7 day Ring Road in early September, skip North? Need 4WD?

Hello, currently planning a 7 day trip in Iceland (9/6 - 9/12). Realize 7 days total in Iceland might not be enough to do traditional Ring Road (LP says 10 days is recommended). Does it make sense to skip North? Also by early/mid September do you need a 4WD/AWD car or will regular 2WD be ok?

Any thought or advice appreciated

thanks

You will never need a 4WD on the ringroad. In winter there may be sections that closes shortly due to blizzard - then a 4wd won't help much. How many FULL days do you actually have? And days without jet lag,? 4-5-6 ?
You should only visit the south coast - or part of it - also depends on how many days you want in/ around Reykjavik .

I have 6.5 days and was only planning on spending 1 day in Reykjavik but your point is valid on time so really only 5 days so South Coast might make most sense. What I more meant was if I wanted to stop and explore some roads find things, does it make sense to have 4WD because regular small car might limit my site seeing?

I think you are doing this backwards.
Figure out what you want to see, THEN decide if you need a 4WD vehicle or not.
Either way I think you should be booking a car ASAP

Had my fathers old grand caravan with mushy suspension and two wheel drive over in 99, drove through a number of gravel backroads as well as the ringroad and had no trouble driving. Some of the cowpaths they call F roads are to be avoided but you having a rental often sign and verily swear to leave those roads well alone so no 4wd required. I'd go for a VW golf or something similar.

thanks all, very helpful, used this advise in coming to decision, posting for others what we ended up doing

https://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/forums/europe-scandinavia-the-nordics/iceland/summary-of-one-week-ring-road-drive

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