2022 Land Rover Range Rover Review: Gold Standard of Luxury SUVs

A multi-hour drive up to the cottage is a prime testing opportunity for a Range Rover.

This 2022 Land Rover Range Rover is the latest and greatest in the storied model’s 50 year history. A mix of crowded highways in the city, rough-surface country roads, and dirt trails for the final stretch should encapsulate most of the situations it will find itself in over the course of ownership.

When the last generation debuted a decade ago, truly high-end luxury SUVs were thin on the ground. Now, nearly everyone has an entry. Or, like Ferrari, they’re about to. That’s fine: with a plush, confident ride and high-end interior, the latest Range Rover has further refined the formula that’s made it the standard of the class.

Land Rover’s flagship rides on a largely new platform for this latest generation. The aluminum unibody chassis has grown in all directions, as is typical for any new car. The expansion has allowed Land Rover to offer the Rangie with three rows of seats in eight-inches-longer LWB, though this tester sticks to the traditional SWB two-row layout. The in-house V8 has retired, and for the first time in almost 20 years, a BMW eight-cylinder is once again underhood. JLR’s own Ingenium inline-six will continue to do Range Rover duty too, including a plug-in hybrid model—and a fully electric model in 2024.

The look is instantly recognizable. Land Rover has stuck to its clean, almost architectural design language for a minute now, and the latest Range Rover makes it even more minimal. At first glance, it’s all straight lines. Look closer and there’s a subtle bend to every edge, from the graceful arch of the shoulder line to the taper of the glasshouse. A crisp character line adds definition to the lower flanks, while generous helpings of black glazing down low and up top trim visual weight from what is a very large shape. The satin gold paint of this test model looks fantastic: glam enough for a flagship, but subdued, not shouty.

The face, with even thinner headlights now, is classic Range Rover. Spin around to the tail and that’s where things get radical. A large, black frame punctuates the tailgate, with the taillights hidden in the ultra-thin vertical elements. It looks clever in the day, and gives the Range Rover a unique nighttime signature.

Enormous 23-inch alloy wheels plant the SUV to the ground. Overall, it’s still very much a Range Rover, and so much more elegant than the brutish Bentayga or clumsy Cullinan.

Like the exterior, the cabin is familiar, but thoughtfully updated for a new decade. There’s still a distinct yacht feel to the leather, aluminum, and wood interior, but now it’s refined. The vents have faded into the background, all trim and tidy lining the top edge of the dashboard. The giant shield of a steering wheel center is smaller, more elegant. Two thick aluminum stanchions prop up the central section, which houses all of the climate controls, including JLR’s clever push-pull-rotate dials.

Front-seat comfort is supreme, once you’ve pulled those heavy doors open and taken the small climb up into the thrones. The 24-way adjustable seats include a variety of massage programs, with five levels of intensity. Needless to say, we arrive at the cottage feeling good. The back row gets an even better deal, with the right-side seat offering up a first-class power-recline feature. There’s a central touchscreen (and wireless charger) in the foldaway center seatback to control the seat angle and massage functions. It’s all kinds of power-operated: the folding, the extension, the cupholder cover.

The tech suite includes a curved 13.1-inch central touchscreen, which runs JLR’s smart, responsive Pivi Pro system. As purely touchscreen setups go, it’s a good one. Keep the capacitive feature off, though; it requires a real poke to register an action, which makes it more of a distraction. A slightly larger (13.7-inch) screen sits ahead of the driver, hanging from the dashboard hood. This high-res, six-sided screen is eminently customizable, providing as little or as much info as you want. Rounding all this out is a pair of 11.6-inch screens in the second row, with screen mirroring and HDMI support.

If there’s a quibble here, it’s that the interior of this tester doesn’t feel worth 50-percent more than some of the competition. It’s a fantastic space filled with quality materials—but that’s expected in anything playing in the six-figure space. A friend calls the interior “basic” at the cottage; I prefer “minimal,” but I admit there’s little flash to draw folks in.

The twin-turbo V8 gives this rolling personal wellness retreat serious go. BMW makes one of the best in the business, and Land Rover has tweaked the engine’s calibration to its own tastes, even if the on-paper stats are the same 523 horsepower and 553 pound-feet of torque as the X7. The result is an engine with creamy power delivery, a super-smooth throttle that’s satisfying to lean into. The eight-speed auto is a near-perfect match; other than very occasional jumpiness from a stop, it melts into the background, as it should.

As impressive as the powertrain is, it’s the Rangie’s well-judged air suspension that really makes it feel special. Even on the enormous 23-inch wheels, the standard mode ride is smooth and controlled, gliding over broken pavement with only a distant, muffled thud. The steering is light and consistent, matching the laidback—but not lazy—feel. Drivers can pick from myriad drive modes, including a Dynamic setting complete with lap timer and g-meter, but that feels uncouth in something this big and gold. Leave it for the upcoming RR Sport. The rubber wrapping those big hoops does transmit a fair amount of tire noise to the cabin; we’d have to drive the smaller-wheeled models back to back to see improvements, if any.

Rear-wheel steering is present on this tester, and standard on all trims in North America. The benefits are two-fold: this hulking beast has a tight turning circle of just 36 feet (11 meters), so it’s easy-peasy to point around an underground car park. At higher speeds, the rear wheels turn in-phase with the fronts, aiding stability.

I’d love to tell you how the Range Rover conquered a serious off-road trail, but it didn’t encounter anything gnarlier than a yump-filled dirt road. Hill descent assist, crawl mode, and even a wading water depth meter are all present here, should you want to go exploring.

With the Range Rover’s reputation as the luxury SUV, it’s not surprising that Land Rover has shifted pricing into the stratosphere. We’re not quite at the aforementioned Bentley and Rolls-Royce levels, but it’s not far off anymore, either.

The basic price of admission is now $105,975 ($128,995 CAD), including destination. Ain’t nobody buying a budget Rangie, though, so expect to shell out even more for some of the desirable options, not least of which are the plug-in or V8 drivetrains, or the extended wheelbase. This tester is the limited First Edition SWB. A launch year special, it bundles just about everything you can possibly get on the new flagship shy of the SV, and comes with a $165,975 ($183,950 CAD) price to match. It’s also a V8-only affair. Our Canadian-spec tester adds a few other options, notably that pricey paint ($7,450 / $9,400 CAD) and the shadow exterior trim. A heated windshield is unique to the Canadian market ($500 CAD), but remove that, and the as-tested price is $176,375 ($199,070 CAD).

What else is there if you’ve got nearly 200 large burning a whole in your pocket? There’s a Mercedes-AMG for every taste, and the GLS 63 is a hot rod of a three-row SUV. The Maybach GLS actually undercuts this tester—in the US, anyway, at $166,150 ($212,400 CAD). Exclusivity your thing? The Alpina XB7 has the Range Rover beat there, though the refreshed BMW X7 touches down later this year, so you’ll have to wait for the latest. Swinging back to sporty? Aston Martin’s DBX is here to answer the call, in a size class down.

Toyota won’t sell you a Landcruiser anymore, but the Lexus LX600 is practically the same thing, only with more leather, and a similar reclining-seat setup in the back. It’s much smoother now than it used to be, but it can’t hold a candle to the Rangie’s serene on-road ride.

The 2022 Land Rover Range Rover doesn’t tear up the old recipe book. It didn’t need to. Like the best icons of the industry, the latest model makes thoughtful refinements instead, expanding its core strengths and sanding down what few weaknesses it had before. This limited-run First Edition is of questionable value beyond rarity, but the good news is that, at least on paper, even the base Range Rover offers most of the same experience. Land Rover’s flagship remains the measuring stick by which all other luxury SUVs are judged.