Volkswagen has confirmed that the upcoming ID. 1 supermini city car will indeed slot in under £17,000 or around $20,500. This news comes courtesy of Autocar, which recently spoke with COO Thomas Schafer regarding the vehicle.

The car, which will be the smallest EV in the brand's lineup and could one day wear the Polo nameplate, will be headed up by Skoda and will most likely sit on the MEB platform. Just a few days ago, the company debuted the ID. 2all Concept that will preview the all-electric Golf (pictured below). That car, with athletic styling and good proportions, will start under $26,000 and most likely previews what we should expect from the ID. 1.

As we've written about in the past, creating a vehicle that will cost so little is a major challenge that has had its setbacks. Schaffer corroborated this sentiment, saying that "it's not an easy game at all" to manufacture such a vehicle. He goes on to say that the one benefit VW does have is its economies of scale. "Within our volume brand group, we're producing four vehicles along with Cupra and Skoda. That volume will help us to bring prices down to be competitive and also still make money."

Schaffer says that building the car will be a challenge, but the brand has committed to it, so now it's full steam ahead until it is accomplished. Soon, as in the next few months, we'll be hearing more from the company about the car.

The ID. 2all Concept debuted with a front motor setup that will produce 223 horsepower. It will come with a choice of 38 and 56kwh battery packs with the bigger pack getting the range to about 240 miles. It's most likely that VW will be sharing this setup with the ID. 1 to keep costs down, but the 38kwh lithium-iron-phosphate battery will most likely be the sole battery option.

As we mentioned before, the car is benchmarking the Polo not only in size and price but also in name. "The Polo is very successful and one of our icons, and we're going to use that vehicle concept in the future as well," Schaffer said. "Whether we use the same name of the vehicle we don't know yet. We're currently working on those iconic names into the future to make sense of the product line-up."

He said the company is looking into hybrid nameplates as well. This could mean that instead of just getting an electric Polo or Golf we could be looking at the ID. Polo and ID. Golf. Not a terrible option, but we think the brand can do better to keep the nameplates alive.

The ID. 1 won't be built in Spain with the other MEB platformed cars and its actual production facility hasn't been confirmed. There's mention of India because of Skoda's presence, but we'll have to wait and see.

At the end of the day though, it isn't looking likely that the ID. 1 will come stateside. The Polo has never been sold here, and American tastes have long since gotten away from subcompact cars. A shame, but not all hope is lost, because if you are interested in a compact electric vehicle, the redesigned Fiat 500e is right around the corner and it will offer super small attractive proportions and about 160 miles on a charge.