Volkswagen Arteon review

There’s a funny thing that subtly alters how we feel about the vast array of products in the VW Group upon climbing out of them. That thing is called ‘expectation’. The strait-laced behaviour of an Audi S3 will disappoint anyone too invested in the Quattro badging, where similar manners in an Octavia vRS feel entirely in keeping with the ‘hot hatch for parents’ aesthetic it wears.

Which is a slightly convoluted way of explaining why your first go in the Arteon will probably disappoint. It drives like a big Volkswagen. It drives like a Passat, in fact, it just doesn’t look like one, so you’d be forgiven for being a bit underwhelmed by its soft ride, relaxed gait and its default to safe, neat handling over anything resembling the deftness of a 4 Series.

But ultimately this is a natively front-driven big saloon that’ll spend most of its life being driven in straight lines for a long period of time. Leaning heavily away from sportiness and into the world of comfort is exactly what it should be doing.

The 268bhp petrol which used to top the range never quite propelled the Arteon with the vigour its spec sheet might have suggested; for all the engine’s decent low-rev torque, it still needed wringing out a fair bit to shift the big Arteon with anything approaching vim. Thus the 187bhp petrol which now leads proceedings (below the big-boy Arteon R, at least) feels yet more strained, and the engine doesn’t sound especially good when you work it hard.

So don’t. Keep things calm, adopt some of the Arteon’s ‘laissez faire’ attitiude, and appreciate the luxury of the space and tech it’s chock-full of. We’ll have a go in the Arteon R in due course, but we suspect its introduction has allowed VW’s engineers to ramp up the aggression in the highest-powered model and leave the rest of the range to do rep duties with the minimum of fuss.

Spec the adaptive suspension and it offers adjustment through the usual settings including Comfort, Normal and Sport, as well via the slider bar where you can adjust to levels between even those presets, to find your own ‘medium rare’. That’s a lot of suspension choices, and unless you’re particularly sensitive of bottom, you’re unlikely to notice any sizeable difference between them.

At no point when pitching the 1.8-ton Arteon into a corner did we think we needed more stiffness than Comfort provided. It’s just not the sort of car you’re going to chuck about for the hell of it, and choosing Sport only adds unwanted corruption to the ride comfort. Its wide track aids its stability, the optional 4Motion brings with it reassuring traction, the grip is high and the steering accurate, if lacking in anything you could describe as feedback.

That’s fine – and in keeping with its brief – but we return to that conundrum of ‘expectation’. Surely, given the arresting looks, it wouldn’t hurt if – away from its big mile munching ability and refinement – it was just a little more arresting behind the wheel.