JACK OF ALL TRADES
For 2025, BMW’s venerable X5 Sport Activity Vehicle joins the electrified crowd with the company’s first local plug-in hybrid offering in the guise of the X5 xDrive 50e M Sport.
Packing V8 power in a chassis sprinkled with M Sport fairy dust (sportier M Sport adaptive air suspension, massive 21-inch wheels and 274/40R21 front tires plus supercar-sized 315/35R21 rears with equally massive big brakes), this X5 breaks cover packing the brand’s now ubiquitous B58 inline six-cylinder turbo engine made famous by ironically, the BMW Z4’s twin, the A90 Toyota Supra which has proven almost as, if not more robust than the Japanese brand’s very own 2JZ from two decades prior. Aside from its robust closed-deck iron block design, it bestows the X5 with a glorious six-cylinder wail missing in its competitors.
This PHEV (plugin hybrid electric vehicle) variant comes with a total system output of 479hp and 700 Newton-Meters of torque driving all four wheels via BMW’s xDrive system. It defaults to full EV mode when in hybrid mode, perfect for escaping home or office with a minimum of fuss. It goes all the way to a top EV-only speed of 140kph (250kph in combined hybrid-sport mode with the internal combustion engine). BMW claims an all-electric range of around 54 kilometers, but independent tests abroad have eked out as much as 87 kilometers in full EV driving mode.
The chassis setting is very sporty, very also playful. It allows you to adjust cornering attitude based on throttle input even if it’s all-wheel drive; the X5 retains a resolutely rear-drive bias and thank the boffins in white coats from Munich for this.
Floor the throttle, and in-gear acceleration is like being launched off of an aircraft carrier: It’s heart- stopping thanks to the massive tidal wave of torque available from tip-in to propel you forward as the electric motor takes care of the torque valley until the B58 winds up and sings its lungs out all the way to redline and beyond. You never feel that the X5 is out of its depth despite the considerable 2,495kg heft and the 214-mm ground clearance: It feels planted, sorted, safe, confident and secure always.
Inside, perforated plush leather seats and BMW’s latest Live Cockpit Professional Curved Display with iDrive is fitted allowing wireless Apple CarPlay or Android Auto mobile phone integration to work seamlessly with the infotainment system with the powerful Harman Kardon surround sound system playing my beloved classical music playlist from Vivaldi, Mozart and Carmina Burana’s O Fortuna. You get 40:20:40 split folding rear seats, a slightly smaller 500 liters (versus 650 liters for the non PHEV) of rear cargo space
In the boot to make way for the battery, increasing to 1,720 with the rear seats folded down.
The X5 is a favorite of mine and hybridization has made it much better. It has the power, the efficiency thanks to its hybrid system and it also has the looks down pat thanks to its M Sport bodykit (front and rear bumpers, side skirts and the vents on the lower front fenders give it a menacing, purposeful yet still very much classic BMW fascia.
If you can only have one car as a jack of all trades, an automotive equivalent of a Swiss army knife that’s fun to drive yet versatile, able to carry five adults plus cargo and travel far distances over questionable terrain in confidence, you can’t do much better than BMW’s X5, now in PHEV guise. And because it’s a hybrid, it’s number-coding exempt, too!
