2018 Audi Q5 ReviewEdmunds

MARK TAKAHASHI: Hey, everybody. We're here with the
new 2018 Audi Q5. It's a significant
deal this year, because it's fully
redesigned after an eight year run with its predecessor. Honestly I think they
knocked it out of the park.

Let's take a look. So the most significant
change for the 2018 Q5 is, obviously, styling. It's adapting Audi's
new design language which was more angular,
sharper, more aggressive. Overall, I like it.

In particular, I like how
the headlights in the grill are nicely integrated. They kind of bleed
into each other. There's a nice following line
that continues throughout. And this satin metal grille
look, it's pretty sharp.

One of the cooler
things is they're now putting these really, really
sharp creases in the bodywork. And these creases really weren't
that possible to manufacture a couple of years ago. It's got this nice
character line, this sharp crease that runs
all the way from nose to tail. And it's a nice kind of
sculpting on the side.

There's a lot of the
same character that carries over from the last Q5. It's got a little bit of a
fastback slant in the back, but not so much that it
impedes on rear seat comfort and headroom or cargo space. In the back here, we have these
nice sculpted tail lights, which mimic what's going on
with the headlights up front. It's got these sharp LEDs
that kind of glow at night.

And there's a nice character
line here at night as well. I mean, it makes it instantly
identifiable at night that it's an Audi. The character line continues
all the way around the back. One thing that's cool, too, is
even on the lowest trim level, you get a standard
power lift gate.

One thing that bothers
me on almost all cars nowadays are these kind
of red running lights that have to be there for
regulations in some countries. Because, you know,
if the tailgate's up and you have the hazards
on, you need something to flash back there. Overall, I'm really happy
with the design of the Q5 and, actually, Audi's
in general lately. They've really just
made a good balance between aggressive
sportiness and classy luxury.

So there's only
one engine that's available with the
2018 Q5, and it's this, the 2 liter turbocharged
four cylinder. It puts out 252 horsepower,
which quite honestly is plenty. If you want more, if you
want more performance, well, then you go
to the SQ5, which has a 3 liter turbocharged V6. That puts out 354 horsepower.

Attached to this
one is a seven speed dual clutch automatic
transmission. It's really nice and buttery
smooth, quick shifts, and really just keeps
you in the power. And at the top end, it gives you
great fuel economy, because you have that seventh gear. Quattro all-wheel drive is
also standard across the line.

One of my favorite things about
Audi's in general and this Q5 is the interior. They do this incredible
job of squeezing a whole bunch of
features in, but making it easy to use without a whole
bunch of buttons cluttering everything up. It's a very minimal design, but
it's still really functional. Every button, every knob, every
control has the same click and has the same weight.

It's a little
attention to detail. But it gives you the impression
that this is a premium vehicle. So you have this
great MMI controller, which most of the German
manufacturers are using, BMW's iDrive, and then
you have Mercedes' COMAND version of this. So you get this
great dial in it.

You know, it's easy to control
everything on the screen. It's got these sharp
detents, so you know when you're hitting
a hotspot or a button. Then you have the
trace pad here. So if you're looking
up an address, you can just kind of trace
as you're driving along.

You don't even have to
look down to use it. It has a pretty
good voice control. Although, since it has Apple
CarPlay and Android Auto built in, I'm more
inclined to use those. They're a little better
with speech recognition.

And it works great. It really truly does. And the one thing I'm
not crazy about when it comes to Apple CarPlay in
this, though, is this screen here isn't a touch screen. Apple CarPlay lends itself
to being a touch screen.

Instead, you kind of have to
roll around with the controller here to get to where you want. You've got this armrest
here that slides forward. And you can adjust its height. And you just kind
of drape your wrist over this, what they
call the yacht handle.

And it falls right
over this dial. So it's a natural
seating position. You don't have to feel
like you're reaching for something awkwardly. Everything just falls
to place perfectly.

One thing I really
like that Audi did with the latest
rollout of redesigns is they added these
virtual gauges. Sometimes they can
be a little gimmicky. But in this case, it's really
helpful, a ton of information. It's scalable and
somewhat customizable.

You can have things shrink
down like the speedometer and tachometer, so you can get
a much bigger navigation screen, and control almost all the other
functions like phone and audio as well. On top of that, it's easy to
see in almost any lighting condition. This is plastic, but it's
kind of soft to the touch. And it has a really good
convincing grain to it.

And it matches really well
with all the other surfaces. And the seats are
fairly comfortable. I do wish we had
ventilated seats that were available in the lower trims. Unfortunately, it's only
available in the Prestige.

There's plenty of places to
store all your personal effects as well. Got a nice little
slide bin here that might store your cell phone. This actually works really
well for cell phones, too. It's this nice narrow pocket.

And you've got two USB
ports here, a sliding bin, and some cup holders here. The cup holders, they're
not that generous. But, you know, they'll
hold your Starbucks, but probably not a Big Gulp. There's this phrase that
keeps ringing true with me when it comes to
describing these interiors.

It's simple elegance. Everything is just laid out
right where you want it to be. It's not too showy. It's understated.

It's just plain classy. So as good as the
Audi Q5 looks, I. Think it actually
drives even better. There's something
about this, where I'm going to get back to
my favorite word, balance.

It's got this
really good balance of comfort and performance where
you're not sacrificing either. They just found this
nice Goldilocks zone where it's really fun
to drive, but it's not going to beat you up
over bumpy pavement. And I'm not feeling a
lot of jolts or bumps that I would in other
sporty inclined SUVs. I think it's a
suspension tuning.

And this suspension
in particular, this is what they call
the steel suspension where it's not adjustable. And honestly, it
doesn't need to be. It's now making me
question if you really do need to spring for the top
of the line trim to get that. Now, it is an SUV.

So you're not going to be
railing around the curves and turns like you're
in an S4 or something. But it is surprisingly capable
and actually is fun to drive. But back to steering,
it's precise. It feels good.

I'm not thinking about
am I at the right angle. It just tracks really
nicely through there. As far as the brakes
are concerned, they're easy to modulate. They're not too grabby.

They just feel appropriate
for a car like this. And I was driving
it pretty hard. And I never noticed any kind of
weakening of the brakes, what we call brake fade. The pedal stayed
appropriately firm throughout.

Right now, it's pretty quiet. There's not a lot of road
noise coming through. There's no wind
noise I can speak of. So on a long road trip,
all that fatigue builds up.

But when it's quiet, has a
nice pleasant ride quality like this does, you
can take this thing cross-country with no problem. You also have these
paddle shifters mounted to the steering wheel. But if you wanted
manual control, you can also just move
the shifter over and do up shifts or down shifts. And the down shifts
are really good.

There's no lurch forward,
because it matches the revs in between the shifts. A down shift should
be heard, not felt. And here's an interesting
test that I usually do, is how tight can I do a U-turn? Pretty tight if you ask me. So in everyday use, that
means that you probably won't have to do too
many multi-point turns.

You really wouldn't think
that this was a four cylinder, except for when you
get on the throttle and you kind of hear
it wind up like that. That sounds like
a four cylinder. If you wanted real power,
yeah, go for the SQ5. But this is going to be
plenty for most drivers.

So let's go back to
regular old comfort mode. And all of a sudden, things
get a little quieter. The revs drop. The throttle dulls
down a little.

It's just a little more
approachable, a little easier to drive around. Now, in this class
of luxury SUVs, you have the BMW X3, the
Mercedes Benz GLC-Class, the Jaguar F-PACE. And all of them are really good. I really, really like the
F-PACE for a lot of reasons.

But I feel that this edges it
a doubt in a number of ways. In dynamic mode in the Jag,
it's a little too jumpy on the throttle. It's a little too
abrupt here and there. And it feels a little bit
bigger on the road, too.

This feels much smaller,
almost like the BMW X3. And I really do
like the X3 as well. Again, this just edges
it out in other areas. It's as engaging to drive.

But some of the
interior pieces in this are a little more modern,
a little more up to date. And it's noticeable. But there's no
loser in the bunch. It's so close that it
really could just come down to personal preference.

But I prefer this. I prefer the Audi. Those are the
reasons why I think the 2018 Audi Q5 is at the top
of the class in luxury SUVs. Head over to edmunds.Com
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