Brake Upgrades?

[Lucas_R]

No need to upgrade the brakes IMO. My GTI is stage 2 street driven and never have i had an issue with the brakes - even when being a bit silly. On a street driven car its simply not needed unless you simply want the "look" of big brakes. Personally there's nothing more ridiculous than seeing a car with $5-8k worth of upgraded brakes sitting in traffic next to you when you know that car never goes anywhere near a track.

[XFJET]

rems are crap

stock brakes on the GTI are not bad, did quite a few Mnt Nebo runs and by the bottom of it they start to fade quite bad but on the street they never fade if you really want better then get the DS's but don't waste money if you don't track it

[brad]

I've had a few people say to me Brembo, but I think it's just because they're a well known brand and not from any actual first-hand experience. From what I can see, they seem very expensive too, and possibly overkill for daily street driving (not track). If they're the best, then I don't mind paying for it but I don't want to throw money into something I won't use to its full capacity, if you know what I mean.

There's a few options depending how complicated you wish to get.

Simplest will be a pad, rotor, guide & fluid change with maybe a set of braided lines if that floats your boat.

Brake Fluid: Unless you know for certain it's been changed properly in the last 2 years I'd start here. VWs are supposed to use a low viscosity fluid (VW spec 501.14) such as VW OEM brake fluid, ATE SL6, LiquiMoly SL6, Pentosin Dot 4 LV, Textar DOT 4 PRO or Land Rover RRS D3. I think it's a Super Dot 4 fluid with a lower cold viscosity.
Make sure the ABS pump is cycled before bleeding (can use VCDS for this).

Rotors: DBA 4000 series. Plain face for a stealth look or get the slotted. There are other equally good choices. Get hatted rotors if you want to save some weight.

Pads: ATE ceramic (use the matching ATE rotors and you get a great warranty). Ferodo DS2500, Forza or QFM A1RM.

Guides: The rubber guides for the caliper sliders go oval after a few years. OEM rubber guides & pins are cheap (~$30) on eBay or fit a Tyrolsport caliper stiffener kit.

Braided lines: Your choice - Goodridge or HEL?

If you want to go multi-piston you can go with a kit (ask Martin what he's got) or fit a NSBBK (not so big brake kit) using Porsche rear brake calipers on custom mounts.