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Jaguar has announced that by 2025 it will only make and sell electric vehicles. That’s less than four years away and means the F-Pace you’re thinking about buying could be the last Jaguar with an actual engine that you ever own. Heck, it could be the last car with an engine you ever own.
Let’s help you pick the right one then, because Jaguar’s just called last drinks.
Driving a whopping great SUV down the straight on a race track at more than 200km/h sounds like fun, but it actually feels a bit wrong, like entering a baby elephant in a dog show.
These are strange times, of course, and the Maserati Trofeo Levante is a suitably strange vehicle - stylish, classy, expensively appointed family hauler that also has the heart and soul of a race car.
Indeed, while performance SUVs are an increasingly commonplace vehicle, the Levante - which was actually getting along in the tooth as a model before this significant upgrade - has higher performance credibility than most.
That's because it has a big Ferrari V8 driving all four of its wheels and delivering a properly supercar-like 433kW and 730Nm.
It's not what you might call a typical Maserati buyer's car, but then only those who know what the Trofeo badge stands for - shouty insanity, basically - will be interested in this end of town. It is a lot of car, but is it worth the large load of money on the sticker ($330,000)?
The F-Pace has been gifted new styling, new engines and more practicality making it an even better SUV than it already was. You could seriously pick any of the grades and be happy with your purchase. Then there’s the question of the engine…
Jaguar says there’s a few more years left in the combustion engine yet, but we know exactly how many years – four, because the company has gone on the record announcing it will go fully electric by 2025. The question for you is – how will you ring out the end of an era – with a four-cylinder petrol, a six-cylinder turbo diesel, an inline turbo six petrol or a cracking V8?
The sweetspot in the range is the R-Dynamic SE 400, with just enough luxury and more than enough grunt.
Maseratis are built for a fairly specific niche buyer; someone with a lot of money, someone slightly older and certainly someone who likes the finer things in life and appreciates Italian style, quality and heritage.
They are not, typically, the kind of buyers who want to tear around race tracks like fiends in big, shouty SUVs. But apparently there is a niche within the niche of Maserati fans who do, and they are willing to invest big dollars in vehicles wearing the Trofeo badge, like this Levante.
It might seem a slightly strange creation, a track-mad SUV with a screaming Ferrari engine, but surprisingly, it really does work.
The very first F-Pace arrived in Australia in 2016 and even after all these years and the arrival of more rivals I still think it’s the most beautiful SUV in its class. The new one seems to look a lot like the old one, but the styling updates have kept it cool.
If you want to see instantly how the design of the F-Pace has evolved from the original to the new one, be sure to watch my video above.
Short story is, this new F-Pace has been given a pretty major styling overhaul inside and out.
Gone is the old F-Pace’s plastic beak. That sounds weird but the previous F-Pace’s bonnet stopped short of the grille and a nose cone had been fitted to cover the rest of the distance. Now the new bonnet meets a larger, wider grille and its flow from the windscreen down isn’t disturbed by a large join line.
Also more pleasing to the eyes is the badge on the grille. The snarling jaguar head is now larger and no longer mounted on a terrible looking large plastic plate. The plate was for the adaptive cruise control radar sensor, but by making the Jaguar badge bigger, the plate was able to be house in the badge itself.
The headlights are slimmer, and the tail-lights have a new design which looks futuristic, but I miss the styling of the previous ones and the way they dipped into the tailgate.
Inside, the cabin has been made over with a giant landscape screen, new chunky climate control dials, a new steering wheel and the rotary shifter has been replaced by a regular upright one which is still small and compact, with cricket ball stitching. Again, take a look at the video I’ve made to see the transformation for yourself.
While all F-Paces have a similar look, the SVR is the high-performance member of the family and stands out with its giant 22-inch wheels, a tough body kit, quad tailpipes, a fixed SVR rear wing, and bonnet and fender vents.
For this update the SVR has been given a new front bumper and larger cooling vents flanking the grille. But it’s more than just tough looks, the aerodynamics have been revised to decrease lift by 35 per cent, too.
What hasn’t changed are the dimensions. The F-Pace is a mid-sized SUV measuring 4747mm end to end, standing 1664mm tall and with the mirrors out is 2175mm wide. That’s not huge, but make sure it’ll fit in your garage.
While the other two Maseratis to get the Trofeo treatment - the Ghibli and Quattroporte sedans - are undeniably lovely, the Levante is not quite as pretty.
Admittedly, for an SUV, it looks very good, and the Trofeo touches - that big, nostrilled bonnet, the red gills on the sides, the carbon, the badges - really do lift its game to another level.
Overall, though, the Levante has just never felt beautiful enough to me to be a Maserati. These guys really do style well, as you'd expect from a premium Italian brand, but making an SUV sexy is beyond even them.
I'll grant you, it does look good from front on, but at the rear they just seem to have run out of ideas.
Credit is due for feeling properly special inside, however.
The F-Pace was always practical with a big 509-litre boot and great rear leg and head room for even me at 191cm tall, but the cabin re-design has added better storage and usability.
The door pockets are larger, there’s a covered area under the floating centre console and in a victory for common sense and practicality the window switches have been relocated from the window sills to the armrests.
This is along with a deep centre console storage area, and two cupholders in the front and another two in the rear fold-down armrest.
Parents will be happy to know that all F-Paces come with directional air vents in the second row as well. And there are ISOFIX outboard child-seat anchors and three top-tether restraints, too.
If you've got to move five people in a genuine hurry, the Levante is a pleasant way to go about it.
There's plenty of head and shoulder room, the seats, while firm in the front, are pleasant to the touch and supportive and there's a 580-litre boot with an electric tailgate and split-folding seats.
The boot feels properly spacious, too, with a 12-volt power outlet and four tie-down points. You won't, however, find a spare wheel out there, so serious off-roading is out (although it probably was already if you look at those expensive wheels).
There are huge door pockets with room for bottles and two big cup holders in the front. The centre-console bin looks lovely, it's all carbon fibre, but is quite small.
There are also three USB points, one in the front and two in the rear, and Apple CarPlay and Android Auto connectivity.
There’s a Jaguar F-Pace for every budget as long as your budget is somewhere in between $80K and $150K. That’s quite a large range in price.
Now, I’m about to take you through the grade names and I need to warn you that it’s going to be messy and confusing a little bit like white water rafting, but not as wet. Life jacket on?
There are four grades: the S, SE, HSE and top-of-the-range SVR.
They all come standard with the R-Dynamic pack.
There are four engines: the P250, D300, P400 and P550. I’ll explain what this means in the engine section down below, but all you need to know is 'D' stands for diesel and 'P' for petrol and the higher the number the more grunt it has.
The S grade only comes with the P250. The SE comes with a choice of P250, D300 or P400. The HSE only comes with the P400 and the SVR has exclusive rights to the P550.
Following all this? Great.
So, the entry grade is officially called the R-Dynamic S P250 and it lists for $76,244 (all prices listed are MSRP - before on-road costs). Above this is the R-Dynamic SE P250 and it lists for $80,854, then there’s the R-Dynamic SE D300 for $96,194 and the R-Dynamic SE P400 for $98,654.
Almost there, you’re doing super.
The R-Dynamic HSE P400 lists for $110,404 and at the top is King F-Pace – the SVR with the P550 listing for $142,294.
There you are, wasn’t so bad was it?
Coming standard from the base grade up is the new 11.4-inch touchscreen, sat nav, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, there’s keyless entry, push-button start, dual-zone climate, power adjustable front seats, leather upholstery, LED headlights and tail-lights, and an auto tailgate.
The entry-level S and the SE above it come with a six-speaker stereo, but as you step into the HSE and SVR more standard features appear such as a 13-speaker Meridian sound system, plus heated and ventilated front seats. A fully digital instrument cluster is standard on all grades apart from the entry S.
The options list is extensive and includes a head-up display ($1960), wireless charging ($455), and an Activity Key ($403) which looks like an iWatch that locks and unlocks the F-Pace.
Paint prices? Narvik Black and Fuji White are standard at no extra cost for the S, SE and HSE. The SVR has its own standard palette and includes Santorini Black, Yulonhg White, Firenze Red, Bluefire Blue and Hakuba Silver. If you don’t have the SVR but want these colours it’ll be $1890, thank you.
I'm sorry, but $330,000 for an SUV, of any kind? Personally I can't see the value, but then personally, as we'll discuss below in the Design section, I can't see the attraction.
This is one of the most expensive SUVs money can buy, well above things like Range Rover Sport SVR ($239,187) or even Porsche Cayenne Turbo Coupe ($254,000), although a pricier Ferrari one is surely on the way.
You'd want a lot for that, and the way it drives and sounds, thanks to that Ferrari engine, accounts for quite a few dollars.
There's also an undeniably high-quality feel to everything you touch on the car, inside and out, and a vast quantity of carbon fibre everywhere as well.
Other highlights include the 21-inch machine polished wheels, an 8.4-inch touchscreen with Navigation and DAB radio, full matrix LED headlights, and incredible Pieno Fiore natural leather, “the best the world has ever seen”, as Maserati says.
The lovely if firm front seats are heated and ventilated, sporty and 12-way adjustable, with Trofeo logos stitched into the headrests. The rooflining is lovely Alcantara, the steering wheel is sporty and features carbon-fibre shift paddles, ad the stereo system is Harman Kardon Premium and has 14 speakers.
And even the rear seats are heated. It feels expensive, and it should. But still, $330K?
Jaguar’s engine names sound like forms you have to fill in when you apply for a home loan.
The P250 is a 2.0-litre four-cylinder turbo petrol engine making 184kW and 365Nm; the D300 is a 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo diesel producing 221kW and 650Nm; while the P400 is a 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo petrol with outputs of 294kW and 550Nm.
The P550 is a supercharged 5.0-litre V8 producing a colossal 405kW and 700Nm.
The SE grade gives you the choice of the P250, D300 and P400, while the S only comes with the P250 and the SVR of course is powered only by the P550.
The D300 and D400 are new engines, both are straight sixes and replace the V6 engines in the old F-Pace. Superb engines, they are also found in the Defender and Range Rover.
Jaguar calls the D300 and P400 mild hybrids, but don’t be misled by the terminology. These engines are not hybrids in the sense that an electric motor is working to drive the wheels along with a combustion engine. Instead, a mild hybrid uses a 48-volt electrical system to help take the load off the engine by helping it start and running the electronics such as climate control. And yes, it does help save fuel, but not stacks.
There’s plenty of grunt from all these engines no matter which you choose, they all have eight-speed automatics and all-wheel drive.
You are also very likely looking at the last combustion engines to go into an F-Pace. See Jaguar has announced that it will only sell electric vehicles beyond 2025.
Four years and that’s it. Choose wisely.
This will be the last time Maserati gets a proper Ferrari engine like this a 3.8-litre twin-turbo V8 shouty monster, which is good for 433kW and 730Nm.
The future, as is the case everywhere, is going to be more electric and less noisy. For now, anyone who can should enjoy this V8 masterpiece, which drives all four wheels through Maserati's Q4 on-demand all-wheel drive system via a limited-slip rear differential and uses an eight-speed automatic transmission.
Its claimed 0 to 100km/h time is 3.9 seconds, which puts it in what used to be super-car territory, and is still very quick indeed, while top speed is an unimaginable 304km/h.
It doesn’t make sense that Jaguar has announced that it will be going all electric by 2025 yet doesn’t offer a plug-in hybrid in its Australian line-up, especially when there is one available overseas.
Jaguar says it doesn’t make sense either, but by that they mean business sense, in bringing one to Australia.
So, for fuel economy I’m marking the F-Pace down. Yes, the D300 and P400 use clever mild-hybrid tech, but it doesn’t go far enough to reducing fuel use.
So the fuel consumptions, then. The official fuel consumption for the petrol P250 is 7.8L/100km, the diesel D300 will use 7.0L/100km, the P400 is stated to sip 8.7L/100km and the P550 V8 petrol will drink 11.7L/100km. Those figures are "combined cycle" numbers, after a combination of open and urban driving.
The official claimed fuel economy for the Maserati Levante Trofeo is 13.5 litres per 100km, but good luck with that.
A more realistic number would probably sit somewhere above 17 litres per 100km, and we would have easily exceeded 20 litres while driving it like lunatics around a track.
But you just paid $330K for an SUV, what do you care about fuel economy?
My two test cars at the Australian launch of the new F-Pace were the R-Dynamic SE P400 and the R-Dynamic S P250. Both were fitted with the road noise cancellation system which comes with the optional $1560 Meridian stereo and reduces the level of road noise coming into the cabin.
Which would I rather? Look, I’d be fibbing if I didn’t say the SE P400 with its smooth inline six that has seemingly endless shove, but it’s $20K more than the S P250 and neither engine is low on grunt and both handle and ride almost identically.
That ride has been improved in this new F-Pace with the rear suspension being retuned so that it’s not so firm.
Steering is still on the sharp side, but body control feels better and more composed in this updated F-Pace.
On the twisty and quick country roads I tested the S P250 and SE 400, both performed superbly, with responsive engines, great handling, and serene cabins (thanks to the help of the noise cancelling tech).
The second part of the test was driving both in city traffic for the best part of an hour each which isn’t pleasant in any car. The now wider F-Pace seats were comfortable and supportive, however, the transmission seamlessly swapped gears and even rolling on 22-inch wheels in the SE and 20-inch alloys in the S the ride was excellent.
We got to drive all three Trofeo-fettled Maseratis on track at Sydney Motorsport Park, and before that on the road, where the Levante felt very pleasant, and pleasantly expensive at all times.
As you might expect, a vehicle with 433kW is difficult to fully appreciate on public roads, although there was the occasional and exciting change to give it a quick, loud blat between gears.
It only takes hearing that engine note, and feeling that torque surge, a few times to see why someone might fall in love with this car, or at least this engine.
Out on the track, the rear-driven Ghibli and Quattroporte, which share the Levante's engine, were surely the more fun and frenetic things to drive, but there were those who chose the Levante as their best of the three, even for circuit driving.
There's no doubt that its on-demand all-wheel-drive system, which is biased towards the rear but asks the front wheels for help when required, made it feel the most planted, and the safest, through fast and slow bends.
There's a definite sense that its engine is being asked to work the hardest, though, to push all that bulk through the air (although its brakes never seemed to fade, which is impressive with more than two tonnes of SUV to stop).
While the big, deafening V8 is willing and keen to rev all the way to 7000rpm (where it bangs on the redline waiting for your upshift, if you're driving in manual mode - I do like that), it started to make large sucking sounds towards the top of each gear, as if it was desperately trying to get more oxygen in.
It genuinely sounded different to the other two Trofeo cars, which is odd, but perhaps they just weren't as near their limits. That bulk also slowed it slightly in terms of top speed down the straight, but it still exceeded 220km/h with ease.
What should be said is that I was genuinely shocked at how good the Levante Trofeo was around a track. So much so I asked to have a second go, just to make sure I wasn't going mad.
Sure, it makes no sense to me personally, and I don't know why anyone needs an SUV that's good on a track, but if you do, I can recommend the Levante for sure.
That hugely enjoyable engine is just too much fun, although it's even better in a sedan like the Ghibli...
The F-Pace scored the maximum five-star ANCAP rating when it was tested in 2017. Coming standard is advanced safety tech such as forward auto emergency braking (AEB), blind-spot assist, lane keeping assistance and rear cross-traffic alert.
This tech is great, but in the five years since the F-Pace first arrived safety equipment has moved on even further. So, while the AEB can detect pedestrians, it’s not designed to work for cyclists, there’s no reverse AEB, nor evasive manoeuvre systems, nor a centre airbag. All are items which weren’t common in 2017 but are now on most 2021 five-star rated cars.
Maserati's safety offering on the Levante includes six airbags, a reversing camera and 360-degree overhead camera, parking sensors front and rear, adaptive cruise control and Blind Spot Detection, Forward Collision Warning Plus, Pedestrian Detection, Lane Keep Assist, Active Driver Assist and Traffic Sign Recognition.
There is no ANCAP rating for the Levante as it's not been crash tested here.
At the launch of the new F-Pace Jaguar announced that all of its vehicles would be covered by a five-year unlimited/kilometre warranty, a step up from the three-year coverage it used to offer.
Service intervals? What are they? The F-Pace will tell you when it needs maintenance. But you should sign up for a five-year service plan which costs $1950 for the P250 engine, $2650 for the D300, $2250 for the P400 and $3750 for the P550.
Maserati offers a three-year, unlimited kilometre warranty, but you can choose to buy 12-month or two-year warranty extensions, and even a sixth or seventh-year drive-train warranty extension.
When much, much cheaper Japanese and Korean cars are offering seven and even 10-year warranties, this is so far off the pace that such a fast vehicle should be embarrassed. And if you're buying something Italian, a better, longer warranty would seem like a must. I'd be negotiating at sale for them to throw the longer warranty offer in.
Maserati says servicing for the Ghibli has a "ball park costing of $2700.00 for the first three years of ownership" with a service schedule of every 20,000km or 12 months (whichever occurs first)
Also, "please note that the above is indicative only of the manufacturers basic routine service maintenance schedule and does not include any consumable items such as tyres, brakes etc or additional dealership charges such as environmental levies etc."