Why the Least Expensive Ferrari Is the One Worth Having
While top-tier supercars chase extreme aerodynamics, the Ferrari Amalfi offers a more accessible mix of stealth luxury and twin-turbo performance
Named after the coast with the most, the Ferrari Amalfi is the Italian automaker’s latest entry-level car, starting at just $261,810 in the U.S., before options and delivery. Needless to say, buyers have a lot of options. Our teal-green metallic test car gained $143,710 worth of personalization on its way out the door.
Above the Amalfi, Ferrari’s portfolio soars in price, performance and visual outrage, starring cars like the 12Cilindri GT, Purosangue SUV and the all-electric Luce. These are Ferrari’s series-production cars, starting between $400,000-$600,000. Adding a zero will take you to the Icona showroom, where very special customers can acquire rarities such as the Daytona SP3 and mighty F80 supercar, the taxes on which would easily exceed the price of our test car.
But if I had to pick just one, I’d choose the Amalfi and give the rest to charity. Why? Because, lately, the more expensive Ferraris are, the uglier they get.
I say ugly. I suppose I mean overly aggressive, aerodynamically inelegant or otherwise looksmaxxed. I liken it the way meteorologists measure the intensity of surf energy, in kilojoules per square meter, except it’s in douchiness per cubic foot. Some of the most coveted examples are drowning in their own testosterone.
This relationship between price and lack of subtlety leaves me with the Amalfi—and the coupe, no less, not even the convertible Spider. More practical, don’t you know.
Not that I don’t have beef with the Amalfi. Introduced in 2025, the two-seat, mid-front-mounted GT replaced the retiring Roma, a lovelier and more astute interpretation of the brief, complete with a historically redolent “eggcrate” grille. While familiar, the Amalfi’s exterior—a “sleek, monolithic speedform”—is wrapped in softer, more organic curvatures. Some might call it underbaked.
The biggest change is at the Amalfi’s front end, where a mesh grille separates the car’s nose from its scimitar-shaped chin spoiler. The twin-bladed look is the current house style, shared with the Luce, 849 Testarossa and Daytona SP3. It works the least well on Amalfi.
When it comes to aspirations to quiet elegance, context matters. Back home in Raleigh, N.C.—sitting in the drive-through line for Chick-fil-A or wherever—the rakish Amalfi would have high-schoolers jumping around like the early hominids in “2001: A Space Odyssey.”
But I drove the car in Monterey, Calif., last month, during the annual classic-car festivities ending with Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. Famous for its billion-dollar traffic jams, Monterey’s Car Week is the one place in all the world where you can drive a new Ferrari and still pass unnoticed. Fine by me. I didn’t have time to juice.
In some ways, the Amalfi’s stealth undersells the beast beneath. Ferrari’s starter kit now also includes the brake-by-wire system shared with 296 GTB, 849 Testarossa and 12Cilindri. The ABS Evo system uses a six-axis sensor to precisely optimize brake-force distribution under changing conditions.
The Amalfi also shares an electric power steering system (EPS) evolved from that of the 296 GTB, which Ferrari says can detect and estimate front grip 10% quicker than before. Perhaps. In order to confirm these figures I would need the car for at least a month in the South of France.
Enzo Ferrari liked to say that his company sells engines and throws in the rest of the cars for free. That sounds strangely plausible in the case of the Amalfi, whose twin-turbocharged 3.9-liter V8 explores the radical edge of combustion, reaching 631 hp at 7,500 rpm. A new engine control system provides independent authority over the turbochargers’ rotational speed, up to 171,000 rpm. That’s cute.
Throw in a flat-plane crankshaft, low-inertia turbos and equal-length exhaust runners and you’ve got a hurricane on a dimmer switch. Ferrari quotes a 0-62 mph acceleration of 3.3 seconds—and then comes the long, muffled howling in third and fourth gear. Oh man. Daddy like. Owners can save time by surrendering their driver’s licenses ahead of delivery.
Being a globally homologated product, the Amalfi has to meet emissions requirements for other markets, including stop-start engine cycling, which while defeatable comes back each time the car is started. With most powertrains, the intermittency of stop-start cycling is no great loss—it’s not like I’m missing the sweaty chatter of the average turbo four. But when the Amalfi’s V8 silences itself, it leaves a pretty big hole in the moment.
The car’s muted voice is likewise an artifact of stricter sound-pollution requirements. As drivers ratchet up to Sport and Race modes on the manettino controller, the active exhaust valves allow more volume and breathy resonance. But even at its wildest, the Amalfi never gets properly wild. Again, I’m good with it.
Organized around what Ferrari deems a “dual-cockpit layout,” the swank, future-curious cabin design imagines driver and passenger bonding over the 10.25-inch central touch-screen display. Sure, why not? The Amalfi also provides an instrument display for the passenger, configured to display vehicle data and telemetry, so lovers can whisper sweet nothings about instantaneous g-loading. The screen is polarized so as to make the display invisible from the driver’s position.
Ferrari’s Human-Machine Interface (HMI) has also been through some things. By popular demand, the capacitive switches on the Roma’s steering wheel have been replaced with tactile buttons and controllers—including, Ferrari says, the return of the iconic Start button. If it was so iconic, why did they get rid of it?
Newbies will have to parse the gear thingy in the console, three controllers meant to evoke the gated shifters of yore. It’s fun to pretend. And even though there are positions for Reverse and Neutral, you can’t just put the car in A for automatic and take off. Drivers tick the right paddle shifter to select first gear, uh, first. Oy.
Anyway, having to master the intricacies of Amalfi’s HMI is the kind of problem one dreams of having. Fortunately, the prettiest Ferrari is also, currently, the most attainable.