Ignition coil APR or OEM Volkswagen

Sounds like coils to me. I wouldn't even mess with swapping them...I would just replace all four. You can do just 2 and 4 but then you can expect 1 and/or 3 to go soon.

I read up some online and decided to order new ignition coils. Took a few days, but I got four new coils and threw them in. Again, problem solved it seemed. No more EPC light, misfire codes didn't come back and no more rough starts.

I was having hesitation problems a few months ago while accelerating. No CEL, and no codes with VAG-COM. I read here that a lot of other people had had identical problems; the CEL and codes didn't start appearing until well after the symptoms started. Changing the coils solved their problems. So I took the risk and changed all four coils (at about 65,000 miles). That completely solved the problem for me. By the way, the new OEM coils had a completely different part number than the original ones.

as the op stated, the car sounded completrely different. there was no hesitation, idle changes, vac changes. the car also accelerated a lot smoother as well. it was easier to start from a stop and the engine felt stronger. i didnt believe this at first myself so i threw them on my buddies heavily modded a4 that had an ignition problem between 4-5k rpm and the sound went away with these coils. his car also performed much better as well.

My wife's 2000 Cabrio started having this same set of symptoms. Replaced coil, plugs, plug wires, cap and rotor not that long ago. Coil was indeed cracked, but the symptoms persist.

Everyone swears the stock coils are great for 800hp because force fed did it. I don't care, the coils suck and always have. I always had random misfires here of there even when new, and I could never run the plug gap I run now with push downs or bolt downs on a stock car even without serious hesitation and enough to increment the misfire counter. This 190k mile Jetta did this also and I thought maybe carbon fouled plugs or a dying coil. Now it pulls 20 inches of vacuum with a rock solid needle at idle no bouncing, no hesitation. The car sounds absolutely different at idle, fresh plugs and a .040 gap, no other change but the coils and fersh plugs. It sounds throatier and crisper with the larger gap too.

I never use aftermarket coils, nor would I. I have taken out too many bad ones. In fact, a friend put a set of some parts store coils in his daughter's Tiguan, and two weeks later one died.

Options like APR's and RS3 coils offer very little if at all over factory other than looking pretty.

VW makes bad ignition coils, period. Bad design, bad reliability, bad everything. They actually came out in pieces and were siezed into the head on some cylinders. There was several inches of calcification and junk from water going down into the holes (no engine cover for 123,000 miles). I had to blow out the plug holes with air compressor, after I vacuumed the inches of calcium dust out, then still after I removed the plugs found rust under the crush washer they seat on. It wasn't fun and I had to polish the holes up to hopefully stop that disgusting build up. It was BAAAAAD looking but it ran fine with only a single misfire up to almost 130k.

Turned out to be bad coil (again).