In its short life, the Jaguar F-Type has proven to be a worthy adversary for the venerable Porsche 911, but so far, Jaguar’s offering has only tangled with the lower levels of the 911 range. That will change, though, when Jaguar Land Rover’s newly formed Special Vehicle Operations gets ahold of the sporty coupe/convertible to create the Jaguar F-Type SVR, which was spotted testing recently at the Nürburgring.

The spy shots show some key changes to the F-Type’s body for improved performance, including a good-sized splitter now positioned below the front fascia, and a massive rear spoiler. Still in the testing phase, expect the face of this SVR to get a lot more aggressive when it is officially debuted, but it doesn’t look like Jaguar is going over the top with its design. In fact, the only other change noticeable on this prototype is different wheels that expose the upsized carbon ceramic brakes.

Along with its aero body package, the Jaguar F-Type SVR should also get a bump in power output. It will use the same supercharged 5.0-liter V-8 as the current F-Type R, which is currently rated at 550 horsepower. Our source projects power to be somewhere in the 580-600 horsepower range, but with that in mind, Jaguar also has the new limited-production F-Type Project 7 that is rated at 575 horsepower.

As for the name, it has been rumored that Jaguar will replace its “R-S” models with an SVR model from its in-house tuning division.

Continue reading to learn more about the 2017 Jaguar F-Type SVR.

Why it matters

The Jaguar F-Type is already a fun car to drive, but a sportier F-Type SVR version should be downright menacing. An interesting note about the spy shots is that the images show the Jag testing with a pair of winged Mercedes C63 AMG Black Series coupes. There’s a chance that this is just a coincidence, but if this AMG car is really the benchmark for this F-Type SVR, then sign me up!

2017 Jaguar F-Type SVR - spy shots