The New 2021 Bentley Bentayga Is an Ultra-Luxury Performance SUV

this is the 2021 bentley bentega and it is a luxury suv and also a performance suv and also an expensive suv this one has a sticker price of just under 200 000 the bentega has been heavily revised for the 2021 model year and today i'm going to review it i get started be sure to check out cars and bids which is my new online enthusiast car auction website for modern cool cars if you're looking to buy or sell a cool car from the modern era the 1980s and up cars and bids is the place to do it you will get the most money for your cool car if you're selling and you will find the best variety of cool car if you're buying check out cars and bids at cars into bids.com i've borrowed this bentega from oguera san diego which is also bentley san diego the bentley dealership here in the san diego area bentley san diego of course has all of the latest bentley models including the new bentega which is just starting to arrive and which is going fast as demand for the revised bentega is strong and with good reason the bentega first came out for the 2017 model year around the same time as a surprising number of other ultra expensive suvs like the rolls royce cullinan and the lamborghini urs and the maserati levante the bentayga's biggest selling point has always been the fact that it's a luxury suv like the rolls-royce cullinan or the range rover but it's also a high-performance suv like the porsche cayenne turbo or the bmw x5m and that's still true for 2021 the base level bentega is a hybrid model which gets 443 horsepower from its plug-in hybrid v6 that's the bentega for environmentally conscious ultra luxury suv buyers at the other end of the spectrum the top level bentega is called the bentega speed and it uses a 627 horsepower 12 cylinder for the new bentega you can only get the 12 cylinder if you get the speed model now those two powertrains are coming soon right now the only bentega available is this one the twin turbo v8 model with 540 horsepower this will be the bulk of sales and this powertrain sends the bentega from 0 to 60 in about 4 seconds those powertrains are largely unchanged for the 2021 bentega but some significant other changes have been made and today i'm going to review the new bentega and show them to you i'm also going to take you on a thorough tour of the bentega and show you all of its interesting quirks and features and then i'm going to get it out on the road and drive it and then i'll give it a dug score all right i'm going to start the quirks and features of the revised bentega with some of the revisions for the 2021 model year and that means starting back here with the most noticeable update that would be the rear lights now the rear lights in the bentega used to look like this they were pretty standard nobody really complained but bentley has changed them for 21 to look like this in order to align the rear of this car with the continental gt and the flying spur the other bentley models so they all kind of have a similar look in back now these tail lights have been pretty polarizing these big ovals back here some people really don't like it some people like the bentley family look but either way they're certainly distinctive you won't be mistaking this for any other type of vehicle now revising the tail lights on the new bentega means that the new tail lights are entirely on the tailgate back here which presents an interesting challenge when the tailgate goes up i'll cover that in a second first let's talk about opening the tailgate you look around back there's no immediately obvious tailgate popper back here not one above the license plate that's because it's hidden in the bentley logo you press the bentley b and then the tailgate opens automatically and that's just a really cool use of the logo back here to push it to have the tailgate open but anyway with the tailgate open now you can see that the taillights are completely gone in back they're up with the tailgate and so they're not able to provide any lighting back here that is against u.s government regulation that specifically says tail light's brake lights cannot be on a piece of body work that moves like the tailgate so bentley had to come up with a solution if they wanted the tail lights to be the ovals and that solution is a second set of taillights in the bumper so right now i have the brakes on and you can see the brake lights are illuminated you open up the tailgate and you can see the brake lights jump from their original position to this second set of lights on the bumper and that way there will always be some tail lights illuminated back here no matter whether the tailgate is up or down the benefit of doing it this way is you can have your entire taillight on the tailgate the drawback is you got to have two sets of tail lights but that's what bentley has done and it's also what audi does in their suvs the q7 the q5 you can see they also have tail lights mounted on the tailgate and a second set in the bumper for when the tailgate is open as for the reasoning behind the new tail lights it's not only to tie it into the other bentley models but also to create a wider look back here bentley wanted the car to look and feel wider give it more presence on the road and they think this design has done just that even though the new bentega is not actually wider than the previous model and in terms of cosmetic changes on the outside of the bentega there's more up front one obvious one is the headlights these are completely new headlights revised again to look like the ones in the flying spur and the continental gt and if you look closely you can see they're like crystals it's a beautiful expensive car headlight look and it really does provide the character i suspect bentley is going for here you also have a wider grill up here and generally more definition with body in front again to give this car sort of a more aggressive larger presence on the road once again the front width doesn't actually change but because of some stylistic changes and tweaks bentley's hoping that you think it just looks like it has more presence frankly i think they've succeeded it certainly does have more presence at least within the parameters of the bentega platform they were already working with by the way these headlights each of them have 48 individual leds inside of them that's a lot i wouldn't want to have to pay for one of these out of pocket if i got in an accident and it was damaged but anyway next we have to get inside the bentega i want to talk about what's new here but first i want to talk key is when you buy a bentega you're given three full-size keys two regular keys and then one valet key which doesn't provide access to the cargo area although in an suv that's kind of moot because you could just climb back there but nonetheless that's what you get they are thick full heavy keys like you would expect for an ultra luxury suv now one cool thing with the keys on the bentega key you can see there's an image of a vehicle looks like a bentega with the tailgate up of course you press that and it opens the tailgate nothing interesting there but the reason i mention it is on the continental gt key there's an image of what looks like a continental gt with the trunk up press that and it opens the trunk they've actually created different pictures for each of their vehicles which is nice attention to detail again something you'd expect at this price point but anyway then we climb inside and let's talk revisions to this interior the updates for 21 are not just on the outside there's a lot that changes in here the biggest one is probably this new center screen it's an 11 inch touchscreen borrowed from the flying spur the continental gt and from other high-end volkswagen group models like porsches and it's sort of the center focal point in this interior you also have a new digital gauge cluster it's a full screen in there instead of old school gauges much more configurable than in the previous bentayga model and also much more modern one thing i love about that digital gauge cluster look how it displays your speed and engine revs you can see i'm revving the engine and just look what happens when the needle climbs it's like it disturbs this little part of the gauge it just looks very luxurious very special a lot of automakers are doing interesting things with speedometers and tachometers but this is one of the best that i've seen one other big change in this interior worth noting is the climate vents right above the center control stack in the past it was two circles like on older bentley models now you can see it's this more distinctive design this is intended to mimic the bentley logo the wings on the outside with the clock in the middle as the b and so that's why it's a little bit strangely shaped it's supposed to remind you that you're in a bentley even from your climate vents but anyway moving on to some other interesting interior quirks and features you climb inside with the key and to start the ventiga you press this start stop button in the center it's this circle in the middle of the center console you push that and it starts right up the reason it's a circle is because surrounding the start stop button is your drive mode dial and you can twist the little dial to go from sport to bentley mode to comfort to custom i like the fact that the start stop button is integrated into that drive mode area that's a pretty cool idea now speaking of cool ideas i've always loved the gear selector and bentley models you have a traditional looking gear lever but the cool part comes when you want to put it in gear you press the bentley b logo on top and that's the button that lets you change through the different gears again a good integration of the bentley logo and next up right above the gear lever you have the climate controls nothing particularly interesting or new here compared to the outgoing model one thing i don't like with the climate controls is that some buttons require additional steps for example you want to turn on the heated seat you push the heated seat button it doesn't just turn them on instead the heated seat menu comes on on the center screen same deal with the cooled seat you press the button and it doesn't just turn on the cooled seats the menu actually comes on now bentley would reply to this and say well you can just put it in auto mode and that's true this car doesn't just have automatic climate control for the air coming out the vents but also for the seats heated and cooled on a warm day you turn on auto cooled seat and it will cool the seat until it reaches your desired level of cool but this whole multi-step button process also continues with the direction of the airflow you can press the airflow button and that doesn't actually change the airflow instead again it pulls up a menu on the screen and then you can change it from there it's easy enough and if you have everything in auto it's not really something you'll deal with but if you want to manually change things it does add one step to each climate control process which can be kind of annoying and next up let's talk infotainment system since this screen is new in the bentega i want to discuss it and i will say it is excellent tremendously responsive to the touch instantly just like a smartphone and unlike in audi models you don't have to like push down on the screen for it to recognize your commands you can just tap like on your smartphone and it's very responsive to everything you tap it will pick it up basically instantly it's also very intuitive everything is organized in here pretty well there is a lot of stuff in this infotainment system but they do a good job of making sure that everything is about where you'd expect it to be and one item worth noting with this infotainment right below it there are some physical buttons you can use to help control the infotainment system for instance if you want to go to nav you don't have to find it in the screen you can press nav and it will take you there same deal with radio media phone whatever now porsches that have this similar infotainment system they don't have the physical buttons i guess the volkswagen group which controls all these brands must realize that bentley customers probably want button backups they get a little bit more frustrated with technology maybe porsche customers they don't need that stuff but it's nice to have in the bentleys and next up let's move on to the gauge cluster the new full screen gauge cluster another very high tech piece in this bentega that helps bring it back into line with more modern rivals a very competitive segment and you gotta have a full screen gauge cluster now because everyone does a couple of cool things in here one i love the fact that it refers to the most recent trip odometer as short term memory whereas the odometer that you can reset can measure longer distances that's long-term memory instead of trip a and trip b it kind of makes it more human seeming which is sort of funny it's worth noting though audi does the same thing in their gauge cluster another thing that audi does that bentley now also does since they have the same parent company in the same technology is the full screen gauge cluster map you can have the map shown small right in front of you which is useful but you can also have it shown full screen and when you do i love the look of the tachometer going away sort of fading out to show the map instead having the map there can be very useful it's right in your field of vision so you're driving along you just look right down see where you're going and look right back up without having to glance over at the center control stack and the infotainment screen and of course that gauge cluster screen is configurable for more than just the map you can also use it to see the radio the current media you're playing from your phone your phone settings calling someone all that stuff right there in front of your eyes which is a nice place for it to be to minimize distraction as for the interior itself in here i have to say it's a bit of a mixed bag previous bentley models i've been in have had some of the finest interiors in the car industry i do have a flying spur earlier this year that was unbelievable truly amazing but this just isn't quite on that level there's a lot of plastic in the center console you can see it all around the gear lever the start stop button pretty much everywhere same deal in the center control stack the wiper stocks they've used a slightly nicer plastic around the steering wheel buttons but it's still kind of a cheap seeming plastic and it's surprising to see that in there now i recognize that the bentayga is bentley's volume vehicle they're trying to sell it to families they've sold an enormous number of them but when you start to diminish that bently feel you really start to hurt the brand and i fear in some senses that might be what's gone on in here with that said generally speaking it is still a very nice interior and there are some really beautiful touches in here some nice materials some things you won't find in an audi or a porsche but in terms of other bentley models it doesn't quite feel as special in the new bentega and next up climbing into the back of the new bentega the first thing you notice when you get back here is that there is good interior room in back i have good leg room few more inches for my knees i have good headroom it is roomy back here now i have always felt the back seat of the bentega was roomy but for 21 it's actually a little bigger than the previous model so there's even more rear seat room than before if for some reason you felt a little uncomfortable in the outgoing model now there are a few interesting quirks worth noting back here one i really like the embroidered bentley logo in the seats you have those in the front seats as well but most automakers don't translate that stuff to the back well when you pay 200 000 for a luxury suv you get embroidered bees in the back seats too i also like the charging options back here you have two separate usb c ports and a cigarette lighter style outlet in the center so you can charge all your devices while you're driving along and you don't have to compromise and charge only one at a time like a lot of cars but undoubtedly the finest item in the back seat of the new bentega is this screen in the center bentley has given up on trying to get all of the rear seat controls into various buttons and switches so rear passengers now get a screen which makes sense because there's a lot to control you have your climate controls in this screen you can adjust the temperature of the fan speed for your rear seat climate experience you also have your heated seat controls back here you press on that and you can turn on your heated seat just like in the screen up front you also have your rear shade controls back here you can use this screen to open or close the shade on the top of the ceiling below the sunroof whether you want it open to experience the sun or completely closed it's all controllable on this screen but if you're like me you're probably thinking this screen is kind of far away to use it you have to reach down it's mounted very low where your feet are not a good placement but bentley has thought of that press this little eject button in the upper right corner of the screen and it pushes out towards you and then you can remove it it's actually just placed there on a magnet and then you can pick it up like a remote and use it to control all of these various functions without it being just integrated into the center console so you can leave it there or you can pick it up put it on your lap where it's more convenient and when you're done using it as a remote you can put the screen right back into its place it will magnetize again and it will look like it was never removed in the first place that is a pretty nifty trick and next up we move on to the cargo area in the new bentega i will access it by pushing the bentley b and it opens right up and you can see the bantega has a fairly large cargo area lots of room for stuff back here if you want to use your bentega to transport things interestingly what it doesn't have is a third row seat this is also true of a lot of really high-end luxury suvs no third row in the range rover the rolls-royce cullinan the lamborghini aeris and also the bentega it's only two rows to me maybe more interesting there's no button that allows you to easily drop the second row of seats from the cargo area if you want to put larger items inside a lot of luxury suvs have a button like that so you can push it and easily drop the seats to put something huge in back but in the bentega you have to go around and manually fold the seats down i guess bentley must figure that not too many people are actually loading massive things into the back of a bentega so it maybe wasn't necessary one interesting quirk of the bentega cargo area on the inside of the tailgate you can see there's this little panel which is held on with this fastener you undo it open it up and nothing is in there that is for the road hazard warning triangle in europe it's mandated that new vehicles must be sold with a road hazard triangle so that's where they put it but in the states we don't have that regulation so instead you just get an empty hidden piece on the inside of your tailgate where you can stick stuff and no one will find it it's an interesting little spot and finally we move under the hood in the new bentega you can see this car's engine or the plastic cover over it like i mentioned this is a twin turbocharged v8 540 horsepower which is a pretty healthy number now like i said there are two other powertrain options both on their way they're not available yet you have a plug-in hybrid v6 or you have the speed model with its twin turbo 12 cylinder but this one will account for the majority of the sales now personally i love the 12 cylinder i think it is the bentley powertrain but in the suv world it has been received as a little bit too expensive so the v8 has emerged as the volume selling model and it's not like it's slow like i said it still sends this from 0 to 60 in four seconds which is unreal for an suv with this much size and luxury leather trimmings which all add weight and so those are the quirks and features of the new bentley bentega now it's time to get it out on the road and see how it drives all right driving the new bentega i really am a bentega fan when it first came out i was really into it a lot of people made fun of me like that thing the bentley suv it's so stupid but since then every luxury brand has come out with an suv and now it doesn't seem quite so stupid anymore it seems like a pretty smart decision at the time actually one drawback about the pentagon one big criticism that it it gets uh is that you know it comes from this volkswagen group family of luxury suvs all of which are relatively similar when you think about it uh the cayenne turbo uses this engine the lamborghini eris uses this engine the audi sq7 uses this engine uh they're all the panamera turbo that they're all in some various state of tune of this powertrain and it kind of diminishes the specialness of it uh you know 10 years ago all these brands 15 years ago all these brands were separate and they built their own separate stuff and now it's getting a little bit more uniform i will say aside from the powertrain use they are pretty distinct when you get inside the bentega does not feel that much like an audi the cayenne does not feel that much like an audi or a bentega um they do a pretty good job differentiating them but ultimately it is a lot of variations on the same platform and the same powertrain so it's sort of like pick which one of the volkswagen group luxury performance suv fits into your budget that's the one you go with me personally though if the bentega fit into my budget i think i'd go with this i have actually always liked how it looked uh i i do think that the upgrades in front for 21 are better than before in back it's certainly debatable i don't mind it i think i like how it ties it into the bentley uh family and also i think before it was too generic but i can definitely see how it's not the most attractive look big oval tail lights on an suv definitely looks a little strange sitting in this car driving and i mean it's so comfortable and so quiet that's one of the things i like the most about it they really have created a fantastic luxurious feed these the volkswagen group suvs they're two of them right at this price point the eris and the bentega but they really do have a very different character the earth feels a lot more performance oriented you know exciting ready to go this is definitely the luxury vehicle of the two but it does come with the bonus of having real power zero to in four seconds is just unbelievable in a vehicle that's this big and in terms of acceleration it's so immediate it is unbelievably fast the difference though between the v8 and the 12 cylinder to me though is the following the v8 is fast you press it throws you back in your seat it's fast there's an engine designed for performance cars like the aeros like the cayenne turbo the 12 cylinder doesn't build power in that way it almost feels like a jet it's not fast and then you're going fast it's hard to even explain but it feels like you're almost just being like sucked forward at this speed it's more consistent and less like throw you in your seat and it's more just like big torquey feel and to me that 12-cylinder is the ultimate uh powertrain overall this is a great suv there's some pros and cons for sure some people will say the styling is a bit of a drawback um certainly the interior materials aren't quite as nice as on some other bentley models but in terms of benefits it's fast it's luxurious tremendously comfortable and the technology is dramatically better for the 21 model year bentega is still a great ultra luxury suv if you're into that sort of thing but it is a very competitive world uh and these changes really help bentega kind of stay near the top of that world and very competitive better tech just feels a lot more modern in here and so that's the 2021 bentley bentega this is an excellent luxury suv and an excellent performance suv and updates for the 2021 model year should help this remain competitive in a surprisingly crowded field of ultra expensive suvs i've been a big fan of the bentega ever since it came out and with these new updates i still am and now it's time to give the new bentega a doug score starting with the weekend categories and styling the bentega still looks fine not gorgeous better in front a little more polarizing in back it gets a 5 out of 10. acceleration 0 to 60 is in the low 4 second range and it gets a 7 out of 10. handling is fine not as tight or as quick as performance oriented rivals like the urus and the cayenne turbo and it gets a 5 out of 10. fun factor is good it's fast and relatively sharp and the fun of driving a bentley suv is undeniable and it gets a 6 out of 10. finally cool factor in the bentega is still cool still head turning still among the ultimate suvs and it gets a 6 out of 10 for a total weekend score of 29 out of 50. next up are the daily categories and features the latest bentega is far more advanced than the outgoing model and it gets an 8 out of 10. comfort is still excellent though not quite rolls royce cullinan level and it gets a 9 out of 10. quality is fine the w12 model i tested a few years ago certainly had nicer finishes inside this one is very nice but on par i would say with a cayenne or a panamera and it gets an 8 out of 10. practicality is normal for a car like this and it gets an 8 out of 10. value is only ok these are great in so many ways fast and luxurious and now high tech but they're also expensive especially as more and more super suvs float onto the scene i love the bentega but i'm giving it a 6 out of 10 for a total daily score of 39 out of 50. added up and the doug score is 68 out of 100 which places it here against some relevant cars the bentega v8 does very well not the highest of the weekend score but not the lowest not the highest in the daily scores but not the lowest that's what i love about these it's a really great and well-rounded luxury performance suv that combines great luxury and great performance better than any rival

Channel: Doug DeMuro

Views: 991,379

Rating: 4.871521 out of 5

Keywords: bentley bentayga, bentayga, bentley bentayga review, bentayga review, 2021 bentayga, 2021 bentayga review, new bentayga, new bentayga review, doug demuro, demuro, doug de muro

Id: zDG0zNQIC_M

Length: 25min 42sec (1542 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 01 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/PilonTheWineGuy]

I saw one of these in Albania with Kosovo plates... Don't even want to know what that owner was involved in.

It looked so out of place compared to all of the multiple decades-old Mercedes and I can't imagine driving it on Albania's "road" network.

[u/AudiQuattroZoomZoom]

I actually was one of the few enthusiasts who loved how the pre-facelift Bentayga looked. Front is ok but rear end is squashed up and weird. The pre-facelift one had a Bentley/Rolls sort of elegance which the facelift loses

[u/Redallaround]

Those tail lights are awful. The old design was so much better (owner of my company daily drives a Bentayga).

[u/Philo_T_Farnsworth]

That removable wireless control panel in the rear seats honestly kinda blew my mind. I was seriously not expecting that.

[u/OhHelloPlease]

That back seat was kinda lackluster. I agree with the odd placement of the screen, thought that there was also going to be one in the middle seat arm rest fold down thingy

[u/EatSleepJeep]

Either one of the wheels is on the wrong side of the vehicle or Bentley has made a strange styling decision. The front and rear are opposite designs.

[u/gluten_heimer]

This seems like a downgrade overall from the previous Bentayga. It loses the good engine, it (debatably of course) doesn’t look any better, and it’s not as nice inside.

[u/JeskoRegistry]

Bentley has nailed it once again. People hate on SUVs immensely in this subreddit, but the Bentayga is next-level. It's impressively fast for its weight, it's luxurious through-the-roof, and it looks clean on the exterior. It is also more subtle than an Urus or DBX or Cullinan. If you look at the side profile and don't notice the Bentley logos on the wheels, a non-car person probably wouldn't know it is a roughly $200k car.

Inevitably, people will mention how much this car will depreciate. It is important to understand that for all or nearly all of the people who will actually buy this car, depreciation does not matter. The type of person buying a Bentayga has enough money that even if the value dropped to $0, they wouldn't have a change in lifestyle and their bank account would barely notice.

[u/ab84fan]

All of these ultra luxury SUVs just prove that a primary "car" brand's styling does not work well in an SUV. This just looks like a bunch of Bentley styling cues grafted onto a generic SUV shape. The Urus, Levante, and Cullinan all lack the beauty and grace of their respective brand's sedans/sports cars.

I think BMW has always pulled it off well with the X5, but I cant think of many luxury SUVs that look just as good as their sedan counterparts.