Heritage
As the first large sporty 4x4 to arrive into showrooms in 1999, it’s fair to say that the BMW X5 was a revelation when it first went on sale.
That it’s been a huge success with more than 2.2 million global sales perhaps isn’t much of a surprise, but it is something of an eyebrow-raising statistic that this latest model will already be the fourth-generation of the X5. Longer, wider and taller than before, this new X5 is also arriving into a very different car market from that in 1999. In BMW’s own showroom alone, the X3 is now actually larger than that 1999 original and the even-larger X7 will join the range in spring 2019.
And while BMW claims improved luxury, performance and, crucially, off-road ability for this new X5, it will need a step forward too. With rivals like the Volvo XC90, Land Rover Discovery and forthcoming new Mercedes GLE, this is hardly a sector of the market where you can afford to take buyers for granted.