Land Rover Range Rover Evoque review

It's a Range Rover, and there's no pretence of being sporty. But there's satisfaction to be had from the way it responds to your demands with considered precision. Bad weather or long trips won't take it out of you.

The whole engine range is made up of 2.0-litre 4cyls, with the exception of the 1.5-litre, three-cylinder option offered with the plug-in hybrid. Diesels are called D165 and D200; petrols are P200 and P250; the plug-in is the P300e. You can guess their power. The base diesel is 2WD and gets a six-speed manual, all others are 4WD and get a nine-speed automatic.

What variants have you tested?

We previously had a go in the P300. It’s no longer available, but the mild hybrid tech is the same as found elsewhere. It shuts the engine early as you move to a halt, and re-starts instantly. It's not a system that gives any extra peak power or torque, but it does help fill in the brief troughs of turbo lag.

We’ve have tested the P300e lately. It combines a three-cylinder petrol engine with a 107bhp electric motor and 14.9kWh battery, for a claimed 39 miles of EV range. Around town it's pretty silent and willing. Out on the open road, performance is effective enough (0-62mph takes 6.4 seconds), and the additional torque from the e-motor undoubtedly comes in handy. But the engine gets a little grumbly when pushed and it struggles to disguise its weight: with this car's electric gubbins it's knocking on over two tonnes, putting it in full EV territory. It shows.

As ever, you can switch between full EV, hybrid and battery save driving modes, with the transition between electric and combustion engine smooth enough. The automatic gearbox too feels well calibrated, but it does occasionally hold on to a gear too long when you open the throttle, before banging down through several ratios. 

Our biggest irritation was undoubtedly the active assistance, aka the Forward Collision Warning and Speed Limit Notification et al, which automatically default to the most intrusive settings every time you start the car. Wow, is the bonging from the speed limit alert irritating, especially when it misreads a 30mph zone as a 20. Toggling between High, Custom and Low modes to switch it off means using steering wheel toggle, or diving into the touchscreen. Painful.

Annoying. How does it ride?

The ride isn't soft like a big Range Rover's or Discovery's, but it's pliable and takes away most of the harshness. Switching between driving/damper modes makes only a subtle difference, and in fact auto mode is the best calibrated of the lot. Comfort mode doesn't help much because it loses wheel control so you feel extra juddering. The suspension is quiet so your ears aren't alerting you to the bumps, only your body. Tyre noise is properly smothered away too.

In corners, you just steer, and the Evoque obligingly sorts things out. There's some roll, but that helps you gauge what's going on in the near-complete absence of steering feel. Mid-corner bumps don't bother it, which is a big plus in most of Britain. The good view out (rear window aside) and comparatively narrow body are both blessings on country B-roads, just as in cities. Little commotion or shudder makes its way through the body or steering column – the extra strength and isolation here are a credit to the suspension and platform.

Off-road, Land Rover always provides decent clearance and articulation versus rivals, and some handy off-road traction electronics to keep you trucking along. Claimed wading depth is a handy 60cm.

Anything else we should know?

For company car drivers, the CO2 outputs range between 168 and 207g/km. Mild hybrid or not, these are mediocre numbers. You're paying for the off-road ability. On fuel, the mid-power diesels manage just better than 40mpg on WLTP, while the petrols are around 30mpg. You might just equal those.

However, the P300e is likely to be much more appealing with its plug-in hybrid powertrain and 12 per cent Benefit-in-Kind (BiK) tax. Land Rover claims CO2 emissions of just 31g/km, and a real world electric range of around 30 miles will save a pretty penny for many commuters.