Toyota Land Cruiser engines & performance

Toyota put on an off-road course in a muddy forest to demonstrate the car’s capabilities. With four-wheel-drive low-range engaged and the systems in Mud mode, you can turn on Crawl Control. The latter is effectively off-road cruise control that tries to maintain a set speed, which you can vary in 1kph increments up to 6kph by twisting the drive mode switch.

So configured, the Land Cruiser dragged itself up and down slopes and through water troughs while I just had to steer. The hardcore off-road enthusiast may enjoy the lever-pulling in an old Defender, but for everyone else this is mighty convenient.

There are shift paddles on the steering wheel, which seems a little optimistic, but they're not in the way.

Illya Verpraet

Road Tester

It wasn’t the most challenging course (neither the rear diff nor the front anti-roll-bar disconnect were ever called into action), but you still wouldn’t want to attempt it in a BMW X3. The Land Cruiser is capable, all right, but we will have to find out some other day where exactly it stands compared with the Land Rover Defender and Discovery and the Ineos Grenadier.

Whether the Land Cruiser is good on the road depends on your perspective. With its chugging, large-capacity four-cylinder diesel and body-on-frame construction, it’s no match for the Defender or Discovery, let alone more road-bound 4x4s like the BMW X5.

The Land Rovers won’t tow any less (3500kg) and are unlikely to be much less capable off road, though, so the ultimate reliability must be a major factor if you are to choose the Toyota.