Mercedes-Benz A45 vs Mercedes-AMG E43

What's the difference?

The Mercedes-AMG A 45 4Matic+ may have grown up a bit in that it’s not as noisy or uncomfortable as the first-generation version which arrived in 2013, But if anything, its more portent than ever. Superb Mercedes-AMG craftmanship, outstanding performance and good value as far as bang for your buck goes.

If you want a fast Benz but your other half prefers genuine comfort and doesn't like the sound of NASCAR, this is your solution. It's an opulent luxury saloon by default, but with proper performance and personality just the flick of a switch away.

We know the E 63 S will be sharper and 1.2s quicker to 100km/h, but it will also cost another E 200 more, and feel like a performance car ALL the time. The E 43 doesn't, which is just brilliant.

When I went to pick up the Mercedes-AMG A 45 S 4Matic+ I walked right past it and then like that lost and confused John Travolta in Pulp Fiction internet memes, wandered around before asking where the car was.

That’s because I was looking for something with a gigantic spoiler on the roof and probably hi-vis green with stripes. But the car assigned to me was the A 45 S in its standard form, and the styling is subtle enough for it disappear into a crowded car park like James Bond into a lavish dinner party.

But like Bond, chances are the A 45 S is the most hardcore person in the room, it just doesn’t walk in announcing it to everybody.

Look closely and you'll see that the A 45 S is not just another small prestige car. There’s the 90mm quad exhaust poking out of the chunky diffuser, the giant 'Panamericana' grille, and the angry looking front apron.

Then, there are the 19-inch matt black alloy wheels wrapped in low-profile Michelin rubber and enormous brake discs with their red calipers, all barely contained by the pumped up front wheel guards which are much bigger than those on a regular A-Class.

The cost option my test car wore was the 'Mountain Grey Metallic' paint, but if anything it made the A 45 look even more covert.

The cabin is small but luxurious and sporty with two-tone leather upholstery (the red and black 'Lugano' leather in my test car is a no-cost option), there’s the microfibre-clad AMG steering wheel, brushed aluminium trim, metal-trimmed pedals and the large display panel (it’s actually two screens joined) is also standard.

The A 45 S is a hatchback measuring 4445mm in length, 1850mm wide and 1412mm tall. Not keen on a hatch but want something with similar dimensions? The CLA 45 S is the A 45 S’s four-door twin-under-the-skin and is just as much of a weapon.

And if you want your A 45 S to look more aggressive, you can option the 'AMG Aero Package' which will see a giant rear wing fitted to the roof.

Or you can buy the Edition 1 version of the A 45 S which includes the big spoiler and shouty design bits to makes sure everybody knows you’re the assassin in the room.

Unlike the bulging wheelarches and gaping gob of the new E 63, the E 43 uses discrete flourishes to distinguish it from the regular AMG-pack E-Class.

Most obvious are the more aggressive 20 x 8 and 20 x 9 'RTO' wheels, but if you look closely it also scores subtle black winglets on the outer edges of the front bumper openings, a single bar grille insert, boot lip spoiler and black split exhaust tips. 

Hiding within those wheels are upgraded 360mm brakes at all corners, with four piston calipers up front and single at the rear.

On the inside, the E 43 steps up to perforated leather and 'Dynamica' pseudo suede seat trim but the fronts appear to be the same comfortable shape as the regular AMG pack seats. Aside from a smattering of AMG badges, that's about it. Like the outside, it looks a little bit sporty, but luxury is the focus.

Along with good performance and handling, part of the appeal of hot hatches is that they’re practical… to a degree. The A 45 S is a small car, but it has four doors, five seats and a boot.

The cabin is small, no doubt about it, but even at 191cm tall I had plenty of room while driving, the seating position is perfect actually, although sitting behind my driving position saw my knees just touching the seat back.

Headroom is getting limited back there, but I still had space. Could you get away with the A 45 S as a family car? I had my family in it for a while, but there’s just the three of us and my son is pre-school-aged. So, a young, small family, yes… until it starts to grow.

Cabin storage is good with two cupholders in the rear centre fold-down armrest along with small door pockets and seat-back nets. Up front there are another two cupholders, giant door pockets, a big split-opening centre console bin and a tray for the wireless charger big enough to fit an iPhone 11 Pro Max.   

Boot space is good at 370 litres. The big shiny CarsGuide suitcase fitted in easily (see images) and apart from the wide-opening of the boot, another hatch power of practicality is that you can fold the rear seats down to open up more cargo carrying space, and in the A 45 S’s case that’s 1210 litres.

I’ve mentioned the wireless charger but there are also four USB-C ports (two up front and two in the rear), back seat passengers also have directional air vents, which is another bonus, along with dark tinted windows (welcome when my son was sitting back there in his car seat).

Like all E-Class sedans, the E 43 has amble room for four large adults to travel comfortably. Everyday practicality is well considered with dual cup holders front and rear with bottleholders in each door, map pockets and ISOFIX child seat mounts in the outer rear positions. Boot capacity is a useful 540 litres.
Like all AMG performance models, the E 43 forgoes run-flats or a spare tyre in favour of an inflation kit.

At $159,900 the E 43 sits exactly $20,000 above the E 400. As you'd expect it comes fully loaded with comfort and convenience features, including a choice of black, brown or beige nappa leather, 'Air-Balance' cabin scent and air filtration system, tinted windows, panoramic sunroof, head-up display and a 13-speaker Burmester surround sound audio system.

Like all new E-Classes, the E 43 also comes with the brilliant Drive Pilot suite of active cruise control and lane guidance tech that permit semi-autonomous driving, including the ability to change lanes. More sculpted AMG front seats and a Dynamica pseudo suede-trimmed steering wheel are available as a $3076 option, but it's worth noting that the seat upgrade eliminates the PRE-SAFE impulse side function that moves passengers toward the centre of the car when a side collision is anticipated.

There may be hot hatches out there which look wilder than the Mercedes-AMG A 45 S 4Matic+ but do they have the most powerful four-cylinder engine ever to go into a mass-produced car? Nope, but the A45 does: it’s a 310kW/500Nm turbo-petrol four.

It doesn’t sound as angry and gravelly as the previous A 45’s engine but it has more grunt (an extra 30kW/25Nm) and is claimed to catapult the hatch from 0-100km/h in 3.9 seconds.

The '4Matic' part of the name indicates the hatch is all-wheel drive and the '+' means it’s a more sophisticated version of the system which allows all of the drive to be sent to one axle, if need be.

What need would that be? The need to drift, of course, which should be up there with other human rights such as clean air, fresh water and free speech.

Yep, the A 45 S comes with 'Drift Mode' (for the racetrack, of course), along with a 'Launch Mode' for perfect-every-time transitions to warp speed.

Changing gears gunslinger-fast is an eight-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission.

Rather than simply plonking the 3.0-litre twin-turbo V6 from the other '43s in the E-Class body and fettling the tune to edge it ahead performance-wise over the smaller models, the E 43 uses larger turbos to boost power by 25kW but retains the same 520Nm, which is also 50kW and 40Nm greater than the E 400.

Like all current E-Class variants, the engine is backed by Mercedes' very clever nine-speed torque converter auto and follows the E 400 and other '43s by sending power to all corners via the 4Matic all-wheel drivetrain.

Mercedes-AMG says the 2.0-litre, turbo-petrol, four-cylinder in the A 45 S should use 8.9L/100km after a combination of open and urban driving.

My fuel test saw me drive 131km of urban and country roads, plus some motorway sections, and needed 16.9L of premium unleaded petrol to fill the 51-litre tank back to full.

That comes to 12.9L/100km, which is thirsty, but my driving style may have contributed significantly to that high figure.

Despite making more power and torque, the E 43 carries the same 8.4L/100km official combined figure as the E 400, but requires more expensive 98RON to achieve it. The E 43 also scores a 14-litre larger 80-litre fuel tank, which should stretch the range between fills by around 167km based on the official figure.

I wasn’t lying in the introduction to this review. The previous A45 was a pretty intense driving experience. The ride felt brutal, the exhaust note screamed and crackled like somebody had set a wheelie bin full of fireworks alight.

And then there was the sweating. I seemed to sweat a lot driving it and there was nothing wrong with the climate control, that just happens to me when I’m under pressure and excited.

So, has the new-generation A 45 S 4Matic+ gone all soft and quiet on us? No, but things have been toned down a tad.

The exhaust note is not as gruff or loud, and even in 'Sport +' and 'Race' mode it’s still quiet enough to pull into a driveway at night without making enemies of your neighbours.

And the ride is also not as harsh, although even in 'Comfort' mode my wife still found it verging on too firm.

The performance and dynamics, however, felt as sharp as ever.

Acceleration is supercar quick at 3.9 seconds. My gawd, you needed a Ferrari F40 to do that in the mid-’80s, and even now the new Mercedes-AMG GT S supercar gets there only a tenth of a second earlier, and it has a twin-turbo V8.

Top speed for the A 45 S is electronically limited to 270km/h. But hot hatches aren’t really about straight-line speed, they’re more about bent-line speed. You know, corners.

So, I took the A 45 S on the twisty roads I take anything that calls itself sporty. The agility of the A 45 S is outstanding thanks to a rigid chassis that handles a change in direction as quickly and easily as you can turn your head.

The brakes bite hard when they have to, and the all-wheel drive hatch scrambles tenaciously out of corners.

A racetrack is really the best place to truly test a serious sports car's limits and our own James Cleary did just that when he drove the A 45 S at its international launch.

As a daily driver, though, for somebody who occasionally likes to get into it on a curvy road the A 45 S is comfortable enough to live with, but hard enough to remain engaging and dynamic when you get the chance to have a squirt.

Working our way out of Melbourne via its network of motorways, there's little aside from perforated leather and Dynamica faux suede seats to tell us we're aboard something a bit more special than most E-Classes. 

Left in Comfort mode via the console-mounted drive select toggle, the engine delivers a creamy urge with max torque available from 2500rpm, the transmission is silken and the ambience is very E-Class.

On the country roads beyond Melbourne's urban limits, you can tell you're riding on 20-inch wheels with limited sidewalls, but it's all entirely liveable and still very Mercedes. 

Flick it over to Sport mode and it's much the same, but confronted with the bitumen rollercoaster that is Chum Creek Rd (look it up, it's worth it), we felt it was time for Sport +. Race mode is reserved for the full-blown AMGs, but Sport + instantly transforms the E 43. 

The steering gets heavier, the exhaust gets louder and the transmission drops at least one ratio, but the dampers also become much firmer which makes it feel at least a couple of hundred kilos lighter than the aluminium-abundant W213 E-Class already is.

The stability control also loosens its leash and surprisingly permits some play from the rear end when you're really pushing under throttle. It is all-wheel drive, but the torque bias favours the rear wheels by a factor of 69:31.

The auto manages to shift quickly and the abundance of ratios means it happens very often. You'd have to be pretty bored to bother with the paddle shifters, as everything responds beautifully to your right foot – including the brakes. 

It's very easy to drive very fast and you soon forget you're driving a near-5m long sedan.

The V6's growl will never match a V8 symphony, but it helps to stamp the E 43's individual character. If it made no noise it would be disappointing, but it does well to push a classic V6 bark past its turbos.

Like all versions of the W213 E-Class, the E 43 carries the maximum five star ANCAP and EuroNCAP safety ratings. A brilliantly integrated suite of active and passive safety features go well beyond its nine-airbag count, 360-degree parking cameras, rear cross-traffic alerts, and a pedestrian-protecting active bonnet.

The Mercedes-AMG A 45 S 4Matic+ is covered by a five-year/unlimited kilometre warranty.

Servicing is recommended at 12 month/20,000km intervals. Servicing is capped at $850 for the first year’s visit, $1200 for the next and $1600 for the third.

As with all Mercedes passenger cars, the E 43 is covered by a three-year, unlimited kilometre warranty. Service intervals are either 12 months or 25,000km and the first three services are capped at $668, $1356 and $1356 respectively.