Land Rover Range Rover Velar verdict

The Range Rover Velar is undoubtedly a car with more of the luxury star quality of its larger Range Rover siblings in some respects than it has in others.

The impact and effectiveness of JLR’s latest changes to it are a little debatable. In a context in which interior functionality is moving ever more wholesale onto touchscreens industry-wide, the Velar's changes in this respect are fairly well handled and don't create significant usability problems. But they do make for some secondary controls that are more distracting than they used to be.

I'd probably find a way to stretch to a six-cylinder D300 Dynamic SE, and get air suspension as part of the deal, if it were my money. In doing that, I'd be confident of getting a very suave and stylish SUV.

Matt Saunders

Road test editor

In terms of outright material quality, and in lower-level trim as tested, the car leaves a little to be desired for the richness you'd expect of a full-sized Range Rover. But dynamically first and foremost, and also in how it looks, it remains an SUV that stands out from its rivals in readily apparent ways.

Its critics may claim it is an entirely superficial car, symbolic of everything that a Land Rover traditionalist might dislike about the new JLR. But, in more ways than one, they'd be wrong to do so.