The 2017 Porsche Panamera Turbo Is the Ultimate $150,000 Luxury Sedan

This is a 2017 Porsche Panamera Turbo, and it's a full-size luxury sedan, just like a Mercedes-Benz S-Class, or an Audi A8, or a Lexus LS, or a Cadillac CT, XT, whatever. But there's one big difference between this car and all of those. Namely, it isn't boring. Now, I love the S-Class and the LS, but let's be honest. They're the cars you buy when you're old, and you've worked your whole life, and you feel like you've earned a nice, big, long car with wood everywhere and seats as comfortable as the $11,000 couch in your home with plastic on it, so it's not destroyed by your perfectly manicured dog the size of a Solo cup. And that's fine, but what if you want a big car that makes a statement, but it's also sporty and exciting and thrilling, rather than comfortable and relaxing? Sure, there's the Audi S8 and the Mercedes S63 AMG, but those are basically the cars I mentioned before, just with larger engines. The Panamera Turbo is the complete package. And today, I've borrowed this 2017 Panamera Turbo from Porsche of Warrington, here in the Philadelphia suburbs, to show you exactly what I mean. I'll start with this. The Panamera Turbo has a twin-turbocharged V8 with 550 horsepower and 567 pound-feet of torque. That's amazing, but then again, so is the Panamera Turbo's price tag. This car starts at $148,000 before options, and options are plentiful. So today, I'm going to show you around this thing, and I'm going to show you all of its unusual quirks and cool features that that kind of money buys you, and then I'm going to take it out on the road and see how this car drives. And then, I'm going to give it a Doug score. And maybe by the end, you'll agree this is the ultimate luxury sedan if you don't want one of those big, boring, comfortable ones. Now, I'm going to start back here with maybe the most important feature of the 2017 Panamera, and that's the fact that it's been completely redesigned compared to the old one. It has the same basic profile, but it's been sharpened and modernized in a lot of ways, which is good, because there are a lot of complaints about the old Panamera, especially in the rear-end design. And I have to say, this one looks a lot better. It has sharper taillights, the entire thing's a smaller, less bulbous, less rounded and weird. The new Panamera next to the old Panamera does look substantially better and substantially more modern. And there's no easier place to see that than around back in the area with the hatchback. The hatchback, you might be wondering? Yes, that's right. Even though the Panamera is referred to by everyone as a luxury sedan, this is a hatchback. Pop open the back, and it opens just like a hatchback. This will surprise some people out there. It's like Porsche has sneaked a stealth hatchback into the luxury sedan market. And yes, that means if you're in the back seat, you can access the rear cargo area, because there's no trunk back here. It's a tailgate, and it's open, just like in a hatchback and unlike in every other luxury sedan. And since I'm already on the outside, moving up to the front and the headlights, one of my favorite features of the new Porsche model range are these daytime running lights they have. They're not the regular LED light strip. Instead, they're four LED dots. These are the daytime running lights when the headlights aren't on, and they give Porsches a very distinctive signature look compared to other cars. Now, when you want to turn on the headlights, the headlights almost look even cooler when they're on than when they're in daytime running light mode. You have one giant headlight in the middle surrounded by three smaller beams of light as backup. It's like a headlight strike force. And no, you can't turn on the headlights by just snapping your fingers. But maybe even cooler are the Panamera's taillights. Now, the headlights are on right now, so that turns on the taillights. And you have your typical red on this side and on the other side, but the other cool thing is you have this dim red light bar running across the back of the whole car. Now, light bars are controversial. Some people love them, some people hate them, but I think it looks really good in this car. I also love the fact that when you put on the turn signal in a Panamera, the turn signal lights up on the outside of the lights in the corner of the car, but it also lights up on the tailgate. And when you open the tailgate, it continues to blink as if it's gonna signal to the sky that you're making a left turn. And then we must talk about the spoiler, which is rather unusual. Now, a lot of cars have spoilers that go up at a certain speed, so that when the car is stopped, it has this flush look, but when the car is moving fast, it can provide downforce if you're on the track or something like that. And this car has that, and you can also raise or lower the spoiler inside. I'm gonna show you that in a minute. But the interesting thing about the spoiler in the Panamera Turbo is it doesn't just go up. It goes up and folds out. So the center part goes up, and then the two panels on top of the spoiler fold out to make the spoiler as wide as possible. When you retract it, those panels go right back on top, and then the thing slides back into the tailgate. It's quite interesting. Now, a lot has been made about the spoiler on the internet, but it's worth noting the old Panamera had the exact same spoiler design if you got the GTS or the Turbo. Nonetheless, there it is. Pretty interesting. Next up, I swear I'm gonna climb inside, but first I want to talk about the Panamera's doors. Now, one of the things that annoys me most about cars is that you can't really open the door and just leave it at the level where you want it. When you open a door in a modern car, it sort of swings a little bit further or it retracts a little bit more because there's these little balls inside the door that determine only a few places where the door can open. It's really annoying, especially if you're trying to open your door in a tight space. It can hit whatever you're trying to avoid. Anyway, the Panamera Turbo, you don't have to worry about that. You can open the door to exactly the position where you want, and it'll stay. And the cool thing about that is if you're opening the door on an incline, it won't come back and try to hit you like most car doors will. It stays exactly where you place it. Every door should be like this, and yet very few of them are. Now I'm inside the car, and I'm gonna move on to the center air vent. If you didn't think air vents could be interesting, pay attention to this. Now, the center air vent, when the car is off, is in its closed state. And you'll notice there's no button or no lever to open it or adjust it. That's because the center air vent in this car is controlled electronically in the touchscreen. If you want the center air vent open, you go into the touchscreen and you open it. But here's the crazy thing. If you want the center air vent moved left or right, you move it in the touchscreen, and then the vent follows you as you move it. If you want to move up or down, same deal. Move it in the touchscreen, and the vent goes after where you're moving it. So you're moving this electronic screen, and this mechanical vent is following behind. It is one of the most bizarre modern features I've seen in a new car, but I have to admit, I think it's pretty cool. So the center climate control vent is pretty crazy, but I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll get back to the center controls in a minute. I'm gonna start over on the driver's side, and that little sticker to the left of the steering wheel, next to the air vent. You'll see this sticker in a lot of Porsches. You might be wondering, what exactly is it? Well, this car will do something like 180 miles an hour. But this particular car, because it's being sold in the north, is equipped with all-season tires, and the tires are only rated for 150 miles an hour. Now, most European automakers get around this by just electronically limiting their cars to the top speed of the tires they put on them, but Porsche doesn't do electronic limiting. So instead, their limit is a little decal over on the left. You're not supposed to go above the speed written on the decal. In this case, it's 150. So there's no electronic limit to keep you from dying. Instead, there's a little decal. Oh, and by the way, Porsche makes sure on the decal to print that it is made in Germany. So you don't think there's some Chinese knockoff decal in your Panamera. And next up, when you get in this car, you turn on, you'll notice that it has five gauges in the gauge cluster. But it's deceptive, because four of the five are not gauges, they're screens. Over on the left, you can adjust the screens, and it displays all sorts of information. And over on the right, it's even cooler. Not only can you adjust the screens and get various levels of information, but one of the adjustments is for the navigation system. And when it appears, it takes away two of the fake gauges, and it just sticks the map right there. So you don't have to look all the way over the middle. If you're trying to see where you're going, you have the navigation system on. It's a pretty cool idea. The gauge in the middle is, of course, a traditional gauge, the traditional tachometer, just like all the other Porsches. Another interesting quirk about this car, over by the steering wheel, when you get inside, there's no push button to start it like there is in every other luxury car. Now, you can still keep the key in your pocket. You don't have to insert it anywhere. But instead of pushing a button, you turn a little lever to the left of the steering wheel in order to turn the car on. You don't push a button. I have no idea why this is, but it's the Porsche way. Now, you might be wondering why that little lever to turn on the car is over on the left. Well, that's because Porsche has always put their ignition on the left, not on the right or in the middle like most other cars. And the reason for that is because it mimics old race cars. Old race cars used to have their ignition in the middle or on the right. But they found that it was faster if you would turn on the ignition with your left hand and put on the seat belt with your right hand in one motion. It could give you a little advantage at the start of the race. And Porsche has been doing that in their road cars ever since. Next up, we got to talk about the gear lever, which is very different from the gear lever in most automatic transmission cars. Now, in order to switch between gears, you push a little button in the front of the gear lever like a trigger. And then you can kind of pull it in between reverse neutral and drive. That is kind of cool. If you want manual mode, move it over to the side when you're in drive and you have manual mode. And it's situated the proper way. You want to downshift, you push it up. You want to upshift, you push it down. Very few automakers do that, but they all should. Now, the most interesting thing about the gear lever, if you're in drive, you've arrived at your destination, you want to put the car in park, just press the little P at the base of the shift lever and it goes into park. That's pretty straightforward. But here's the cool part. If you're in manual mode and you want to put the car in park, press the little P and then the gear lever slides back over and goes into park like it's being moved by some unseen Porsche gear lever ghost. Also interesting in the middle of the interior, there are two cup holders, as there should be, as there are in most cars. But the interesting part is that one is larger than the other. So you can have one big drink and one normal-sized drink. Next up, we move on to my favorite controls in this car, starting with the climate controls. Now, to change the temperature and the amount of air you're getting, it's not just some cheap plastic switch or dial. Instead, it's this gorgeous silver switch, one for temperature and one for amount of air on both sides of the car. And you move it up or down and it feels just so nice even to adjust the climate control. But the climate control switch is pale in comparison to the dial in the middle of the center console that adjusts the stereo volume. Take a look at this thing. It just feels so nice, so upscale. It's so wonderful to touch. Yes, you can adjust the stereo volume on the steering wheel, but why would you when you can touch this lovely dial in the middle? And since I'm talking about the controls in the center of this car, here's another cool thing about them. When you turn the car off, they're not there. These aren't traditional buttons. Instead, it's one big electronic panel. And so when you turn the car off, it's all just black. Only when you turn it on do the buttons reappear so that you can touch them. And I say buttons because they're not actually capacitive touch like in a lot of cars where you just tap them and they're supposed to do what you want. Instead, in this, you have to push them down. Now, the drawback is it takes a little more effort to actually push them if you want something to happen. But the benefit is you actually do get feedback when you touch these things so that you know that you've touched them. Unlike in the cars where it's just a screen where you're not really sure, is it doing it? Is it just lagging? Should I press it again? I prefer this. Now, one of the most interesting buttons in the middle here is the one that says individual. Press it and the little individual light comes on. That is for the individual drive mode. You can choose between sport and normal or you can make your own special drive mode catered to your own special whims. Next up, keeping with that individual theme, I'm going to move away from the technology for a second and move on to the sun visor. And the sun visor opens like you'd expect and there's a little mirror inside it with LED lighting. So you'll have an unobstructed view if you want to look at yourself. But the cool thing about the sun visor is it also has a little clip for papers or whatever you need to store up there. Of course, there's a little clip in the sun visor. That's because the Panamera is German and the Germans are always thinking of every practical solution for everything. Next up, moving back to technology, I got to spend a minute on the center touchscreen. Now, the center touchscreen in the new Panamera is excellent. It's massive and it is incredibly responsive to your touch. It's one of the better screens I've seen in any modern car. Now, the center touchscreen in this car, of course, has all of the typical center touchscreen features like climate control, the stereo, the navigation system. But there are a few things in this one worth highlighting. For example, on the satellite radio screen, it has one of the coolest things. Instead of having to switch between different channels with the tuner and you go 41, 42, 43, you can type in the channel that you want. So if you're on channel number one, you want to go to 57, just type in 57 and you're there. Of course, you can also set presets like a normal infotainment system. Now, another cool thing about it is the spoiler. Now, you use the screen to raise and lower the spoiler, just like in the 918 Spyder. But the cool thing about this car is that when the spoiler is raised in back, it's raised on the screen. And when the spoiler is down in back, it's down on the screen. And maybe the coolest thing is when it's in between going up and down, it does exactly on the screen what it's doing outside the car. So you can see your spoiler going up or down just by looking at the screen. That's the perfect touch for the kind of people who love driving around with their spoiler up so everybody stares at them because now they can also see what their car looks like with the spoiler up. Next up, moving on to the climate controls. I already covered that center climate vent and how you turn it on and off and how you move it around. But the rest of the climate screen is also pretty cool. I say that because you can direct the air on where to go like you can in any normal car. But in this one, it doesn't just turn on a little light telling you where the air is coming out. It shows you where the air is coming out. There's a little air coming out of the middle or if you put it on the feet, there's a little air coming out of below the dashboard. Two other interesting things in the infotainment system. Number one, the owner's manual is contained in the infotainment system. It's actually pretty useful in here because there's an index and you can look stuff up a lot easier than if it were a paper book. Also interesting in the center touchscreen, something I absolutely love. You can move around where the sound is aimed at. And it's not just like in your normal car where you can move it to front or back or right or left side. And this thing, it's like a little scope and you can put it exactly where you want it. Oh, do you want the rear passenger side passenger to have the sound coming right on his knee? Well, you can do that in this car. Of course, the center touchscreen also controls an enormous amount of other car features. Virtually anything you can imagine from the lighting to the wipers to the seats, anything configurable you can control in there, including the direction of the seat heating. In other words, when you turn on your heated seat, do you want more of it on your back, on your butt, on your legs? You can control that in there. In my car, you just press the heated seat button and it comes on and it chooses where to put the heat. One other interesting thing up here is that the clock doesn't keep the time when you turn off the car. Turn off, lock it, walk away, and both hands go back up to 12. But when you approach the car, when you unlock it, they stamper back to the correct time like toys in Toy Story, trying to go back to being toys before the kid comes into the room. As you can see, I had to be very quick when I filmed this clip in order to catch this in action. This is something that I suspect 99.9% of Panamera owners don't know happens, but now you know. Now, next up, this car gives you the opportunity to open the rear tailgate from the interior. It's a button right here on the door. That's not all that uncommon. Just push it and the tailgate pops open. What is uncommon is you could also close it from the interior. In most cars, because they're worried that there might be something stuck there that you can't see, they won't let you do that. But in this one, you can, but there is a catch. You can't just push the button and it closes. You have to hold the button down. So if you stop holding it down, it just closes halfway. It's kind of an interesting phenomenon to observe, especially if you're sitting in the driver's seat and you're wondering why the tailgate hasn't closed because you already pressed the button. Next up, moving into the back of the Panamera, which is surprisingly spacious. When the Panamera first came out, the directive was that a tall person had to be able to sit back here without any headroom issues. And I'm a pretty tall person and I can sit back here without any headroom issues. It's really no problem. There are a couple of interesting things you'll find in the back. One of them is the cupholders. Under this little lid, if you look at them, you'll notice they are basically the shallowest cupholders in existence. I wouldn't put any drink in there. It would spill all over the leather in this car. But push this little button and the cupholders suddenly become deeper so you can fit drinks in them. That is pretty ingenious. Then again, it's the Germans. Two other interesting things back here. Number one, in back, there is one of those really cool silver switches like they have up front for the climate control and the stereo volume. In this case, it's to close and open the rear sunshade on the rear sunroof. The sunroof itself doesn't open. Only the front one does. Another interesting thing in the back, the seats fold down. This really is a hatchback. I swear you can fold down the seats and you have this giant cargo area like in a wagon or a hatchback where you can put more stuff than in a traditional sedan. So those are all the interesting quirks and the cool features of the 2017 Panamera Turbo, which are surprisingly plentiful for a Porsche. Now it's time to get this thing out on the road and see how it drives. And remember to click the link below to go to autotrader.com slash oversteer for more of my thoughts on the Panamera Turbo and for a list of luxury sedans currently listed for sale on Autotrader that are basically sports cars. All right. Driving the Panamera Turbo. This should be an exciting event here. The thing about this car is, whoa, wow. It's really, really fast. That's the thing about this car. Of course, I'm now sitting in a stoplight and it feels like the perfect luxury car. I can't hear a thing, road, engine, anything like that. None of the other cars moving. It's just perfectly silent. It's so quick. I don't even know what you'd do if you have one of these. Where do you go? The materials feel great. Just looking around this car, everything is just really well built, well done. It's typical Porsche. I mean, everything is really, really high-end, high-class. Nothing rattles, shakes, squeaks like it shouldn't. The car is just really in, you know, everything is bolted down. And this might be a $150,000 car, but if you start touching stuff and poking stuff, it also kind of feels like it is. God, it's just so quick. It's so quick. It's hard not to just want to. Also, of course, it feels very stable, very planted on the ground. That's the Porsche signature, the German car signature, but it just, it feels so good. I feel like I could throw this around corners a lot faster than a lot of other luxury sedans. Now, one of the things I've always kind of disliked about the Panamera is its size, and that's still the case. If you live in a big city or something, you're not going to want this car. This car is wider than my Range Rover, longer than my Range Rover. It's so big that it's just not that maneuverable or usable in tight spaces. So like Manhattan, Philadelphia, Rhode Island, Chicago, places like that, you don't want to be involved with this. You wish that they made sort of a smaller one. Visibility seems to have improved. It isn't quite as questionable as it was in the past. It doesn't feel 911 nimble around corners. You don't feel the weight as much as you feel the physical size. In a 911, it feels like the whole car is just like right there, and you're kind of controlling the whole thing, almost like you're a kid controlling it with like a matchbox from above. In this car, it sort of feels like you turn, and there's a lot of other car around you turning. It doesn't feel heavy, but it feels big. And this car is one of those few cars where you can actually sort of feel the distinction between the two, because it's nimble. I mean, I can go around the corners much faster than I should. It's just that I'm acutely aware that there's a lot of car around me. Now, with that said, one of the things I've learned, I've spent a lot of time in Panameras, and one of the things I've learned is that you can get accustomed to it. You can get used to the size and then not feel like it's really all that big, and you can start to feel comfortable, more comfortable throwing it around corners like a sports car. But the steering is great. It's lighter than a 911. There's no doubt about that. It's still glued to the road, etc. You're never going to get that heavy steering feel in a sports car, in a sedan. Now, I'm on a rough road, and it's definitely a little harsher over these bumps. There's no doubt compared to an S-Class or something like that. But this is the trade-off. I mean, it's really a question of what you want. Do you want, you know, a performance car in the corners? Do you have the kind of commute where you can zip through some curves, or do you just want to sit there and waft? A lot of buyers choose to waft, and at this price point, I understand that. People who are buying this car are 70 years old, when you can afford a $100,000 car, and so they often don't want to drive this fast. In the end, I think this car is exactly what I would expect if Porsche were to do a luxury sedan. It's faster, more exciting, more fun, more tossable than a normal luxury sedan, but it's also, you know, a little bit harsher and stuff, like a 911 is harsher than an E-Class. It's well-engineered, but it's more of a performance car than a Mercedes or a BMW. If that's what you want, this is the car, and it's worth the money. And I wouldn't fault someone for buying an S-Class over this. I understand. This is a little bit more frenetic. But for those of us who still want a little performance with our luxury, this is a pretty good choice. So, that's the 2017 Porsche Panamera Turbo. It combines a lot of the benefits of a luxury sedan with a lot of the things that car enthusiasts love about sports cars, and now it's a lot more attractive than it used to be. It's the ultimate luxury sedan, or hatchback, with the ultimate luxury sedan price tag. And now it's time to give it a Doug score. Starting with the weekend categories and styling, the new Panamera is far better-looking than the outgoing model, yes, but it's still not exactly beautiful. It earns a 6 out of 10. Acceleration is strong, as Porsche says it does 0-60 in 3.6 seconds, earning it an 8 out of 10. Handling is good, especially for a large sedan, but it's not quite sports car good, and it gets a 6 out of 10. As for cool factor, it's certainly cool, but most of us see Panameras pretty commonly now, so it doesn't have the head-turning factor it did a few years ago, and it gets a 6 out of 10. As for importance, the Panamera isn't an ultra-rare sports car, and even in turbo trim, it's not ultra-unique or museum-worthy, giving it a 5 out of 10 and a total weekend score of 31 out of 50. That's an average weekend score, but it's a respectable number for a sedan. Or hatchback. On to the daily categories, starting with features, the Panamera Turbo is totally loaded with stuff, but it's still missing some obvious ones. There's no self-driving feature like in many rivals, and it's completely beyond me why Porsche still doesn't offer a 360-degree top-down parking camera. That knocks it down from the 9 it deserves to an 8 out of 10. Comfort is good, but not on the level of the very best pillow-soft luxury cars, which is probably by design, and it earns a 7 out of 10. Quality is tremendously high, Porsche reliability is notoriously strong, and interior materials are truly excellent, giving this car a 9 out of 10, falling short of a perfect score just because potential repairs will be pricey down the line. Practicality is impressive, given the Panamera's hatchback status. It has up to 52 cubic feet of cargo space, which is amazing and worthy of an 8 out of 10, but only four seats and poor fuel economy knock that number down to a 7 out of 10. Finally, there's value, and I know it's hard to say a $150,000 luxury sedan is a good value, but when it's a luxury sedan and a hatchback and a sports car, you're not going to convince me that number should be less than a 7 out of 10. Add it up, and the total daily score is 38 out of 50, tying the Panamera for first place, and I suspect a slightly more affordable Panamera model like the 4S would be squarely in first. Add it all up, and the total Doug score is 69 out of 100, which is near the top, and it deserves it. The Panamera Turbo can really do it all. Click below for a Google Doc with the Doug scores through the prior video.