Land Rover Velar review

Overview
What is it?
What are the rivals?
Is the design ageing well?
What’s underneath?
What's the verdict?
Mercedes-Benz GLE Coupe
Audi Q8
BMW X6
Driving
What is it like to drive?
How’s fuel economy?
Any good?
And the handling?
Range Rover Velar SVAD review: hot SUV driven
Range Rover Velar P300 review: 2.0-litre SUV tested
Range Rover Velar review: the 375bhp 'First Edition'
Interior
What is it like on the inside?
Buying
What should I be paying?

Overview

What is it?

The Velar is by most standards a large luxury SUV. But Range Rover offers more vehicles above it: the Range Rover Sport and then the Range Rover proper – which even has a LWB version. As if that weren’t enough, there are the more practical options from Land Rover: the Defenders in various lengths, and Discovery.

Seems like the Velar is sitting in a pretty tight niche then, and sure enough it doesn’t sell as well as the RR Sport or Evoque. The fact you see it less frequently has helped its design maintain the woah-factor it had way back in 2017.

For 2023 it has had a set of revisions, but justifiably no change outside. Indoors, it gets the company’s latest big-screen command-and-control system. It’s slick and clever, so why do we find ourselves hankering for the old system? Click the Interior tab of this review for the answer.

What are the rivals?

It plays against the premium manufacturers you’d expect. The Mercedes GLE Coupe or Audi Q8, or, in a ‘sportier’ bent the BMW X6 and Maserati Grecale. Even a Porsche Cayenne Coupe. Like the Velar, all expensive and heavy cars.

Smooth, pared-back and slimmed-down style takes priority over absolute space. The Velar’s silhouette is quite fast, marked by a rising belt, falling roof, pinched tail and a lot of screen rake. So while rear seat legroom is OK, headroom in the back isn’t for giants and the boot is shallower than some.

Is the design ageing well?

Proportions are great and the surfaces are pure as snow, all helping stave off the assault of passing years. It’s largely naked of step-lines. If you don’t like fakery, look away from the ‘vents’ on the bonnet and below the door mirrors. But they do slightly reduce the visual mass of the Velar, and they’re meticulously shaped to match the front and rear light clusters.

The cabin is even more visually pared back. Looks good in photos but be careful to check you can actually live with it. It’s so minimalist that your sheer presence, never mind your phones, cups and bottles, besmirches the design horribly.

What’s underneath?

The underbody and suspension are largely aluminium, shared with the Jaguar F-Pace, rather than the Range Rover and Range Rover Sport. So it doesn’t have a low-ratio transfer box, nor the decoupling anti-roll bars you can get on the Sport. So it’s not fully specced to Land Rover’s outermost off-roader level. But by most standards it’s massively capable in the wilderness. And easily capable enough for its buyers, who’d buy a £1,500 Canada Goose jacket to go to the pub, not to trek across glaciers.

For 2023, the plug-in hybrid version, called P400e, has a slightly higher battery capacity so it can do a WLTP-rated 38 miles all-electric, or about 25-30 real-world. It also shuffles between electric and piston drive far more smoothly than most PHEVs. The petrol engine in that one is a four-cylinder 2.0-litre, not to be confused with the six-cylinder in the non-plug P400, which costs about the same.

We’ve tested it alongside the D300 diesel, and the four-cylinder D200 diesel.

For the driver, the Velar is about relaxed security rather than engagement. Let it lower your heartbeat and enjoy the panoramic view of the scenery. And the new range of engines have futureproofed it a little longer.

The newly installed display/control system is mostly good to use and striking to look at. Just be careful with your interior trim choices.

The Velar majors on style but it’s still a useful car. It’s roomy enough for a family, not so big it’s awkward in cities, and capable of unusual off-road and towing feats.

Where rivals from Mercedes, Audi and BMW just look and feel like taller versions of their saloons, a Range Rover is still a distinctive thing.

Driving

What is it like to drive?

Before we get into that, let’s cover the engine choices. While rivals have narrowed their options and even chucked out diesel altogether, not here. The Velar’s engine buffet table is still a long one.

Land Rover has stage by stage overhauled its engine range. A couple of years ago the original V6 diesel D300 gave way to a straight-six. Four-cylinder P250 petrol and D200 diesel options, and a P400 petrol six, bulk out the non-plugged range. Of these, only the P250 petrol goes without a 48 volt mild hybrid systems to shave off a few grammes of CO2.

The D300 might not be fashionably fuelled but it’s a great all-rounder: smooth, quiet, easy-going and good for 0-60mph in 6.1 seconds, and all-the in-gear shove you could ever realistically ask for in a two-tonne SUV. Wind it out a bit and it even generates a cultured six-pot growl.

How’s fuel economy?

The WLTP measurement is 38.6mpg: we got 32mpg, and that was from an example just a few hundred miles old. Even if you have to shut your eyes and hold your nose when ticking the ‘diesel’ box on the configurator, there’s still a deep sense of ‘rightness’, of this being the engine that the Velar was born to cradle.

Even the four-cylinder D200 diesel is a decent thing. Not the performance of the D300 of course, but for cruising around it’s more than enough engine, with a 0-62mph time of 7.9 seconds. Keep the revs low and it’s quiet too. You may see over 40mpg on the motorway, where the D200 acquits itself rather well.

In 2021 a P400e came in, a plug-in hybrid. Two years later it had a slight battery boost so can now hit a notional 30 miles in e-mode. Unlike most PHEVs, this one can accept DC rapid charging as well as home AC.

Any good?

It’s smooth and quiet when driven by electromagnetic force of course, if not exactly swift – there’s only so much 140 electric horses can do when pulling 2.3 tonnes of cart.

Many PHEVs hit you with an awful delayed thump as the petrol engine clutches in, but here it’s a smooth process. It’s quiet in petrol mode too, as there’s active noise cancellation. And besides, the presence of a pretty torquey e-motor really does a grand job of bolstering mid-rev torque and cutting turbo lag. Petrol and electricity in tandem can send it from 0-60mph in a very respectable 5.1s.

Of course you’ll only approach the official fuel consumption if you plug it in obsessively. But even without plugging, the hybrid operation does improve efficiency.

That said, the PHEV version is a couple of hundred kilos heavier than the P400 six-cylinder petrol, and feels it. The ride is a bit more turbulent, especially if you don’t have the optional air suspension. At least the brake pedal isn’t typically mushy like some hybrids. If you’re doing city work, this is the Velar to have.

And the handling?

Don’t come to any Velar for agility. Like a proper Range Rover, it’s dignified and in command of most situations, with well-oiled accurate steering. If you’re in a real hurry, the sport mode does tauten the damping, lower the body and shift more power to the rear.

It doesn’t really want to be hoiked around tight corners like this, mind. It’s too heavy, remote and isolated. In fact, a Range Rover Sport, with its adaptive anti-roll bars, can actually feel more lithe and engaging. Also, Velars come as standard with all-weather tyres, not the dry-surface performance grippers some rivals get.

The ride is generally civilised and quiet, swallowing big bumps well. It’s a relief from the thumpy, rocky progress of too many ‘sports’ crossovers. The air-suspended Velars are a step up from the steel-coil versions too.

The other pole of the Velar’s CV is the off-road modes, raising it off the ground (if it’s specced with air springs), changing powertrain calibration and the traction and diff thresholds. It’s got wade sensing so it’ll ford a flood, and doors that wrap down around the sills so you don’t get mucky calves when you get in and out.

When you are in those modes, even the head-up display does its bit, showing axle articulation and inclination angles and diff lock status.

Oh, and when you take the PHEV off-road, you can enjoy the gorgeous tweet-tweet-rustle sounds of nature, as you ooze along on battery power, crushing everything in your path.

Interior

What is it like on the inside?

It’s not as tall as a Range Rover or a Sport, but you still feel elevated. Ahead is Range Rover’s usual minimalist rectangle of dashboard, with a T-piece coming down as the centre console. The shapes are clean and sparsely ornamented.

New for 2023, the Velar has grabbed its maker’s latest screen system, a large tablet emerging from the centre dash. The typography, graphics and functional logic are as good as any rival’s, and it works snappily.

But it’s overloaded. Pre-facelift, the Velar had a second touch screen below, which you could easily set to carry the climate controls, off-road or dynamics settings, or audio. Plus it had a pair of nice graspable multi-functional control knobs. Now you have to use the upper screen to flick between these different functions: often putting things an extra finger-jab away.

Also, in place of the old lower screen there’s a cubby box. It’s useful, but nastily executed: it has a thin plastic lid that undermines the cabin’s quality.

The Velar launched with the option of light coloured cloth. That has gone. Now if you want non-leather it’s black or black. Still, it’s a rich-feeling and comfortable material. In leather, there are other colours. Whatever your minimalist tendencies, we’d urge you to give serious thought to some colour, and the ash grey wood finishers. Otherwise the cabin looks surprisingly drab and plasticky.

Because the front seats are bulky, there isn’t quite the legroom you’d hope for behind, and the rakish roof slightly limits headroom. But it’s still roomier than a Mercedes E-Class executive minicab. Back benchers get ports and vents and lights of course.

Cabin storage is tight, despite the added centre console storage bay. The boot is big in area but a little shallow, but because this is a long car the overall capacity beats many rivals.

Under the floor it only makes room for a space saver, but that’s better than just a can of repair gloop when you’ve slashed a tyre in the wilderness.

Special mention to the optional Meridian sound system, which sounds like music rather than like a music system.

Buying

What should I be paying?

Prices for the 2023 Velar S start at £54,105, an £8k step up from a couple of years previously. That’s for a 200bhp four-cylinder diesel – the 250 petrol is slightly more. And with a nod to the company car chooser, this spec can also be had as a PHEV for £64,745.

That’s a minimum of around £700/month lease deal or so for the non-hybrids and £50 a month more for the PHEV, which you might see back in fuel saving.

But hold on. This car is about style, and ambulance-white paint and sofa-castor wheels aren’t exactly stylish. So you need to add a minimum of £1,600 to jolly up your colour and hoops.

Also, if you’re a strict vegan, or just happen to like cloth cabins, note that non-leather can’t be had on the lower two trim levels. The tech pack (HUD, wade sensing, surround camera) is a tempting £1,685, and driver assist £1,615. You probably want the cold climate pack (£1,015) too, you rugged outdoorsy lifestylist you.

So in the end you’ll probably step up to Dynamic SE trim and get the 20-inchers as standard, and a superb Meridian hifi. This doesn’t add any of the above packs, mind, and you can spend even more here (£2,225) for the adaptive air suspension.

Dynamic HSE trim must be the meat of the range, because it comes with all five powertrain options. The six-cylinder diesel is a tick under £70k, the P400 and P400e just over. By this stage, 21-inch wheels are standard, as is the driver assist and air suspension and 20-way powered seats. The Kvadrat cloth cabin becomes optional here, at no cost.

Finally, it’s Autobiography, six-cylinder engines only, starting beyond £76k including most of the packs.

For the non-plug cars, CO2 varies from 178k/km for the four-cylinder diesel to 227g/km for the petrol six. The pluggable P400e is a tax-friendly 42g/km.

Warranty is three-years unlimited mileage as standard. If you intend to keep it beyond that, you can buy Land Rover’s extended warranty to cover up to 10 years/100k miles. Not saying anything about Range Rover’s reliability and repair cost reputation, but, y’know, we would.