2017 BMW 5 Series vs Maserati Ghibli

What's the difference?

Eco-friendly vehicles are the leather pants of the new-car world; it takes a lot of money to make them look good (but people who own them think they look fantastic regardless). If you don't have a gazillion dollars to drop on a Tesla,  then it's a one-way ticket to Prius town. And really, who wants that? 

But what if it didn't have to be that way? Behold the BMW 530e iPerformance.

Seemingly tired of waiting for the Australian Government to introduce any sort of meaningful subsidy for green cars, BMW has made the choice simple: you can have a petrol-powered 530i for $108,900, or opt for the plug-in hybrid 530e for... $108,900. This is truly revelatory thinking.

There's no specification penalty, either, and the hybrid will power to 100km/h in an identical 6.2 seconds, so you're not even any slower. But you are sipping less fuel, emitting less C02 and basking in the general smugness, and sweet silence, that comes with feeling like you're saving the world.

So what's the catch?

Richard Berry road tests and reviews the new Maserati Ghibli with specs, fuel consumption and verdict.

Ah, you've just waded into some seriously fun waters. Serious because it's clear you're looking for something practical with four doors, and fun because it needs to be blisteringly quick, while wrapped up in a high-end package. The Maserati Ghibli is all of these things and it was an instant star worldwide for the Italian brand when it arrived in 2014. We've lapped up this model in Australia, too. Last year, of the 483 Maseratis sold, 330 of them were Ghiblis.
 
The Ghibli's up against some fierce and established competition – BMW's M3 is the resident icon in the mid-size high performance sedan class and the Mercedes-AMG C63 s is the Beemer's worst recurring nightmare. Then there's the new Alfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio which looks like it could be the brand's comeback car. All of them are seriously fun in a high-end, practical performance way.
 
We tested the recently updated entry level petrol Ghibli with the smell of its rivals' upholstery still fresh in our sinuses. So, what's it like to live with – from car parks and peak hour traffic to country road blasts. How does the new update actually update it? Why does the shifter keep doing that? And does just being a Maserati make the Ghibli better?