faztaz

Just placed a Q7 order for my wife (Samurai Grey with Cedar Brown and several packages including luxury). My question is for those with the alcantara headliner and door surfaces have you had any issues with daily use. This will be our family car with 2 small children in child seats and I'm slightly worried about how the alcantara will hold up. Is there a prep I can do to the surfaces to prevent them from absorbing oil, fingerprints, etc?

superswiss

I don't have any experience with how Alcantra holds up if you have kids, but one of the selling points of Alcantara, Microfiber and all other brands of the same kind of material is that they are easy to clean. A bit of soap water and the dirt comes out. I have black Alcantara seats in my 2013 RS5, light colored microfiber dining chairs in my house and a charcoal microfiber sofa. The furniture is about 10 years old and my car 5 years. None of it is showing wear. Even the dining chairs that my wife and I sit in most don't look any different than the other chairs that are only used when we have guests. You can find YouTube videos where people claim Alcantara doesn't wear well, especially on steering wheels where you touch it constantly. I don't have any experience with Alcantara on a steering wheel, but again, I've seen that just a little bit of soap water gets all the oil and grime out of it. I kinda swear by the material. I don't ever really want full leather in a car again. Leather is very easy to scratch and I feel especially with kids you may have more issues with the leather than with the Alcantara.

mcdream

I've had S8 with Alcantara interior for about 7 years (+3 years from previous owner). Normal leather parts (seat sides) are showing much greater signs of wear than Alcantara (which doesn't have any real signs of wear). On the drivers seat the Alcantara hasn't streched at all unlike other cars where the normal leather has stretched and has become "baggy".
My Q7 is bit over 1 year old and it does have perforated Alcantara seats (where S8 has normal Alcantara) but so far so good.
Since my children are also in child seats then I got an Audi child seat cover that goes under the child seat just in case.
Usually they behave reasonably well and we don't give them anything "sticky" to play with during road trips.
Everything else we can get clean nicely.

I've also got Alcantara seats in my Seat Cupra but the Alcantara there is bit different (not so soft and probably resists better to wear?). No issues with it there either but we don't use it much.
Safe to say that I won't get any new car without Alcantara seats.

jetsfan101

I have alcantara headliner on my Q7 and havent had any issues. I think if anything it's easier to clean off than cloth. For sure

Meyecul

BigKutta

I dont think you have any issue unless your kids are touching it all the time with dirty hands. Alcantara isn't bullet proof. However, i do know that Alcantara steering wheels do not look good after a couple of years.