Porsche Macan Review Hands-on

The Macan is Porsche’s response to the rapidly growing demand for compact SUVs, vehicles which provide the on-road presence and ostentation of an SUV with the lesser footprint of a regular family car, making them much easier to park and weave through town. If you want the large hatch and on-road practicality of an SUV and have no intention of traversing anything more arduous than a National Trust car park, then a compact SUV, or crossover as such cars are also known, is the car for you.

As you’d expect, the Porsche Macan is no ordinary crossover, its intention being to combine the practicality of a crossover with the soul and performance of a sports car.

The Macan certainly looks the part, having a muscular front end, chunky wheels and an eager, energetic demeanour. It also has a massive boot, enough room for five passengers and comes with a choice of three powerful engines. If Porsche really has set out to build a practical family sports car, then your first impression within minutes of driving the Macan is that it has succeeded.

PERFORMANCE

We were lucky enough to drive all three versions of Porsche Macan, the Turbo, the Macan S and the Macan S Diesel, and were impressed with all three. Ordinarily, we’d have a clear favourite yet all three engines are impressive and well suited to their demographic. It’s also worth noting that although the line-up includes a “Turbo”, all Macans are turbo-powered.

Based on specification alone, the 400hp Macan Turbo is the most exciting of the line-up, with a 0-62mph time of just 4.8 seconds (4.6 seconds with Sport Chrono package), and it is epically fast for a car of the Macan’s size and 2-tonne weight. You hit 60mph in the blink of an eye and are on your way to even higher speeds before you’ve taken your foot off the accelerator. Oddly, though, there’s little sensation of the immense force propelling you forward, none of the thrill or exhilaration you’d expect to feel.

The Porsche Macan Turbo is astonishingly fast

We also expected the Macan Turbo to come with a sports exhaust as standard. The Macan Turbo is very quiet around town, which is welcome, but it’s still quiet when you open the throttle on the open road or when you hammer it around a track.

The Macan Turbo is wonderfully civilised and stupendously fast, which is exactly what Porsche wanted to achieve. If you want the fastest, most powerful Macan available at launch then you should buy the Turbo, but we’d prefer it to be a bit more uncouth and raucous when pushed.

The Macan Diesel, meanwhile, should be the weakest of the three models, as its 3-litre engine produces just 258hp, peaking between 4,000 and 4,250rpm. However, the diesel engine also produces a massive 580nm of torque between 1,750-2,500rpm, which helps it move around town and country with prodigious speed. Set off from the lights too aggressively and you’re pushed forward with tremendous force. It may not have the immense power of the Turbo, but the Diesel is an immensely enjoyable car to drive. Even better, there’s no tell-tale rattle or clatter to betray the fact it’s a diesel.

The Macan S is perhaps the most balanced of the three Macan models, producing 340hp at 6,500rpm and moving from zero to 62mph in 5.4 seconds (5.2 seconds with Sport Chrono package). It’s wonderfully smooth in sound, feel and power delivery. Although not as fast as the Turbo, the Macan S is no slouch, and you’ll have absolutely no problem overtaking slower traffic or having fun on country roads.

Unlike other big Porsches, such as the Panamera and Cayenne, you don’t feel conspicuous driving the Macan through town, and you can weave the nippy Macan through traffic much more easily. Each model benefits from Porsche’s superb PDK dual-clutch gearbox, which means you get seven forward gears, snappy gear changes (especially with Sport or Sport Plus modes activated) in manual mode and sensible gear selections when in auto mode. We’d expect to see a PDK gearbox on the S and Turbo models, but we’re very pleased to see it’s a standard feature of the Diesel model too.

Whichever Macan you choose, you’ll find that it has excellent handling, grip and stopping power. The Panamera and Cayenne both have excellent handling for cars of their size, but you do feel the weight of them in corners, to different degrees. That isn’t the case with Macan, which felt light and nimble. Likewise, some crossovers have had good handling and a saloon car feel, but none have had the sports car feel of the Macan. It’s also worth noting that all Macans are four-wheel drive.

We only had the Diesel for a few hours, so we couldn’t see how economical it is, but Porsche’s official figures for the Diesel place it at 44.8mpg combined. Fuel consumption figures for the Turbo and S are 30.7mpg and 31mpg respectively.

INTERIOR

The Macan’s interior is typical Porsche, which means comfortable seats (the Macan uses the same seats as the Cayenne), a neat, tidy and well-ordered dashboard and one of the best instrument panels you’ll find. The centre console is a tech-fiend’s dream, laden as it is with a plethora of buttons that control everything from the dual-zone climate system to the comfort level of the ride and Sport mode. It may look confusing initially, but you’ll soon learn what all the buttons do.

As is common with Porsche models, there’s a rev counter smack bang in the middle of the instrument panel, with a digital speedometer inset. To the right is a graphical information display, and you can select the type of information you want to see. You can, for instance, set it to show the navigation map, trip data or fuel consumption figures, among others. This display is a god-send, as it means you don’t have to take your eyes off the road to fiddle about with the Macan’s touchscreen.

There’s plenty of room for both the front passenger and driver, and plenty of room for drinks, CDs, phones and USB drives. Sadly, there isn’t as much space for rear passengers as we’d like, even behind a 5ft 8in driver, so adults in the rear may complain on long journeys. There is, however, a massive amount of space in the boot, with 500 litres of space available with the rear seats up and 1,500 litres available with the rear seats down. Even better, you’ll have no trouble getting bulky items in the back of the Macan thanks to the rear hatch’s square shape. Whether you need to load suitcases or flight cases, you’ll have no problem getting gear in the back of the Macan.

There’s not as much room in the rear of the Macan as we expected

COST

The Macan S and Macan Diesel are both priced at £43,300, and the Macan Turbo is priced at £59,300. Add options and those prices will increase rapidly. However, the Sport Chrono package, which provides sharper, sportier gear changes, throttle response and steering, among many other things, and the massive panoramic sunroof are just two options that we’d specify in an instant.

The Porsche Macan has a massive, sensibly shaped boot, and this makes the Macan eminently practical as a family car

CONCLUSION

With the Macan, Porsche has sought to create that Holy Grail of motoring, a practical family car that feels and performs like a sports car, and to the largest of extents it has done exactly that. If you desperately want a Porsche but are forced by circumstances to buy a family car, you no longer have to compromise.

The Macan really is Porsche’s most practical car yet. Its cabin is large enough to accommodate a family and its boot is large enough to ferry all but the largest home appliances from the shop to your home. There’s plenty of room for storing drinks, CDs and trinkets in the cabin, and the dashboard, instrument panel and centre console are all designed to make driving comfortable, fun and efficient.

Yet press the Sport or, if you’ve specified the Sport Chrono package, Sport Plus button and you have a powerful car with sporting prowess that defies its size. If you want a sports crossover, there’s currently only car you should consider: the Porsche Macan.

Contact your local Porsche Dealer to arrange a test drive. Explore the Macan further on the Porsche website.