2025 Range Rover Evoque: When you just gotta be different
The Range Rover Evoque’s unusual style never pleased Mr. Driver’s Seat’s eye, but still there's a lot worth a second look. Unfortunately, there's a lot worth a second thought.
2025 Range Rover Evoque Dynamic SE vs. 2025 Volvo XC60 T8 AWD Polestar Engineered PHEV: Battle of the pricey little SUVs from northern Europe.
Price: $62,930 as tested. Major options include Dynamic Handling Pack offering variable drive settings for $1,050; Cold Climate Pack heating the windshield, washer jets, and rear seats, and adding headlight washer for $980; Technology Pack adding head-up display, surround camera, and more for $1,400; more noted throughout.
Conventional wisdom: Car and Driver likes the “chic exterior styling,” that the “minimalist interior still feels upscale, name brand across its hood carries hella value,” but not that “rear passenger space is not adult-friendly, doesn’t share its sibling’s all-terrain proficiency, not as fuel-efficient as you’d expect from a small SUV.”
Marketer’s pitch: “Captivating, sophisticated, and charismatic. Range Rover Evoque is shaped by the city.”
Reality: Is anyone’s SUV really going off-roading?
What’s new: Here are two examples of smallish SUVs from either side of the North Sea — the Range Rover Evoque from England and the Volvo XC60 from Sweden. Both have a cult following but could hardly be considered segment leaders.
The wedge-shaped Evoque is pretty much the same since 2020, despite “a subtle evolution of its reductive exterior design” for 2024, as Land Rover describes it.
Competition: Besides the XC60, there’s the Acura RDX, Audi Q5, BMW X3, Genesis GV70, Lexus NX
Up to speed: The Range Rover Evoque features a 2-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine. It makes a respectable 246 horses for the small SUV it’s pulling around.
The Evoque offers decent acceleration from a standing start, getting to 60 mph in 7 seconds, according to Land Rover.
Unfortunately, somewhere in the computer or transmission logic, the acceleration drops off noticeably for passing or regaining speed after turning a corner. There’s a whole dead spot and then roar, off you go.
Shifty: The square shifter control pushes forward for Reverse, pulls back for Drive, and knocks sideways for shiftability. Then the paddles control shifting. This operates the 9 speeds, an odd number, literally and figuratively.
On the road: The Evoque offers a spirited ride on country roads worthy of a BMW or Audi (or even stablemate Jaguar). Go a little crazy past the farms and around the bends and you’re rewarded with a very enjoyable, fun vehicle.
By a little crazy, I mean a lot crazy. I prefer something fun without going nearly double the posted speed, as a driver but certainly as a pedestrian/bypasser/headshaker. This is where Minis and some Volkswagens, Audis, and BMWs win.
The drive settings are only available via the touchscreen. The main button is distressingly small, but after that’s activated the buttons get big.
Driver’s Seat: The seat feels angular and jabby at first sit, but some adjustments made it fit nicely, and that seat really wants to hold you in place. Fortunately, it’s more cuddly like a Lexus than kidney-punching like some Audis.
The dashboard provides information readily. The shadow gray ash veneer dashboard panel ($200) classes the place up.
The dramatically vanishing side windows that define the Evoque are as difficult to see out of as you’d expect, adding to the engine’s passing woes.
Friends and stuff: The rear seat room is surprisingly generous, with headroom, legroom, and foot room all accommodating, even allowing for some wiggle, especially in light of Car and Driver’s complaint. The center passenger has a smallish hump for an all-wheel-drive vehicle, but lack of foot room will be an issue.
The seat also provides nice accommodations, and even the door is just wide enough to allow a sleepy Mr. Driver’s Seat to get his size 12 feet through without toe stubbing.
Cargo space is 21.5 cubic feet behind the rear seat and 50.5 when it’s folded. Towing capacity is 3,968 pounds.
Play some tunes: The Meridian Surround Sound System ($450) was a quirky DJ. It provided overall some of the best sound I’ve heard in a long time, and opened up more pieces of songs than I usually get.
But the test song — an exceedingly deep Bob Dylan track, his Best Male Rock Vocal Performance Grammy nomination (I kid you not!) for 2001 — falls flat. But, everything else works so well, the stereo gets an A.
Operation was fairly simple, even though it’s all through the 11.4-inch “curved glass touchscreen,” as Land Rover hypes it, volume controls and all.
Keeping warm and cool: That same screen made the HVAC operation a real pain. One has to zero in on the small temperature number on the side of the touchscreen, and then a whole world of HVAC controls opens up. None of them take the clear road that the drive mode buttons do.
The recessed rectangular vents also fall short on allowing for directional control.
Fuel economy: The little SUV averaged about 20 mpg, kinda sad.
Where it’s built: Halewood, England
How it’s built: Consumer Reports predicts the Range Rover Evoque to rate a 2 out of 5 for reliability.
In the end: There’s a whole lot to like about the Evoque, except for the fuel economy and the touchscreen controls. The reliability rating isn’t much help either.
And when the GV70, X3, and even NX are factored into the equation, well, there you go. Like, literally, I’d go there instead.
Next week: Let’s see how the XC60 fares.