View Photos of the Mercedes GLE vs. BMW X5, Audi Q7, and Porsche Cayenne
The luxury-SUV segment continues to evolve and grow into something that can handle more than the maze of the mall parking structure.
With SUVs of all sizes and types outselling Corona on Taco Tuesdays, it's easy to forget how relatively young so many of them are. When Mercedes launched the proto-GLE, the M-class, in 1997, SUVs were still mostly Ford Explorers and Jeep Grand Cherokees. The luxury class in particular was so infantile that the first M had a ladder frame.
Twenty years later, there's been such baffling diversification of the SUV species that all four vehicles seen here now have "coupe" siblings that are mechanically identical but intentionally less practical.
Three of these style statements are new within the last year, and the fourth is a sitting 10Best winner.
The latest M-class, now known as the GLE-class, grows longer and wider, with an additional 3.2 inches of wheelbase stretching rear-seat legroom.
A third row of seating is also newly available. Ours lacked that option, but the GLE450 packs Mercedes's new 3.0-liter inline-six that makes 362 horsepower and 369 pound-feet of torque and features a 48-volt motor-generator that allows for greater flexibility in the fuel-saving stop-start system.
When the M-class rolled out 20 years ago, cross-state rival BMW was just a half-step behind with its first SUV, the X5. This time, BMW beat Mercedes to the punch, rolling out the latest-generation X5 three months before the GLE came out.
Based—as is much of the BMW lineup, from the 3-series to the new three-row, seven-passenger X7 SUV—on Bavaria's yogi-flexible Cluster Architecture, the X5 also offers a third row, though the wayback's standard installation in the X7 makes big brother the choice for families with, well, more and bigger brothers.
In the U.S., the increasingly diverse Volkswagen Group sells seven SUVs based on the MLB Evo platform, from the $44,000 Audi Q5 to the $300,000 Bentley Bentayga Mulliner. But the Porsche Cayenne is the bastard that paved the way for bastards like the Bentayga and Lamborghini Urus.
Revised for 2019, it's a nearly two-and-a-half-ton truck with up to 541 horses from a brand that made its name on lightweight sports cars with engines so small and simple, they didn't need water cooling.
Our other MLB Evo entrant, the Audi Q7, stretches four inches longer than the Cayenne between the wheels. The model was the last to market of the vehicles gathered here, with sales starting for 2006, eight years after the Mercedes made its debut.
But its current generation is the group elder, having gone on sale for 2016. It's also a Car and Driver favorite, occupying the segment's spot on our list of 10Best Trucks and SUVs and finding its way into one editor's garage.
2019 BMW X5 xDrive40i, 2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige, 2020 Mercedes-Benz GLE450 4Matic, and 2019 Porsche Cayenne
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
2018 Audi Q7 3.0T Prestige
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