Love it or not, the LT2 6.2-liter V8 carried the mid-engine Corvette from concept to credibility over eight years. Chevrolet just announced its funeral. Its replacement is a 6.7-liter small-block called the LS6, producing 535 hp and 520 lb-ft of torque, the most torque from any naturally aspirated V8 General Motors has ever built. It goes into the Grand Sport, the Grand Sport X, and the refreshed Stingray. The iconic Corvette just keeps getting better.
The LS6: Sixth Generation, First Principles
The LS6 name last appeared on the 5.7-liter V8 in the C5 Z06, from 2001 through 2004, an engine Corvette people still talk about like it never left. Chevrolet just brought it back bigger, newer, and meaner: 6.7 liters, 409 cubic inches, the sixth generation of the GM Small Block, assembled at the Flint, Michigan, facility where Corvette V8s were first built in 1955. Seventy years of small-block development, and this is where it lands.
409 cubic inches. No turbos, no supercharger. All the joy and fun of a naturally aspirated, growling, big-block V8 sitting midship in America’s most iconic sports car.
In an era where manufacturers are strapping boost to everything just to keep up with electric torque, Chevrolet went the other direction and built displacement the old-fashioned way. The result is 535 hp and 520 lb-ft of torque, the most torque ever extracted from a naturally aspirated V8 in GM’s history.
The engine runs a 13.0:1 compression ratio, breathes through a 95mm throttle body, and pulls air through a tunnel-ram intake with high-velocity ports that keep airflow moving fast across the entire rev range, not just at the top. That’s where the torque number comes from. The LT2 with Z51 made 495 hp and 470 lb-ft. The LS6 clears both without a drop of boost. Bottom end is forged pistons and rods, the lubrication system is built for sustained track use, and the max engine speed is 6,600 rpm.
Then there’s the exhaust. Center-exit arrives on a pushrod C8 for the first time, and if you’ve ever been near a well-sorted small-block through center pipes at full throttle, you already know why that matters. If you haven’t, it’s one of life’s simple pleasures that you have to experience at some point. Pop into any Cars and Coffee event, and there will be eager C8 owners happy to take you for a ride. A The eight-speed dual-clutch routes it all to the rear wheels at a 5.56:1 final drive ratio.
Grand Sport: Rear-Wheel Drive, Three Levels of Serious
There’s a conversation that happens every time a manufacturer releases a performance lineup with multiple tiers. The top spec has the most power, the most hardware, the most capability on paper. But the middle of the range is almost always the car that does everything well: fast enough to embarrass most things on a back road, comfortable enough to drive to the track, engaging enough that you never feel like you’re leaving performance on the table. The Grand Sport is that argument applied to the Corvette lineup.
The standard configuration runs Magnetic Ride Control, a Touring suspension tune, Michelin Pilot Sport All-Season 4 tires, and an eLSD. With 535 hp from the LS6 and rear-wheel drive, this is not a detuned car waiting for options to make it real. It is a complete, capable machine that works on Tuesday morning as well as it works on a Saturday canyon run.
For drivers who want more edge, the Z52 Sport Performance Package stiffens the suspension, switches to Michelin Pilot Sport 4S summer tires, and installs J56 iron brakes sourced directly from the Corvette Z06. Not inspired by the Z06’s brakes. The Z06’s brakes. Standard front rotors measure 14.6 x 1.3 inches. The Sport package steps up to 15.7 x 1.5 inches of Z06-spec iron, more rotor mass, and thermal capacity where it matters most.
The Z52 Track Performance Package goes further: carbon-ceramic J57 brakes, Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2R tires, track-specific chassis tuning, and the full carbon aero package, including splitter, dive planes, rockers, rear wing, and underbody strakes. Center-exit exhaust is standard in this configuration. Curb weight for the standard Grand Sport is 3,520 lbs.
Grand Sport X: The E-Ray, Renamed and Rearmed
Buyers thought the E-Ray was an EV because we are sometimes a society of idiots who can’t see the forest for the trees. As such, Chevrolet replaced the name with Grand Sport X, where “X” now designates eAWD across the Corvette range, consistent with the ZR1 and ZR1X pairing. The naming cleanup alone was overdue.
But here’s what the Grand Sport X actually is: 721 combined horsepower, all four wheels, all-season ready, without sacrificing a single thing on the performance side. That number puts it above the current Z06’s 670 hp, and before anyone starts drafting a lineup-logic complaint, understand that these two cars are not for the same buyer.
The Z06 is a specialist. Flat-plane crank, 8,600-rpm ceiling, an exhaust note that exists nowhere else at any price. It is a track weapon with a specific and irreplaceable personality that demands you meet it on its terms. The Grand Sport X is for the buyer who wants serious, all-in Corvette performance without the compromises that come with a specialist car. The driver who lives somewhere that sees real weather, who wants AWD confidence in January and track capability in July, who doesn’t want to own two cars to cover both situations. For that buyer, 721 hp with an intelligent eAWD system and all-season rubber from the factory is not a consolation prize. It’s the right answer.
The hardware backs it up. The Grand Sport X pairs the LS6 with the front-axle electric drive unit from the ZR1X: a permanent magnet motor producing 186 hp and 145 lb-ft of torque at an 8.15:1 fixed ratio, fed by a 1.9 kWh lithium-ion battery pack mounted low and centered in the chassis to preserve mid-engine balance. Carbon-ceramic brakes are standard. Front rotors measure 15.7 x 1.5 inches, rear 15.4 x 1.3 inches. Curb weight is 3,800 lbs, a 280-lb premium over the standard Grand Sport, which the front motor and battery account for entirely.
Power management follows the ZR1X architecture: Endurance mode manages battery deployment for consistent eAWD output over a full tank; Qualifying delivers optimum lap-time power; Push-to-Pass delivers maximum output on demand. Stealth mode runs the front axle only to 50 mph without waking the V8. The owner who lives in a quiet neighborhood and tracks their car on weekends will use it every single morning without mentioning it to anyone.
Heritage: Let’s Talk About Admiral Blue
Let’s talk about Admiral Blue. Chevrolet is bringing it back for 2027, and for anyone who knows what a Grand Sport looks like in that deep, rich metallic blue with a white center stripe and red hash marks, that news alone is enough to start a serious conversation about a deposit. The 1996 C4 Grand Sport was built in a run of 1,000 units and has been a collector car ever since, thanks in part to that iconic livery. Admiral Blue returns to the full 2027 Corvette palette.
This level of heritage paired with this level of performance, at what a Corvette costs versus what a 911 costs in 2026, is the kind of combination that makes even the most committed sports car people pause and reconsider their life choices. Admiral Blue on a Grand Sport with a white stripe, red hashes, and 535 naturally aspirated horsepower from a brand new V8 architecture is a serious value proposition dressed up in one of the best liveries in American car history.
Keen-eyed enthusiasts will notice immediately that the location of the hash marks has moved, too. On every road-going Grand Sport from the C4 through the C7, they lived on the front fenders. On the C8, they sit at the rear quarters, directly above where the V8 now lives behind the cockpit. Bold decision, but it shows someone at Chevrolet was paying attention.
The Launch Edition interior goes full Santorini Blue throughout: every surface is dipped, red stitching and accents, Grand Sport plan-view outlines embossed in the headrests and stitched into the floor mats, red accents on the leather-wrapped gauge pod hood, aligned with the steering wheel center mark. Pitch Gray Metallic joins the exterior palette as a new option across all 2027 Corvettes. Wheels are 20×10 front and 21×13 rear in forged aluminum across four finishes, with five-spoke carbon fiber available in three treatments.
The 6.2 Is Gone. The Whole Lineup Moves With It.
The Stingray and Grand Sport are projected to be the volume core of Corvette sales, and both now run the LS6. Both will be built at Bowling Green starting this summer. The 2027 Stingray picks up available center-exit exhaust for the first time, revised Magnetic Ride Control calibrations built on Z06 and ZR1 development data, and Michelin Pilot Sport S 5 tires on the Z51 package with a shorter 5.56:1 final drive ratio. The most attainable Corvette just got meaningfully better across the board.
But the bigger story is what this announcement says about Chevrolet’s commitment to the Corvette as the standard bearer for American performance. At a time when manufacturers are smoothing out their performance cars, chasing broader audiences, and letting successive generations drift toward homogeneity, Chevrolet went the other direction. New engine architecture. More displacement. More torque. More personality. The C8 Corvette didn’t arrive and plateau. It keeps getting more focused, more capable, and more distinctly itself with every iteration.
The least expensive way into a 2027 Corvette comes with a brand-new V8 architecture, an iconic engine name, and 520 lb-ft of naturally aspirated torque, all built in the same Michigan city where this lineage began in 1955. For a car that didn’t need to get better, it got considerably better. The performance bar is higher, the value proposition is stronger, and with Porsche pushing its prices further north every model cycle, Chevrolet just made a compelling case to even the most loyal sports car buyers that a trip to a Chevy showroom is worth their time.
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