BMW B47

The B47 is BMW’s current 2.0-litre four-cylinder diesel, in production since 2014. It is the
diesel member of the modular B-family, alongside the petrol B48 four
and the B57 six — and, like the
N47 it replaced, it has never been sold in the United States.

What the B47 is

A 2.0-litre inline-four diesel with an aluminium block, high-pressure common rail injection
and one or two turbochargers depending on output. It shares its architecture with the rest of
BMW’s modular family: roughly 500 cc per cylinder, common bore spacing, shared ancillaries with
the four-cylinder petrol B48 and the six-cylinder diesel
B57.

That modularity is the point of the B generation. Four petrol cylinders, four diesel, three
petrol, six of each — all built on the same module, on the same lines, with the same
tooling.

Why it is not in our records

Our specification pages come from United States government data, and a car not certified for
sale here does not appear in it. The B47 has no American application: the 118d, 320d, 520d, X1
and X3 diesels it powers were sold in Europe and other markets only.

The American diesel story is short and entirely six-cylinder. The
M57 arrived in 2009 in the 335d and X5 xDrive35d and finished in
2013; the B57 appears exactly once, as a certification record for a
2018 540d xDrive that our 2018 5 Series brochure does not mention at all. After that, nothing.

What we do not publish

No reliability rating, no power figures and no specification table. There is no United States
government record covering this engine and no brochure in our archive that describes it. The
complaint database usually cited for durability claims covers vehicles sold in America, which
these were not, so even the flawed approach is unavailable.

General description — displacement, layout, the family it belongs to — is on this
page as description. Where a page here carries a number, it names the record the number came
from; this page carries none because there is none to name.

Common questions

Which BMWs have the B47?

The 118d, 120d, 218d, 318d, 320d, 420d, 520d, X1 18d and 20d, X2, X3 20d and others, in
diesel markets from 2014. None in the United States.

Is the B47 related to the B48?

Yes — same modular family, same basic architecture, one diesel and one petrol. The
B48 is the one Americans actually get, in the 330i, 530i and X3
30i among others.

Can I buy a four-cylinder diesel BMW in America?

No. No four-cylinder diesel BMW has ever been certified for sale in the United States. The
diesels sold here were six-cylinder cars, and the last of them was a 2013 X5 xDrive35d.

What is the difference between the B47 and the N47?

Generation. The N47 ran from 2007 to 2015 and the B47 replaced it
from 2014 as part of the modular family. Neither was sold here.

Sources

None for this engine, and the page says so. The American diesel comparison comes from EPA
certification and fuel economy data, named on each specification page, and
from the 2018 5 Series brochure in this archive.