We Drive Jaguar’s All-New XE – Video Review

SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO

Trying something new is usually exciting. Like venturing into that section of the gym you always avoid. Or visiting a new restaurant. Both of these are relatively painless and unless you are caught on camera falling off the gym equipment, usually lead to very little public humiliation.

It’s a very different process if you’re a car manufacturer. Taking a crack at a new segment requires many years of research, development, testing and most importantly – a massive lump of cash.

For many years, Jaguar had the skills, engineering know-how and confidence to pull of a car like the new XE, but the finances were, in a manner of speaking, problematic. But now, emboldened by the success and popularity of cars like the F-Type, Jaguar have decided arguably the toughest premium segment of all; the segment dominated by cars like the BMW 3 Series, Mercedes C Class and Audi A4.

Right off the bat, the XE looks good, if a little restrained. It’s immediately recognisable as a modern Jaguar and fans of the brand’s general look and feel will not be disappointed.

The interior is particularly luxurious for this segment with leather covering the entire dashboard, boldly double stitched and framing a touchscreen featuring Jaguar’s brand new infotainment system, which is a much needed leap-forward from the long-serving, clunky system that it replaces.

In this video, we’ll detail what the new XE is like to drive, which engines are available and more importantly which one you should buy, what the boot space is like, as well as the rear legroom, and of course we’ll dive into the pricing, which is…interesting.

For our comparison below, we have compared the new Jaguar XE 20d R-Sport with the BMW 320d M-Sport and Mercedes C220d AMG Sports auto.