The Bentley Bentayga Speed Is Back, And Now It’ll Drift

Been mourning the death of the old 190mph Bentley Bentayga Speed? Ever since the big old W12 bruiser was discontinued in 2023, we’ve had to make do with Bentaygas powered ‘only’ by a 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 (plus a V6 hybrid).

Well, on that front, we have good and bad news: the good is that the Bentayga Speed is back. The bad, depending on how you look at it, is that it, too, is now a V8. The W12 engine, after all, went out of production altogether last year, and now all of Bentley’s flagships have eight-pot power.

But while the Speed versions of the Continental family incorporate their 4.0-litre twin-turbo unit into a hybrid system, the new Bentayga Speed remains solely powered by petrol. It continues to drive all four wheels via an eight-speed automatic.

Here, the engine’s churning out 641bhp and 627lb ft of torque, helping cut the 0-62mph time to 3.4 seconds – a full half a second quicker than the old W12 Bentayga Speed. Top speed, meanwhile, is 193mph, 3mph faster than the old one.

Truthfully, that old 12-pot was always better at muted, stately whooshing than raucous shoutiness. That shouldn’t be an issue in the new Speed, which comes as standard with a sports exhaust. If that’s still not noisy enough for you, you can spec a titanium exhaust from Akrapovic, which you can tell apart from the standard system thanks to quad tailpipes.

The updated Speed comes with Bentley’s usual suite of drive modes – Comfort, Sport and the middle-ground Bentley mode. Sport mode, though, has been treated to a significant tweak, with a new Dynamic setting for the stability control. This, in Bentley’s own words, allows for “exhilarating drift angles or power-on oversteer.” In a Bentley SUV that presumably weighs the same as several small planets. The mind boggles.

The Dynamic ESC mode also introduces launch control to the Bentayga for the first time, while other chassis changes include all-wheel steering, brake torque vectoring and a 15 per cent increase in damping stiffness.

To tell the Speed apart from lesser Bentaygas, look out for the darkened chrome trim pieces, smoked head- and tail lights, and Speed-specific 22-inch wheels. If you spec the optional carbon ceramic brakes, meanwhile, you can also choose some truly enormous 23-inch wheels, the biggest ever fitted to a Bentley. Oh, and there are lots of Speed badges, which should make spotting it easier.

The smattering of Speed badging continues on the inside, where there’s also a Speed-specific UI for the instrument display. The standard Speed upholstery features a dark leather offset by flashes of a brighter shade, neatly demonstrated here by a lurid green. This being a modern Bentley, though, you’ll be able to do pretty much whatever you want with the interior through the company’s Mulliner personalisation division.

Pricing and availability are yet to be confirmed, but as the new flagship of the Bentayga range, expect the Speed to start comfortably north of £200,000, before you even think about throwing some lavish options at it. So what’s it to be – this or the new Aston DBX S?