2025 Volkswagen ID Buzz Cargo Review: How Practical Is It Really?

We loaded all kinds of random junk into the ID Buzz to get a sense of what VW's electric bus can comfortably carry. The post 2025 Volkswagen ID Buzz Cargo Review: How Practical Is It Really? appeared first on The Drive.

May 12, 2025 - 18:00

2025 Volkswagen ID Buzz Cargo Review: How Practical Is It Really?

The 2025 Volkswagen ID Buzz is an electric vehicle, a bit of a vanity product, and as of this writing, still something of a novelty on American roads. But it is also a van. There’s a lot of wind noise. It rides pretty stiff. And it’s quite spacious, even for six or seven passengers. We took some time to load all kinds of random junk into one to help you get a sense of what the ID Buzz can comfortably carry.

To learn more about the van’s driving dynamics and interface, check out our first drive impressions. Then, we packed six dogs into the thing to get their impressions. Not a dog, but my bud Jerry Perez will have a deeper, week-long test drive review here on The Drive soon, too.

One more thing: We did this test before the stop-sale was put in place after regulators determined the ID Buzz’s rear seat to be too wide for two people. So the third row you’re seeing in our pictures might not be what you can get at a Volkswagen store. Meanwhile, let’s talk cargo.

We got a group of bulky objects to load in as examples. *Andrew P. Collins*

VW ID Buzz Cargo Configurations

American-spec ID Buzz vans have three rows of seating. Even with all the seats up, the Buzz has room for at least four decent-sized duffle bags. Behind the third row, there’s a spring-loaded shelf above soft storage boxes that you can pull out like drawers. They’re like the kind of things you’d buy at Target for your kid’s college dorm room; not particularly elegant but simple and useful.

The ski boots should give you a good sense of how big those boxes are—one pair fits perfectly. *Andrew P. Collins*

The quickest and easiest way to convert the Buzz from passenger to cargo mode is to simply slap the seatbacks down. This gives you a very deep and reasonably tall void of space without the inconvenience of removing anything. The floor is flat … ish. One large piece to lay down on top of the seatbacks would be great for camping or loading cargo that needs to slide or drag into the van. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like such a part exists yet. But it’d be easy enough to make with thick birch or something.

Removing the rear shelf and third row of seats opens up much more space, most critically affording you a lot more cargo height in the back. It’s not difficult to pull those parts, but it’s not exactly trivial. The shelf comes out with two big thumb screws—a simple and slightly tedious task. The rear seats are cumbersome and annoying; getting them to fold, and then slide, and then finally un-click is a multi-stage process involving a lot of movement.

Once they’re free, the seats are not light so you’ll want to lift slowly and carefully, with your legs, not your back. (A key mobility tip because I’m convinced anyone who wants, and can afford, an ID Buzz is at least 50 years old.)

There are quite a few motions involved in pulling the back seats out. It’s mildly annoying, but pretty easy after a few removals. *Andrew P. Collins*

In this cargo configuration, you’re ready for basically anything. I’d throw a tarp down before picking up anything gross, but even if you don’t bother, there’s not much to rip or scratch. The ID Buzz’s cavernous interior can easily eat a set of wheels, a full-sized office chair, or a huge haul of rectangular boxes. A big bicycle fits, but carrying bikes inside any car is madness—they’re too dirty and weirdly shaped. Still, if you refuse to get a bike rack, scroll through the gallery below to see how well a large full-suspension mountain bike fits.

The final phase of a cargo-mode conversion would be to remove the second-row seat bench. It’s definitely possible—the bolts holding the seat to the van’s body all look pretty easy to access. But it’d still take a breaker bar to bust them loose, and for what it’s worth, VW’s people told me that these seats are not meant to be removed by customers.

Removing and reinstalling the rear shelf is easy, and you can do it by hand. The bolts are quite long, though, so you’re stuck spinning them for a while. *Andrew P. Collins*

I declined to mess with them and most owners will probably feel the same way—this feels like a major missed opportunity. Being able to easily remove the second-row captain’s chairs for mega cargo hauls, or to take the midship seats out and leave the third row in place for a limousine-like effect, was one of my family’s favorite things to do with the last van we owned: a first-gen Honda Odyssey from 1995.

VW ID Buzz Interior Dimensions

These measurements will give you a sense of the ID Buzz’s usable interior space. On the left I’ve sketched how tall and deep the cargo bay is with all the seats folded down, and on the right you get an idea of how big the space is behind the second row when the third row’s removed. The cargo area is about 57 inches wide at its widest, though the door is 48.

My mom says we can hang these on the fridge. *Andrew P. Collins*

Here’s How Different Things Fit In The VW ID Buzz

Scroll through this little gallery I made of a few familiar things being stored in the ID Buzz. This might give you a better picture of its real size than simple dimensional measurements.

Here’s a front bumper in box.
Let’s add some more long cargo.
These skis are almost 190 centimeters
Back shelf out, seats down.
One seat missing.
Full cargo mode.
Enough room to relax.
These boxes are about 2×3′
Tall enough for a vacuum.
This is a standard Home Depot tote.
Anotha’ one.
These are 16-inch wheels from a Honda prelude.
Here’s a Dometic fridge, a decent-sized 35L one.
A Herman-Miller chair fits no problem.
Bike doesn’t fit elegantly, but it does fit. And this is a large one.

And here’s how some of these loads look from the side door.

VW ID Buzz Personal Storage

No matter what position the seating is in, the ID Buzz has a few useful small storage slots for personal items. The pockets left of the steering wheel and shelf in front of the front passenger are good for quick toss-aside road trip accessories, and the center console has a neat little pop-out trash-can style bucket at both the front and rear.

Here’s a closer look at the small storage cubbies and cup holders that you have access to in front of the ID Buzz. *Andrew P. Collins*

The cup holders that pop out from under the infotainment system are kind of flimsy and awkward to reach. Storage pockets in the doors have USB chargers, which is always nice.

The Cargo Van Verdict

The 2025 Volkswagen ID Buzz is definitely commodious. The combination of a low ride height and high ceiling make it easy to load from the back, and the flexibility in cargo management between the seats and the little rear shelf is decent. If you’re thinking: “Will I be able to carry a lot of camp gear, or sleep in this thing, or bring home lumber with it?” you can, for sure.

The little shelf behind the third row is clever and well-made. By bisecting the rear cargo area, you get a lot more utility out of an area that’s generous vertically but not very deep.

I do wish it were easier to take the second row of seats out, that’d make it much easier to utilize the side sliding doors for cargo work.

The rear cargo door is enormous. It makes a great awning if you’re tailgating or camping. Less optimally, it might make loading the van in a garage challenging. It might also represent some complications for bike racks. The Buzz’s roof is so high that it’d be annoying to put bikes onto it, and the back door opens so wide that you’d probably have to re-rack bicycles even mounted low on one of those hitch-style carriers. Empirically speaking, the rear cargo opening is 43 inches high and 48 inches wide.

Finally, where the ID Buzz gave me the most acute frustration loading and unloading things is more a product of its modernness than its dimensions. There’s no power button on this stupid thing, so it’s always trying to turn itself off as you close doors. The giant rear hatch tried to close on me like a giant clam gobbling up some plankton. I can appreciate that it’s trying to think for me, but a simple on/off switch rather than a proximity detector would go a long way to making this thing more grumpy-old-man friendly. It kept fighting me as I tried to move it around my loading area and parking pad.

Bottom line: The ID Buzz feels like a middle ground between a modern minivan and an old-school cargo van. I didn’t find the ride quality or driving dynamics to be particularly impressive, but its abundance of headroom and straight, simple walls might give it an edge in hauling over, say, a Sienna or Odyssey.

If you have a small business that involves transit’ing things a relatively short distance (flower shop, catering, mobile dog grooming) one of these could be great if you can grab a pre-imported one that’s not tariffed. Nobody raises an eye to a minivan or cargo van running around town, but in New York’s Hudson Valley where I road-tested this thing at least, people went nuts for the ID Buzz. It seemed like almost everybody pointed and smiled at it. Then again, even at the lowest model’s list price, you could basically buy two Mercedes-Benz Metris vans which are much nicer to drive but not nearly as cute.