Mercedes-Benz CLA review

Perfectly acceptable if not perfect. The 250+ manages 0-62mph in a rapid-ish 6.7 seconds but doesn’t feel that fast. The 350+ with a 0-62mph time of under five seconds is appreciably faster and yet not actually more fun. Both run to 130mph at the top end.

Both have accurate but numb steering no matter the drive mode, both ride with the kind of bullish fluency you expect from Mercedes. Brake recuperation comes in various stages of strength, as well as an intelligent mode that does the best it can with the information available, and there’s nothing scary about the one-pedal mode at all – you soon get used to it.

It’s also very quiet, capable and flat through corners, and very calm. But it just feels a bit determinedly sensible. There’s not a huge amount of character to the way it delivers the experience, and although that’s probably bang-on for what a Mercedes customer might expect, for a reader of TopGear.com, it comes across as a bit bland. Even for an EV.

There is precious little in the way of rear-wheel drive feeling in the 250+, even with 260-odd bhp at the back axle, and the 350+ likes to push wide if you get on-throttle  early and try to be silly. This car isn’t a fan of silly.

So it’s boring?

That depends on what you get excited about. It might not be the last word when hanging by your fingernails on the dynamic limit, but if you can muster some excitement for a car that’s slapping its mission statement into next week with efficiency and tech, you’ll be satisfied. This isn’t a performance car – even with dual motors – and doesn’t pretend to be.

And once you set up all the tech to your satisfaction, it becomes quite charming. It’ll be a killer daily if you’ve got to do lots of miles on boring roads and you want to do so cheaply and in comfort. That sounds like damning with faint praise, but that’s what a lot of people want, and Mercedes is eminently wise to that fact.