2022 BMW M5 CS Price Is Very Different Depending On Where You Live

The 2022 BMW M5 CS debuted barely 24 hours ago as of this article posting on January 27. The world was rocked by its 626-horsepower (467-kilowatt) engine, impressive weight reduction, and a 0-60mph time of 2.9 seconds. It also launched with pricing announced for various parts of the world, and it's far more expensive in Europe than it is in the United States.

Let's break things down starting with pricing in Euros. BMW's official press release lists the most expensive figure in France at €199,900. Head over to Germany, and the M5 CS starts a bit cheaper at €180,400. That's fair – France is known to have some of the highest new-car prices in Europe, and when you're talking about a high-performance machine like the M5 CS, a spread of approximately €20,000 isn't out of the question once various taxes and fees are added. However, in the States, the hot Bimmer starts at an equivalent of just €117,000. Wait, what?

To make this live for you, we'll do another set of pricing with all conversions in US dollars. BMW USA lists the M5 CS with starting price of $142,000. In US currency, the German starting price would equal $218,000, while the French price hits a whopping $242,000. Yes, for the cost of a single M5 CS in France, you could have an M5 CS and be just a couple grand away from getting another M5 in America. That's not just significant, that's extraordinary. And perusing press releases for US and European regions, we can't see any notable differences to explain why.

It's not connected to pricing of lower-spec M5s, at least not entirely. In Germany, the M5 starts at €91,900 which translates to about $111,255. That's only about $8,000 more than the $103,500 starting price currently showing on BMW USA's consumer website. In France, the M5 Competition is the lowest M5 model listed at €138,850, which equals about $168,000 in US currency. It's certainly more expensive than BMW USA's $111,000 base price for the M5 Competition, but percentage-wise it's still a far cry from the CS price gap.

Yes, converting currencies doesn't offer a completely accurate, apples-to-apples comparison. But when the differences are as extreme as what we see here, complete accuracy isn't required to raise some eyebrows. Naturally we contacted BMW to ask about the pricing structure and why it's so different, but thus far we haven't heard back. If we do, we'll certainly pass on what we've learned.