Brake pads Akebono or Hawk Performance

Yes, they're excellent brakes.

Very little dust. Excellent grip. They do take a few min to warm up when cold/wet but it’s not noticeable at all.

I run hawk hps pads on my NA. They've held up to entry level track work and not made much noise on the street. Feel fine when I choose to drive the Miata to work.

I paid < $250 for brakes/rotors (Akebono ProACT pads + Raybesto Element3 coated rotors).

I’ve used dozens of different pads on VWs and other makes, for regular driving with low dust and massive pad and rotor life? I’d use Akebono, made in USA and no pads are higher quality but some can be equal. Are you running it really hard? You’re gonna be replacing whatever you put on so semi-metallic can't be beat,cheap and has the best feel as well because it wears the rotor and pad together!!! Pagid or Bosch QC are hard as a rock and fade free with great feel but dusty. More importantly you need to do the job correctly, the pad is the least of your worries if you’re new to doing it, find YT brake vids for your car if you are, I still watch them to find my mistakes.

I believe if a VW dealer replaced your pads they’d be semi metallic, stop quickly, and have a good amount of brake dust. I went with Akebonos and yes they have a tiny bit less bite. But I have virtually no brake dust and I hear they last a fair bit longer. I’m happy with them

I use my s4 for dd, and use Stoptech cross drilled with Akebono ceramic. The lack of brake dust is unbelievable, and this set up generally gets me tons of miles out of them

I personally use OEM rotors direct from Mercedes and Akebono ceramic pads to eliminate brake dust. Those work just fine for me.

Zimmermann is quality. If you want OEM brake feel go with Textar or Pagid pads. I have Akebono pads on the Z3 and don’t like them

Btw i did Akebono pads after replacing my rotors and it squealed really bad, ended up going to lexus dealer and had to get oem pads.