Yahoo Autos 2024 Lexus LS500h Tested: Keeping It Older School
These days, full-size luxury cars are as much about on-road comfort as they are vessels for an automaker's latest, greatest technology. It doesn't matter if it's scent diffusers, trillion-color ambient lighting, or theater screens that descend from the ceiling—it almost feels like these attention-grabbers have put simple, straightforward luxury by the wayside. But that's not the case with the Lexus LS. If you want a full-size luxury sedan where a coddling ride takes center stage, this is the luxobarge for you.
This specific luxobarge is the LS500h, which skips the base model's twin-turbo 3.4-liter V-6 in favor of a hybrid powertrain that combines a naturally aspirated 3.5-liter V-6 and a pair of electric motors that combine with the engine through a planetary gearset—one motor acting primarily as a generator, with another capable of driving the rear wheels on electric power alone—for a total of 354 horsepower. That output is a bit less than the 416 ponies that the base 3.4-liter puts out, which means performance takes a hit, but in exchange, we're promised more efficiency.
On paper, the Lexus LS500h is well behind its primary competition. Our test car managed the 60-mph sprint in 5.6 seconds, which falls behind our latest tests of the 536-hp BMW 760i xDrive (3.5 seconds) and the 429-hp Mercedes S500 (4.6 seconds). The six-cylinder BMW 740i also offers more power (375 horses); we have yet to test that one, but the factory-stated 60-mph time is 5.2 seconds. The LS500h's quarter-mile efforts aren't much better; requiring 14.3 seconds at 99 mph, the Lexus is more than a second behind the Mercedes, and it lags the Bimmer by more than two seconds.
Further testing only highlights the width of the LS500h's performance chasm. Wearing a set of Bridgestone Turanza EL450 all-season tires, the LS made its way around the skidpad with a paltry 0.81 g of grip. The Germans we tested both arrived on Pirelli P Zero PZ4 summer rubber, dramatically improving their skidpad ratings: The 7-series achieved 0.89 g, while the S-class stands atop the podium at 0.91 g. The Lexus's mediocre grip also led to a 177-foot stop from 70 mph, needing 17 feet more than the BMW and 19 feet more than the Mercedes.
But the LS500h is a hybrid, so it must be more efficient, right? Well, hybrids get the most benefit from their electron motivation at lower speeds, so a 31-mpg result from our 75-mph real-world highway fuel economy test proves no more efficient than the S500, and the 7-series was just 1 mpg behind.
The data may not paint the greatest picture of the Lexus LS, but there are a couple of reasons for this. First, the current generation of LS debuted for the 2018 model year, which means this car is a little long in the tooth, while the BMW and Mercedes have received major overhauls in that span of time. Second, what we appreciate about the LS isn't quantifiable. Instead, it's about the experience.
The LS feels decidedly old-school in execution. Every input is muted and dead simple to modulate without a hint of passenger head bobs. Even the threshold between friction and regenerative braking is super smooth. The steering is overboosted to hell and back, and we're pretty sure we could crisscross the country with little beyond a pinkie finger's worth of effort. A standard air suspension makes no sacrifices for handling; yes, there's a stiffer Sport mode, but the LS doesn't feel as planted as the Germans, and it's immensely comfortable in daily operation, soaking up just about every imperfection the road has to offer.
Sure, there's a small hiccup as the electric motors make way for the internal-combustion engine to kick in, but that's the most jarring part of the entire LS experience. The transmission—a mishmash of a continuously variable unit created by the planetary gearset with four fixed ratios thrown into the mix—isn't our favorite, especially in this upper echelon of luxury where traditional automatics reign supreme, but we experienced very few situations where the CVT held the V-6 at a noisy part of the rev range. In fact, at wide-open throttle, we recorded 70 decibels in the Lexus, the quietest of the three cars we've discussed. Keep your throttle work light, and you'll jet off to (Rides Like a) Cloud City.
Hop into either the S-class or 7-series cabin, and you might wonder if you landed in a casino in Macau. Screens, lights, and other check-out-my-Instagram details cover nearly every corner of their cabins. The LS, on the other hand, offers a straightforward combination of (much welcome) physical switchgear and buttery-soft leather. A 12.3-inch touchscreen runs the latest infotainment software found on other new Lexus and Toyota vehicles, and it's a welcome replacement for the mouse-pad-based user interface we grew to revile. Our test car lacks the ultra-fancy cut-glass trim, but there isn't a single corner of this cabin that feels lacking. The only true annoyance is that the seat-massage controls are hidden behind at least two button presses. The horror.
In addition to offering a simpler luxury car than its German counterparts, Lexus also makes a value play at the base end. The LS starts at $80,685 for its gas-fed LS500, which is about $15,000 below the cheapest BMW 7-series and almost $40,000 less than a bare-bones Mercedes S-class. The LS hybrid's $115,560 base price eliminates most of that gulf, but it still rings in under anything from the S-class lineup.
If driving verve and on-paper points of comparison matter most to you, the Lexus LS would likely float right past your eyes unnoticed. But if you want a paragon of comfortable handling without a bunch of frippery that seems best suited for putting your service advisor's kids through college, the LS500h keeps things laser-focused on comfort.
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