 170,000 units. Unlike Mercedes, BMW continues to offer a wide range of front-wheel-drive compact models, including the 2 Series Active Tourer minivan, which is priced very attractively for young families and other buyers.
In 2018, Mercedes sold 609,000 compact models — A-Class, B-Class, CLA, GLA — with every fourth Mercedes sold being a compact model. In 2019, compact range sales reached a peak of 667,000 units, mainly due to the very strong sales of the A-Class.In 2024, sales of models from the Entry range dropped to only 534,000 units.