The Range Rover Evoque is One of the Best Luxury SUVs

I'm Jacob. I'm Yuri. We're going for a drive. 2020 Land Rover Range Rover Evoque. P300 R-Dynamic HSE with no launch control. Not bad after, definitely not much right off the line. I felt like it was a lot faster when I was just driving it and then I'd already floor it. It's actually a lot faster when you're regularly driving it, not off the line, but we'll get to that in a second. Horsepower and torque. 296 horsepower, 295 pound-feet of torque from a 2-liter 4-cylinder turbo. That's good power out of that. Yeah, so let's get to that now. So as soon as I started driving this thing, I noticed that this has the most appropriate amount of power for this type of vehicle. Yeah, I noticed the exact same thing. Yeah, so when you're just cruising along in drive and then you give it a little bit of power, it's the right amount of torque. And it's all like low-end torque, which made me think that I was actually in a V6 at first. I'm like, oh, damn, this is a turbo 4? Like, this is really good. But the problem is this has a 9-speed auto and it's very slow when you floor it. So I'm going to floor it right now and then we're off. Man, there's so much transmission lag these days. I know. So if you use the paddles, it's a little bit slow as well. So it's just kind of not the best transmission. But this isn't a fast driver's car. This is a kind of like soccer mom car. Kind of. It's a really good-looking soccer mom car. Yeah, and previously when we drove the old Evoque, I said it was the best-looking SUV. I have since driven a ton of other SUVs. I don't think it's the best-looking anymore, but I still think it looks really darn good. Yeah, this refresh was needed and I think they nailed it. Like, this looks really good for an SUV. Yeah, and it looks like they kind of took some Velar stuff as well. They did. And maybe some Kia Soul stuff as well. I think the Kia Soul took a lot of this. I know, I know. But quickly on the drive modes, because there aren't many for on the road, there are actually more for off the road. So on our bottom screen, yes, there are probably about three or four screens in this car, but we'll get to that in a bit. You hit vehicle and then you go through them. The only two drive modes for the road are eco and comfort. There is no sport mode in this. And then we do have three different off-road modes, which I'm sure the people that buy this car are really going to enjoy. But I'm going to send it into cliche corner in comfort mode because that's the sportiest mode for on the road. And it does handle pretty well. Obviously, there's a lot of body roll because this is an SUV, but it actually turns in quite well, like shockingly well for what this is. You can feel some torque vectoring going on because the traction control and stuff kicks in. But overall, for what this is, this type of SUV handles really well. And so I did mention the multiple screens in here earlier. Let's talk about them starting with this one, the mirror screen. So if you flip this, you actually have a camera just like Cadillac is doing. Yeah, and you can also adjust like if it's up, down, brightness and all that stuff. It's kind of funny seeing the settings icon in your mirror, though. Yeah, and the camera is up in the shark fin, which is pretty jokes, too. But overall, I find it really distracting, and I figured out why. It's because I don't know where my back end is. There's no reference point. So I have to flip it back, and now I know where the back end of my car is. So the main screen tilts up, and it's white during the day, black at night, so it's easy to read because if you made it black during the day, it would just be glares. Yeah, so there's actually no physical buttons at all to control this infotainment, which is pretty wild, and I don't like it, and they're trying to future-proof themselves. I don't really like it, but let's dig into it. It's got Apple CarPlay, Android Auto, and Android Auto is actually widescreen. Is this the first time? Yes, so Android Auto widescreen does not exist here. It's regular Android Auto, but it's on a wider screen. So there's no stupid clock on the right. And I think it actually looks good, but the thing is on your Android Auto, you can't pinch to zoom on Google Maps, and I can't move my finger to move around. I think it's something to do with the display. Yeah, it's one of those that you can't touch twice at once. Yeah. But then we've also got rewinding satellite radios, no tune mix, but it gets the job done. And the infotainment is a little bit laggy, which totally sucks because if you're trying to remove hard buttons, don't make it laggy. Yeah, but everything Land Rover kind of lags, right? It does, unfortunately. That's just the way it is. Jag and Land Rover lag infotainments. Yeah, so let's talk about this bottom screen. So then we've got kind of our climate and some other vehicle settings down there, and then you can also change your radio from down there. Then we've got these two knobs, so if you're on a screen, you can use a hard knob to kind of go through some finer tune settings. So if I click my heated seats, I then use the knob to see how much heat I want to my seat or my massage. Yeah, so it does have different levels of massage, and then like you already said, you change them with this button. But the thing that sucks the most, and you typically complain about this stuff, is that if you're running Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, it's difficult to get out of. It takes multiple button presses on the main screen, but the savior is this bottom screen, so you can still change your radio stations in the bottom screen while running Android Auto or whatever up top. Yeah, but you can't rewind from there. That's right. And that's the best feature of all radios in the world. And then we also have gloss black at the bottom, these capacitive buttons, which are terrible because they're already fingerprinty, so I don't like them. But we do have a volume knob. Yeah, thank you for that. But to use the volume knob, the shifter gets in the way of your hand. Like, try. Yeah, you got arrested on a weird angle. It's such a pain. Yeah, overall, this does look impressive, though. Like, Jaguar Land Rovers always look impressive. Yeah, and everyone who gets inside is always impressed, but usability is just not that good. But also with the infotainment, we do have our 360 camera and reverse camera, but you can't get the 360 camera to show up at the same time as the reverse camera, which kind of sucks. But they are high res. Then we've got automatic parking and all that stuff that's set up through the infotainment. And we also have one of the coolest features ever fitted to a vehicle in terms of cameras. Clear sight ground view. Tell them what it is. So it pretty much takes your 360 camera and shows it in front of you, so when you're driving, it takes that last thing that was in front of you before you drove over it and displays it underneath you. So you can see, like, where a parking spot is or if you're parking over a handicapped spot. Or over lids. Over lids or boulders for off-roading. Yeah, it's meant to be used off-road, but you can definitely use it in the city, and this is a really cool feature. And how do you like your gauge cluster? Gauge cluster is typical of every JLR vehicle. It's a little bit laggy. It's super customizable, but overall it works. And then to control everything in your gauge cluster, you've got to use these crazy buttons on the steering wheel, which are all touch buttons that have a click, but they also change anytime you do anything. Yeah, they're contextual depending on the menu. You'll get used to it, but it's a little bit weird. But again, it's very impressive. And surprisingly enough, I did get used to it in, like, two minutes. Yeah. You know if you have to, like, prepare for a test? You just got to sit there, think real hard, concentrate? That's what all these new cars feel like to me. I'm like, Yuri, you can do this. You know where the settings are. You've done this before. Top row, down, left. And we also have our heated steering wheel button on there. And typical of Land Rover, we have this metal ring on the inside so the back gets hot, but the front is, like, ice cold. I love it. I hate it. While we're talking about the steering wheel, it's so heavy to steer this. Like, more than it should be for a car that's in comfort mode all the time. And then we do have these plastic flimsy kind of paddles. You're not going to use the paddles on this car anyways, but they're there. Unless you're off-roading or something. Yeah, well, maybe. And then we got it on the shifter too, which is down for up, up for down. Thank you very much. And it's a normal shifter, not some weird dial. Well, it's kind of a joystick. In today's modern society. It's pretty normal. That's normal. And this does have Lane Keep Assist, but it's just like ping pong. It just kind of bounces you between the lanes. Yeah, it's lane departure. But it's called Lane Keep Assist in the settings. Yes, but if it keeps you in the lane by stopping you from departing, it is technically lane keep. We're just, we have a higher standard. Yes, our standard for lane keep is lane centering. Yes, yes. Which this does not do. So we'll talk about the looks and the rest of this interior when you drive. But first, visor test. 3, 2, 1. Fail. All right, time for the box test. Box test. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. Pretty respectable for the weird shape of this compact crossover, but it is a sexy crossover. So let's talk about the looks with you in the driver's seat. I gotta say sexy. Ready? Oh, I'm ready. That sucked. Quite a lot of lag off the line. Okay, looks wise. Love it. The most evoked part of it is that the top is a different color than the rest of the body. Yeah, the overall side profile is actually like an exciting shape in today's boring, bland, every SUV looks the same. I think the thing that makes the Evoque look so cool is that it's like short and stubby like a little ball. Yeah, it's like a squished Range Rover. And then it's got these huge fender flares and it's got that cool thing where the hood goes over the fenders. I really like it. I really like how this looks too. The headlights are really aggressive. Yeah, I think they've thinned them out a bit since the last one we drove. They have. They kind of squished them a little bit more. And then the taillights look very Velar to me. I love the taillights. They're like 3D. Yeah, it feels like you're going through Tron or something. It's kind of like a budget version of the LC500 taillights because those are like super nice. Not that we've driven an LC500 yet. No, I only know how it looks. And then in the front, we've got a whole bunch of grills. What I think is funny is that little grill above the license plate. Oh, the one that looks like a Durango SRT grill? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it looked that way. Kind of weird. Yeah, I don't mind it. And then we've got a lot of gloss black plastic that kind of comes around the bottom at the front, which looks almost like a fake skid plate. And same at the back, which kind of looks like a diaper. Yeah, it's kind of part of the R-Dynamic package. I think it does look really sharp overall. And as is typical of most Range Rovers, the wheels are just oversized and it looks so good. Yes, and what is the Continental recommended tire for the Evoque? The Extreme Contact DWS06 and the Viking Contact 7. And this thing would be probably good in winter because it is all-wheel drive. That's right. So the same amount of send every single time. But I guess every Land Rover, Range Rover is kind of all-wheel drive. Yeah, they are. That's kind of typical. Yeah. And then also like all the new Range Rovers, we got handles that pop in and out. Which are so fancy. And then it also says Range Rover on the hood, which is very cool. Yeah, I love that about Range Rovers. You know what I saw on the road? What? Some guy wrote Rogue on his Rogue on the hood. Really? Yeah. Wow. All right. He had like chrome letters, but he actually did it. Yeah, it's like the Telluride. It has that too. But the Telluride is bigger. Yeah. Like a Rogue. I know. Come on. Yeah. You know what should have it? The Kia Soul. Oh my God. So SUV looks wise, one of the best looking SUVs still. Yeah, for sure. Or at least one of the most interesting looking SUVs still. Most interesting and just most well put together. Yeah, but it's gotten a lot lower on my list since like the Urus, the Alpha, the Trackhawk. That's true. Well, Trackhawk is bigger, but yeah, I totally agree. It looks better. I know. And the Venue. Good one. So now let's move on to the general interior. How cool is this eggplant color? This eggplant color is lovely. Everything is leather wrapped. Everything feels premium to the touch. I love everything about the looks of this interior. I love how they split the top black and the bottom eggplant. And I think the gloss black looks nice too. I'm not the one who hates gloss black. Yeah, I am. He's the one who hates it. Yeah. So that's going to get fingerprinty. This one's already a little bit scratched. So you're definitely going to have to pay someone to clean it and polish out the swirls at some point. So then we've also got eggplant armrests, which are split open, which is nice. Then we got our cables for our cell phone and stuff. Then we've got our cup holders and they are two different sizes. The one on the left. That's a pass. The one on the right is also a pass. The grips are too tight on them. But say we want to put our cell phone somewhere. We've got this extra little lid that we can slap over that and it's rubberized so our cell phone won't slip. That is cool. Now get rid of this so I can drink my coffees. The driving position is great too. My elbow does touch the armrest and touch the steering wheel just fine. And you sit relatively low. At least the dash is like kind of big in front of the driver. And then we got a head up display, which is very easy to read and able to adjust from the gauge cluster. So we've got heated seats and massage seats in here. How are the massage seats? The massage seats are pretty good. It's like a bunch of little lumbar things in your back. Yo, say massage seats five times really fast. Massage seats. Nailed it. Massage seats. Yeah. I'm going to trip up if I say it. All right. Now let's talk about the rear seat room. There's actually quite a bit. Only because of the scoop in the front seats. So I can actually fit comfortably back there. How's your headroom? Headroom is fantastic in here. Do you like having a big moonroof in front of you in the back seat? I do. It's actually really impressive. So let's get into the price. It starts at $61,500 for the R-Dynamic HSE, which is the top trim. Canadian. And this one is optioned out to $71,200. So what's the competition for this? That puts it in line with the Mercedes GLC 300, the BMW X3, the Audi Q5, the Lexus UX, which we haven't driven, the Lexus NX, which we have driven, and JLR's own Jaguar E-Pace. Yeah, I think this kind of wins, but I do really like the X3. I like BMW's control system. Same here. I really like the BMW X3, and styling-wise, this beats that, but overall function and kind of like how it feels put together, I think they're kind of tied for me. I think if you bought this instead of an X3, more people would be impressed, and they would treat you with more respect. Yeah, and we have had some issues with Jaguars and Land Rovers in the past with the infotainment systems. Nothing with this one, so I'm happy to report that. But how about the XC40? The XC40 looks kind of cool, but I think I prefer everything about this. I don't think the XC40 looks cool enough. The orange interior is so awesome, but would you really take an orange interior over this? No, I wouldn't. This looks so nice. Would you take a gimmick over class? No, I'm not that type of person. So let us know what you guys think of the updated Evoque. Would you take this over anything else we just listed? Let us know in the comments below. See you next time. That's our new thing.