Porsche Panamera Turbo Review: You Really Don’t Need That Cayenne

Did you forget about the Porsche Panamera? It’s quite possibly the last car you picture when you think of the Stuttgart manufacturer.

We car bores still go straight to the 911 and the 718, while it’s Porsche’s SUVs that find their way onto the driveways of five-bedroom detached houses in the home counties. That said, the Panamera did end up outselling the Taycan in 2024, Porsche’s shiny EV saloon taking a bit of a sales mauling.

Really, though, Porsche’s big executive express has always been a curiosity – after all, there simply aren’t that many people out there after a massive luxury saloon with sports car dynamics, even when it has a badge this desirable. Still, that hasn’t stopped Porsche from engineering the heck out of the third generation, which debuted at the end of 2023.

It sits on an updated version of the old car’s platform, shared with the latest Bentley Continental and Flying Spur, but has a totally overhauled exterior and interior, the latter in line with the updated Cayenne. It rides on fancy new dual-chamber air suspension that, among other things, jacks the Panamera up to a hilarious donk-like ride height when it’s unlocked to make it easier to drop into its low, snug cabin.

We’ve been driving the plug-in Turbo E-Hybrid, which was top of the tree until a more powerful Turbo S version arrived (Turbo models are now hybrid-only, leaving the GTS as the top non-electrified version). It’s still prodigiously powerful: the ubiquitous VW Group 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 is aided by a 187bhp electric motor integrated into the car’s eight-speed PDK gearbox. The combination delivers a max of 671bhp and 686lb ft of torque to all four wheels.

Unsurprisingly, this makes for fairly mighty numbers, especially for something that weighs an unladen 2360kg: 0-62mph takes a quoted 3.6 seconds, and top speed is 196mph. The way it delivers this power is familiar from lots of other hugely powerful, electrically-boosted cars: a huge, unwavering surge that trying to find the upper reaches of anywhere besides an empty Autobahn is going to land you in front of someone you have to call ‘your honour’.

It really is addictively fast, but it’s not particularly playful in the way it achieves that speed. Even in the hotter drive modes with the ruder exhaust active, the V8 only ever provides a distant rumble, like standing several miles away from a NASCAR superspeedway on race day. As supercar-troublingly rapid as it is, the Panamera is still very aware of its brief as a businessperson’s express.

That said, we’re not sure how many businesspeople need to take corners like this. With such massive tyres, four-wheel drive and, on this car, optional Porsche Torque Vectoring Plus, grip reserves are vast, even on greasy, cold and sometimes icy roads.

Combined with steering that’s more communicative than it has any business being in a huge luxury saloon, you can haul the Panamera through corners with the kind of speed and agility you’d expect for a car carrying a good few hundred kilos less. This is further amplified with our test car’s £6978 option of Active Ride Control, a set of hydraulically-driven shocks that react near-instantly to inputs from driver and road and cancel out body roll to a spooky degree.

Serious brakes are needed to keep everything in check, so up front the Panamera gets enormous 420mm cross-drilled discs with hilarious 10-piston callipers, with 380mm items and four-pots at the back. Together with some light regen from the electric motor, they do a very good job of stopping the mighty Panamera from barrelling up on other road users like a weird remake of that Indiana Jones scene with the boulder.

You get the sense the Panamera is simply bludgeoning physics into submission rather than cooperating with them, but it’s still hugely impressive. That said, really get cracking and all the computer power in the world can’t overcome its massive weight, and hints of understeer will start to bubble through. Similarly, on tighter B-roads, its sheer size and long, thrusting bonnet give you a sense of what it might be like trying to manoeuvre an oil tanker down the Thames.

It’s all very adept, then, for spearing across the countryside in an unflappable manner, but you still get the sense that the Panamera’s happiest as a cruiser. You sit relaxed and sports car low, cocooned in a sumptuous, isolated chamber of leather, technology and thumping bass from the excellent but sadly optional Burmester sound system.

The air suspension is arguably at its best here, smoothing out the worst that British roads can throw at it without a second thought. Its ability to transition from hunting corners like a swollen Mitsubishi Evo to sitting calmly on a motorway like an S-Class Merc really is impressive. However, the worst surfaces do interrupt the tranquillity of the cabin with thuds and reverberations.

Mostly, though, the Panamera feels like it would be a truly spectacular thing to chew up big miles in, especially given the cabin’s loveliness. All the materials feel top-notch, and it’s fairly sensible ergonomically, too. Porsche’s so far resisted over-screening its cars, and plenty of core functions are handled by the glossy black panel in the centre console.

What look like annoying haptic buttons actually provide proper clicky feedback, and things like temperature and fan speed are adjusted with lovely tactile switches. Good luck keeping the whole thing fingerprint-free, mind.

Things are slightly less peachy in the back: though the Panamera’s massive by saloon standards, adults sitting behind a taller driver might find their knees brushing against the seatbacks, and its sloping roofline can make things a bit claustrophobic.

Being a PHEV, the Turbo E-Hybrid comes with some laughably optimistic economy figures. MPG is quoted at 134.5, but subtract 100 from that figure and you’d be doing well on anything other than a short, electric-only trip. After a day of admittedly spirited driving, an indicated 25mpg was the best I could manage.

It’s the same story with its electric-only range – Porsche quotes 49 miles, but on the bitterly cold day I drove it, a full battery was offering me 28 miles. The number the car gives you does at least seem fairly honest, and doesn’t drop alarmingly quickly when it’s being used to augment the petrol engine.

Overall, the Panamera Turbo E-Hybrid probably might have the greatest breadth of capability of anything Porsche makes. It does a decent impression of a 911 in the corners, has all the luxury of a Cayenne, and cruises like a modern-day 928. The most glaring flaw is that Porsche ditched the mega-cool Sport Turismo estate version you used to be able to get.

Oh, and the cost: while a basic V6 Panamera starts at £83,568, the minimum for a Turbo E-Hybrid is £145,400. Our car was optioned up to a frightening £188,262. Although it’s a bit bigger and posher, a car like this will inevitably be compared to the new, hybrid BMW M5, which kicks off at just over £111k. We’re driving that soon, so we’ll find out if the Porsche’s extra size and slightly healthier performance numbers are worth another £34k.

Regardless, the Panamera deserves more of a look-in than it gets. In 2024, it was outsold by the Cayenne more than threefold, but as good as the latest Cayenne is, spec-for-spec, its big saloon cousin is probably even better.