Nissan Navara vs Nissan Pathfinder

What's the difference?

While it won’t appeal on the value front as much as its Mitsubishi Triton engineering twin, the Navara’s tweaks from Premcar make it a more comfortable and livable thing. 

The extra cost is worth it for how much better it is on the road, plus you get more features, regardless.

Whether the changes to the Navara are sexy enough to get people in the dealership door is another question, but anyone who takes this over a Triton won’t be disappointed.

If it's for work, the SL or ST will do. If it's doubling as a family car, the Pro-4X is worth the outlay.

Note: CarsGuide attended this event as a guest of the manufacturer, with travel, accommodation and meals provided.

There’s a lot to like about the Nissan Pathfinder. The current model not only looks a lot better than its predecessor but in ST-L trim — and with an even cheaper front-wheel drive model — it offers the kind of value Australian families are chasing. 

For all its practicalities, towing capacity and refined driving experience, the Pathfinder’s fatal flaw is its limited engine choice. A thirsty petrol V6 with no engine start-stop tech stunts its appeal for those who live in suburban areas where a Kluger hybrid just works better.

The ST-L is a worthy consideration for your next purchase if you’re less bothered about fuel use, and it's the pick of the line-up, offering just about every creature comfort and safety feature you'd want in a good-value package.

Nissan has done well to inject its own design flavour into the ute, because even though there’s inevitable similarity in the silhouette, it doesn’t just look like a Triton.

Impressive given a lot of the car is the same, and Nissan couldn’t change any of the hard points the Triton comes with. In fact, the Navara’s dimensions are largely the same as the Triton, coming in at 5320mm long, 1930mm wide and 1815mm tall.

The biggest Nissan-specific design element is a nod to the Navara’s heritage, the three little vent lines above the grille hark back to the original D21 generation ute which had these holes in the bonnet.

It’s subjective to some extent, but I reckon the Navara has the Triton beat on the design front.

Depending on the variant, you get some other indicators that this is no Triton, including a sports bar on the rear of the cabin with ‘Navara’ cut into it, or Pro-4X decals if that’s the variant you go for.

Given the lifestyle and off-road focus of the Pro-4X, it also has a bit more trim inside and out to feel more rugged and premium.

The Navara’s new interior is a big step up over the previous generation, even if it is genuinely all-Triton in there. The biggest change is the Nissan badge on the steering wheel.

It’s a ute, so there’s still a lot of plastic, cheap materials and even the nicer looking surfaces are in a few spots made of gloss black plastic (sometimes called piano black) which gets smudged easily and after a short while.

The Pathfinder has a lot going for it in the looks department. Lead designer Ken Lee leaned into the nameplate’s past, incorporating the three horizontal strips between the broad bonnet and 'V-Motion' grille which is encircled in chrome. 

There’s real presence to this SUV (partially down to the Pathfinder's sheer size) with chunky wheel arches and plenty of vertical surfaces. The most eye catching colour is 'Scarlet Ember' red ($750) but the pearlescent 'Deep Ocean Blue' seen here is a classy look. 

Every manufacturer is doing the spaced out nameplates on the boot lid now, but the Pathfinder was an early adopter and it is particularly well executed on this car. There's also the massive (in proportion to the vehicle) Nissan badges. 

Inside, the Pathfinder focuses more on practicality and usability than wow-factor. There are no tacky design flourishes and the three-row SUV manages to stay on the right side of Americana, a trick the Toyota Kluger could learn.

It’s a bit of a shame the Navara doesn’t benefit from the changes Nissan has been making to its interior design and layout recently, because it leaves older Nissans in the dust, in terms of design and ergonomics.

But, the Mitsubishi Triton’s interior isn’t a bad one for the Navara to have inherited, because it just works. It’s uncomplicated and sensible, if a little boring.

There are physical buttons for shortcuts, and the tech is relatively straightforward, even if it does also carry the downside of Android Auto being wired-only. It adds to the somewhat dated feeling the Navara’s interior carries, but the physical space itself is rather sensible.

The Navara’s seats are comfortable, and as the driver it’s easy to find your own preferred position, with the electric adjustment in higher variants being an extra help there.

The driving ergonomics and visibility are also good, which lines up well with the Navara’s driving dynamics and makes it feel less like you’re pedalling a big dual-cab around.

Behind the driver, there’s not heaps in the way of amenity, but the addition of USB ports once you’re past the base SL is welcome for second-row passengers, and the space isn’t cramped by any means.

The Navara has a tub capable of easily fitting a Euro pallet, according to Nissan’s specs, but with its distance of 1135mm between wheel arches, it won’t fit an Aussie pallet. The tub is almost square, at 1555mm long and 1545mm wide, and 525mm tall. 

Plus there’s the 3500kg towing capacity and its payload ranging between 964kg for the Pro-4X or up to 1064kg in the base SL.

The Pathfinder is a thoughtfully packaged and practical vehicle, trading on more than just size with plenty of clever storage solutions. 

In the front there are generous door bins, twin cupholders and a deep central cubby. But there’s more, with a thin rubberised storage shelf above the glove box perfect for phones or sunglasses and a pass-through space below the centre console for larger items. 

A storage space for a smartphone is found in close proximity to USB-A, a USC-C and 12-volt sockets. All of thus is beneath a physical switch panel for the dual-zone climate control. 

The 9.0-inch multimedia touchscreen is the only letdown, feeling quite small in the Pathfinder's vast cabin. It is still responsive and features wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, though. The Pathfinder’s sound system is passable after tweaking the bass and treble balance. 

The analogue speedometer and tachometer sits either side of a 7.0-inch media screen that gives driving information along with settings for safety systems. There are switches on the steering wheel to control major functions, including cruise control, media and the screen operation. 

Among its competitive set, the US-built Pathfinder’s build quality is excellent. There are cleverly positioned soft-touch plastics and we didn’t notice any rattles over our week of testing, unlike Palisades and Klugers. The steering wheel, especially, is appointed in a high quality, smooth-grained leather.

While the ST-L may only get cloth upholstery, which is admittedly harder to clean than leather, the high-quality material is more temperature stable than the imitation cow hide often seen at this price. It’s also combined with heated front seats. 

Adding to the comfort factor is power adjustment for the driver’s seat including in/out and up/down lumbar control. The passenger seat is manually adjustable but with a lever for height and the driving position is pleasingly low-set. 

The low front seats open up a world of excellence for the second row’s stadium seating which gives passengers a fantastic view out. Not only is this just nice, it also helps kill travel sickness for kids (and grown-ups). 

The second row is on front/back sliding rails with fine backrest adjustment to dial in a comfortable position. There’s ample room even for adults over 185cm with plenty of head, leg and toe-room. 

Amenities include a third climate zone, USB-A and USB-C charge points, a total of six beverage holders and a fold-out armrest.

The Nissan Pathfinder has ISOFIX tabs in the two outboard rear seat positions. The anchors are not hidden behind a cover so there is nothing to lose and the three top tether points are big and meaty for easy access. 

Nissan deserves praise for its wide opening doors, the Pathfinder’s go almost perpendicular to the body with a large square aperture making loading dogs, children or shopping extremely easy.

But there’s one crucial flaw — the back windows don’t go all the way down leaving around a third of the glass sticking up. 

The Pathfinder’s three-wide third row is vast in the third row, with enough space for adults in a pinch — at least two across the three-wide bench — and up to four beverages.

The power-actuated second row gets out of the way quickly (perhaps a little too fast!) and slides back into place easily. The rear bench is split 60/40 with the long portion on the Australian kerbside.

There are no ISOFIX or top tether points in the third row of the Pathfinder ST-L which does hurt its practicality. The Ti-L features ISOFIX and top tether for one third row seat.

Aside from that, the Pathfinder is about as good as an SUV gets for practicality, though a Kia Carnival people mover has the edge for outright human carrying ability. 

Behind the shapely power tailgate, the Pathfinder offers either 205L, 554L or 782L of cargo space depending on how many seats are in use. And while the smallest figure sounds compact, the space is tall and square making it quite practical. Four school bags would fit easily or five at a pinch. 

With the third row stored elegantly in the floor, the space is generous although interrupted by the roof-mounted middle third-row seat belt which is a faff to unbuckle.

Amenities include two shopping bag hooks, a 12-volt socket, four tie-down points and a spacious wet storage area below the boot floor.

The spare tyre is hung beneath the Pathfinder however it is a temporary space saver, rather than a full-size item. 

Despite no diesel powerplant, the Pathfinder’s towing capacity is best in class, beating both Palisade and Kluger with its 2700kg braked limit (750kg unbraked).

Though still shy of the ladder frame Ford Everest and Isuzu MU-X (3500kg), the monocoque Pathfinder’s high limit is impressive.

The ST-L is not lacking for features, with 18-inch alloy wheels, a 360-degree camera view system, tri-zone climate control, a head-up display, built-in navigation, wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, front and rear parking sensors, cloth upholstery and heated seats. 

The front-wheel drive ST-L starts at an impressive $59,670, undercutting the Hyundai Palisade Elite ($66,800) and more spartan Toyota Kluger GX hybrid ($60,920). The all-wheel drive ST-L seen here costs $64,170, with all prices before on-road costs.

As for other Pathfinder trims, the Ti adds a more powerful stereo, leather-accented upholstery and different wheel designs for $67,990 (in front-wheel drive) and the full-fat Ti brings a digital driver’s display, 20-inch alloy wheels and second row captain’s chairs — dropping seat capacity to seven — for $82,490, all before on-road costs.

A 150kW/470Nm four-cylinder turbo-diesel engine lies under the bonnet, which falls a little short of some rivals, but isn’t glaringly weak.

Its power lines up with, for example, the Toyota HiLux, but torque falls short of its rival’s 500Nm. It’s the same story for the Ranger, though that ute slips a nose ahead with 4.0kW more than HiLux and Navara in its four-cylinder guise.

The Navara’s six-speed automatic transmission also sends that power and torque to all four wheels, though how exactly it gets there depends on the spec and whether you have a centre differential or not.

The Nissan Pathfinder is only available with a petrol engine. It is an all-aluminium dual overhead cam direct and multi-point injection 3.5-litre V6. It's part of Nissan’s ‘VQ’ engine family that has been around since 1994. 

The V6 develops 202kW at 6400rpm and 340Nm at 4800rpm which are respectable outputs. The torque builds steadily from around 3000rpm and starts to really move the Pathfinder above 4000rpm. 

The lusty engine note is a nice touch in a world dominated by down-sized turbo-petrols and hybrids. There’s something refreshing about the natural response of a large capacity naturally aspirated engine, too, interfacing slickly with the nine-speed automatic transmission.

From the Navara’s 75L tank, a claimed 7.7L/100km is used on the combined (urban/extra-urban) cycle, though on the launch drive we saw the trip computer hovering around 9.0L/100km.

With a few hundred kilos in the tray, that jumped up to the low 11s.

Hypothetically, if you manage to get close to Nissan’s claimed consumption, you should be able to get more than 900km out of a single tank of diesel. Nissan’s claim isn’t too outrageous, either, considering the type of driving a car launch generally consists of isn’t normally conducive to favourable fuel consumption figures.

For all the benefits of that large capacity V6 it has a fatal flaw and that is fuel efficiency — particularly around the suburbs. 

The Pathfinder’s rated fuel consumption is 10.5L/100km in the ADR combined (urban/extra urban) cycle with 245g/km CO2 outputs, however it is much thirstier around town. 

After 100km of suburban driving in Sydney, the Pathfinder’s trip computer read 15.3L/100km. It lacks an engine start-stop system to save precious millilitres when sitting at traffic lights. 

Other large V6 vehicles will be similar, or probably slightly higher in the case of the multi-point injected Palisade, but the gold standard in this segment is the Toyota Kluger hybrid which easily returns figures of 6.0L/100km or less in pretty much all driving. 

A longer 200km loop taking in motorways and country roads saw the Pathfinder consume fuel at 11.4L/100km which is an improvement but still very high.

Our observed fuel consumption gives the Pathfinder, with its 71L tank, a theoretical driving range of 602km. It will happily take standard 91 RON unleaded at the pump.

Now we get to the biggest reason you’d consider a Navara over the Triton it’s based on.

While the Navara benefits from having a relatively new platform underneath it - thanks Mitsubishi - it’s still a ladder-frame dual-cab ute so expectations weren’t exactly on the floor, but they also weren’t sky-high.

And sure, a lot of the details about the new Navara aren’t groundbreaking, nor is much of the way it drives - but the changes Premcar has made to the suspension in this ute are well worth the extra outlay.

What Premcar has done with the Navara, on what we would guess is a relatively constrained budget, is find the most cost-effective way to make the ute better to drive.

They went with upgraded dampers which have been tuned to balance control and comfort with the ute’s off-road ability.

The result? A very controlled front-end, more communicative steering and confidence on the road to drive over even rough surfaces without fear of being flung off the road. Ladder-frame utes don't normally feel so controlled over rough surfaces at high speeds.

It’s worth noting that while the SL and ST still benefit from the suspension upgrades, the ST-X and Pro-4X in particular are much better to drive than you’d expect from a dual-cab ute.

Some of the roads around Canberra are particularly rough, even close to town where the speeds are lower, but the Navara handled myriad surfaces and conditions on- and off-road, in the soaking wet and when it was bone-dry.

Aside from one particular section of the launch that may have just been a little unkind to the ‘stiffer’ sidewalls on the ST-X compared to the Pro-4X, the Navara’s behaviour was not only confidence-building, but allowed for a degree of fun not normally present in the class.

The steering feel left no guesswork necessary, and there’s not a huge on-centre dead-spot as is often the case in a dual-cab. Nice and direct without being too heavy.

The Navara’s weak point, which still gets a pass mark, is probably that its drivetrain now feels older than the ute in which it lives. The outputs are passable, and the transmission finds the correct place well enough, but in a world of 10-speed autos in Rangers or petrol plug-in hybrids, a bog-standard turbo-diesel with six gears has to be bang-on perfect to keep up. 

The Navara’s is adequate, but once you’re used to it, the drive experience is a step above most in the ute segment in terms of control, something that’s hard to come by in this segment.

It translates well to off-roading, where the ute’s front-end settles very quickly over ridges and undulating surfaces without the harshness of a too-stiff set of dampers.

Unsealed roads feel easily dispatched even at relatively high speeds, and with the right tyres (a la Pro-4X) the Navara is a seriously capable thing.

If you find yourself the owner of a D27 Navara and never leave the bitumen, you’re missing out.

The Nissan Pathfinder is a remarkably pleasant drive. It is smooth and quiet on the motorway, comfortable around town and talented on testing Australian country roads. 

Nissan has managed to nail the fundamentals including a well-weighted electronic power steering system, good ride comfort at high and low speeds and impressive body control for a high-set 2052kg vehicle that rides on passive dampers. 

The 18-inch alloys are wrapped in 255/60 Kumho Crugen HP71 tyres which are notably cushier than the Ti-L’s bigger 20-inch alloy wheels shod with 255/50 rubber. 

Being a car-based SUV, the Nissan Pathfinder is more comfortable and a sportier drive than more off-road focused vehicles such as the Ford Everest and Mitsubishi Pajero Sport. It is not as dynamic as smaller seven seaters such as the Kia Sorento but is still secure and stable. 

There are seven drive modes in total, with three ('Sand', 'Mud' and 'Snow') dedicated to off-roading, a further trio ('Auto', 'Eco', 'Sport') for the tarmac and a dedicated 'Tow' mode. 

Along with adjusting steering weight and shift logic, the all-wheel drive Pathfinder adjusts the torque split settings. It can be a little slow to shift torque to the front wheels leading to chirping on fast getaways but it is mostly solid and a worthy $4500 investment over the new front-wheel drive only model. 

Visibility is not great with a high belt line and low-set driving position. With the third row's large headrests up it's hard to see out the rear window, too, so it can be difficult to judge kerbs and walls while parking. A standard 360-degree camera system helps in low-speed manoeuvring.

The Nissan Pathfinder received a maximum five-star ANCAP safety rating in 2022. 

It has a total of nine airbags including dual front, a front centre, side chest for first and second rows and curtain airbags covering all three rows, unlike some smaller rivals.

Active driver assistance systems include autonomous emergency braking (AEB) that can detect cars, pedestrians, cyclists and motorcycles.

The AEB system functions front and rear and includes junction cross-traffic detection. Lane-keep assist, blind-spot monitoring and speed sign detection are also standard. Stability control and ABS systems intervene early and smoothly.

Going further than just having the systems, the Pathfinder’s integration is very good. The adaptive cruise control is smooth, the lane-trace assist is mostly good. They can all be easily disabled if you like, too.

Nissan’s 10-year/300,000km warranty is fantastic but applies only if you service with Nissan. It’s five years with no kilometre limit otherwise. 

There’s five years' of flat-price servicing at $499 per visit, every 12-months or 15,000km, whichever comes first.

Roadside assist is also free for a decade if you service with Nissan, or a year otherwise.

Given there are around 180 Nissan dealers nationwide, finding one shouldn’t be a challenge.

Nissan recommends the Pathfinder is serviced every 12 months or 15,000km, whichever comes first.

You can pay-as-you-go ($2592) or up front ($2333) which saves $259 over five years ($518.40/$466.60 average per workshop visit).

Those service price options are closely aligned with the Hyundai Palisade ($2345) but Toyota’s $1325 Kluger offer remains unbeaten. 

A five-year, unlimited kilometre warranty covers all Nissan vehicles in Australia. It is now the standard with other marques, including Kia, MG and Mitsubishi pushing boundaries with longer seven and 10-year offers.