2018' Mercedes-Benz

Premium-feeling and well-trimmed interior
Many standard safety and technology features
Surprisingly comfortable ride quality, given its performance abilities
Even the pavement-pounding AMG GLE is easy to drive around town
It's tremendously powerful and agile for its size, but you never forget just how heavy this GLE Coupe is. It's civilized when you're just cruising around. A puzzling vehicle, it's effective in the same way a gold-plated hammer is.Despite its mass, it stops from 60 mph in a respectable 112 feet. Pedal feel around town is intuitive and easy to modulate.For its size, it's more adept than you might expect. Heavy and stable. Body roll is reasonably contained, and it changes direction without drama. But other sporting SUVs have better handling.It's quite pleasant in normal driving. It behaves in a civilized manner in routine driving. Smooth gear changes. The idle-stop feature responds acceptably quickly when restarting. This is a vehicle you could let your grandparents drive.While finely trimmed, the GLE cabin suffers due to the low and sloping roofline, which eats up interior space. There's surprisingly little space inside given the gargantuan outside dimensions. All of the downsides of a large vehicle with none of the upsides.We're happy to see Apple CarPlay make its debut in the GLE Coupe, but the lack of a touchscreen makes it all but unusable. The control and adjustability are beyond what the COMAND interface can handle. The touchpad and dial are two separate systems, and actions and motions don't carry over.
Audio & navigation
Our tester's Harman Kardon audio system sounds good and is easy to use. Inputting destinations is straightforward, and the system provides sufficient directions to maximize success. The biggest challenge will be in getting into the proper mode by jogging and spinning the dial controller.
Smartphone integration
Bluetooth pairing is quick, and both USB ports in the center console can be accessed by the head unit. The lower of the two USB ports is dedicated to Apple CarPlay/Android Auto integration, but accessing that mode is tremendously difficult.Driver aids
The adaptive cruise control works great, and the function is easy to access via the cruise control stalk. Blind-spot detection is just about perfect, and lane departure feedback is gentle. Lane-centering is fine for extremely intermittent use.
Voice control
The voice recognition system doesn't recognize plain text inputs via the touchpad. The system has a specific order and way of inputting commands. This can get tricky since the system is a bit laggy, so you find yourself repeating and mis-timing commands.