Coinciding with the global launch of the Volvo EX90 SUV, Abbey Road Studios and Bowers & Wilkins have revealed the newest phase of their partnership with Volvo Cars. Together, the two audio brands have collaborated on bringing Abbey Road Studios to automotive, launching first in the Volvo EX90 in 2025, and reimagining the automotive audio experience. 

For over 92 years, Abbey Road Studios has been at the forefront of the audio industry. Meanwhile, Bowers & Wilkins has been developing state-of-the-art loudspeaker technologies to the car environment with its automotive partners. 

Now, the two brands have combined their expertise to redefine automotive sound quality and reimagining the in-car listening experience. The partnership between Abbey Road and Bowers & Wilkins addresses the acoustic limitations of the car environment, transporting the driver and passengers to new and more compelling listening spaces. 

The new sound mode available in the Volvo EX90 SUV Bowers & Wilkins asserts, captures the characteristics of Abbey Road’s studio spaces, equipment and processes to create a new listening experience. The Abbey Road Studios Mode represents an evolution from feature-focused to experience-focused sound modes, allowing the listener to effectively engineer their own sound, using configurable settings developed directly with Abbey Road’s engineers. 

The audio mode, the company continues, is inspired by the sonic DNA of Abbey Road’s equipment and spaces, emulates the characteristics of the recording studio environment, and with it the ability to adjust the sound to your own preference. This enables everyone to experience the sound of the studio environment, and the chance for music lovers to explore and create new ways of listening to their favorite content. The mode represents choice and creativity, offering the users new ways to explore spaces and sound character within the confines of the car. 

The natural sound of the studios is captured using real measurements taken from several live spaces and control rooms, plus the tonality of Abbey Road’s EMI-era equipment and expertise of its engineers. In Producer Mode these components have been combined to give the user freedom to explore both the scale of the spaces at Abbey Road and the way in which equipment affects tonality—shifting the acoustic from a retro vintage to a deeper, modern sound, narrowing or expanding the stereo sound field, and adjusting the acoustic environment, just as a producer or engineer would do Bowers & Wilkins states. 

For those less confident in adjusting the specific characteristics in Producer Mode, four presets provide a selection of sounds, optimized for different listening styles. Settings created in Producer Mode can also be saved as custom presets. 

Debuting in the Volvo EX90, the Abbey Road Studios Mode is accessed via the car’s redesigned user interface, alongside more traditional audio settings. The mode will be available free of charge via an over-the-air software update in 2025 for all EX90s fitted with Bowers & Wilkins. 

The EX90 features a highly advanced Bowers & Wilkins audio system, which includes several proprietary Bowers & Wilkins technologies. Seven Continuum cone midrange drivers and five Nautilus Double-dome tweeters are complemented by eight aluminium-domed headrest and ceiling speakers. The central Tweeter-on-Top on the dashboard is a further visible embodiment of Bowers & Wilkins’ acoustic philosophy, also being used in their high-performance home loudspeakers, the most advanced of which – the 800 Series Diamond – can be found in use at Abbey Road. Each of the 25 speakers in the EX90 has been carefully positioned within the car’s cabin. The system has been developed and tuned by Bowers & Wilkins engineers in close collaboration with Volvo Cars’ own audio team and is also capable of playing Dolby Atmos content. 

Bowers & Wilkins and Abbey Road have a long-standing relationship. In 1980, Abbey Road Studios started using Bowers & Wilkins 801 loudspeakers as their studio monitors. Today, over 40 years later, the latest generation of 800 Series Diamond loudspeakers have taken their place. Throughout that period Abbey Road engineers have appreciated how the clean, accurate and revealing nature of the speakers enriches the mixing and mastering process, meaning that music recorded in their studios is often first heard through Bowers & Wilkins speakers. 

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