Volvo XC90 VS Maserati Levante
Volvo XC90
Likes
- Excellent space and seating options
- Top-notch safety package
- Power of combined engines
Dislikes
- Hard to replicate fuel economy
- Can occasionally feel lethargic
- Some option packages a bit cheeky
Maserati Levante
Likes
- More affordable entry into Levante range
- Great engine note
- Almost identical standard features to the Levante S
Dislikes
- GranLusso and GranSport packs are expensive
- Limited room in the rear seats
- Steering is overly sharp and quick
Summary
Volvo XC90
With its new XC90 line Volvo has squashed the stereotype that a luxury seven-seater has to be powered by a lusty V8. We put the hybrid T8 to the test.
We live in a world of stereotypes. All black people can dance, all Asians are good at maths, all Americans are loud and brash. Blondes are dumb, girls are not good at sport, police officers live on doughnuts.
By the same token, BMW drivers don’t know how to use an indicator or read a stop sign, Audi drivers are yuppies, Mercedes drivers are arrogant and stuffy, and Toyota drivers are, well, beige.
Oh, and Volvo drivers are tree-hugging, latte-sipping, doily-loving, hat-wearing geography teachers or dentists who drive boring, conservative cars too slowly in the fast lane, and refuse to let people pass.
Like mud, if you fling stereotypes around often enough, they stick and Volvo has had to work hard here to kill the 'just another Volvo driver' leanings.
It has answered in the best way possible with technically advanced, sharp-looking cars that will continue to be on trend for years to come. With the new XC90 line it has also squashed the stereotype that a luxury seven-seater has to be powered by a lusty V8.
We put the hybrid T8 to the test.
| Safety rating | |
|---|---|
| Engine Type | 2.0L |
| Fuel Type | Hybrid with Premium Unleaded |
| Fuel Efficiency | 2.1L/100km |
| Seating | 7 seats |
Maserati Levante
Maserati. What do you reckon that name means to most people? Fast? Loud? Italian? Expensive? SUVs?
Well, maybe not the last one, but it likely will soon. See, with the Levante SUV accounting for half of all Maseratis now sold in Australia, shortly it’ll feel like SUVs are all Maserati makes.Â
And that may happen even faster with the arrival of the most affordable Levante ever - the new entry-grade, simply called Levante.
So, if this new cheaper Levante isn’t expensive (in Maserati terms) does that mean it’s not fast, loud or even Italian, now?Â
We drove this new, most affordable, Levante at its Australian launch to find out.
| Safety rating | |
|---|---|
| Engine Type | 3.0L turbo |
| Fuel Type | Diesel |
| Fuel Efficiency | 11.8L/100km |
| Seating | 5 seats |
Verdict
Volvo XC907.9/10
This hybrid XC90 is on point with all that Volvo’s flagship offering is renowned for – safety, performance, technology and style -  and allows you to give impetus to your environmental ideals too.
The D5 Inscription remains my favourite in the new XC90 range because of its overall verve but no doubt the Twin Engines will find equal favour especially amongst buyers who spend a lot of time in traffic covering short distances.
Maserati Levante7.3/10
The entry-grade Levante is the best choice in the current line-up (Levante, Levante Turbo Diesel and Levante S) because it’s almost identical in performance and features to the pricier S.Â
I’d give the GranLusso and GranSport packs a miss on this base Levante, but would consider them on the S where they are possibly worth the extra $10,000 rather than the $35K asking price on the entry car.
The Levante does a lot right – the sound, the safety and the exterior styling. But the quality of the interior, with its FCA shared parts, lowers what should be a prestige feel.
And back seat comfort could be better, Maseratis are grand tourers and an SUV from this brand should be able to accommodate at least four adults in superb comfort – something this one can’t do.
Given the choice and about $130K would you choose a Porsche Cayenne or a Maserati Levante? Tells us what you think in the comments below.
Design
Volvo XC90
What’s not to love about a large, chunky SUV with a no-nonsense stance and bold demeanour? One where the sloping lines and angles don’t mess with the feeling of understated efficiency and the sizeable grille and 'Thor's hammer' headlights are complementary rather than a distraction?
That quiet confidence is mirrored in the interior space, too, where the minimalist design brief leaves an uncluttered dash and just a couple of buttons to interrupt a smooth and tasteful canvas.
The cabin really is a beautiful place to be with its large digital driver display and, in our test car, a stylish mix of leather, wood and smart plastics proving to be a winning combination.
Supportive, luxurious sport seats whip up the comfort level and electrical adjustment means it is super easy to settle on a suitable driving position.Â
Not as simple, however, was getting the side mirrors to stay in their set positions, the pesky things assuming a shape shifting personality of sorts every time you switch off the engine. There is evidently some hoodoo combination to get them to behave but as I found with the S90 that particular spell does not feature in my extensive repertoire.Â
Maserati Levante7/10
The Levante looks exactly how a Maserati SUV should, with the long bonnet flanked by curvaceous wheel arches with their vents, leading towards a grille that looks ready to eat up slower cars. The heavily raked windscreen and cab-back profile is also very Maserati, as are haunches that muscle over the rear wheels.
If only its bottom was less Maserati. It’s a personal thing, but I find Maserati rear ends lack the drama of their faces and the Levante’s tailgate is no different in that it borders on plain.
Inside, the Levante looks to be a premium, well-crafted place, although closer inspection reveals there are certain items which appear to be shared with other brands which, like Maserati, are owned by Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA).Â
The window and headlight switches, the ignition button, the air-conditioning controls, even the display screen all can be found in Jeeps and other FCA cars.
There are no functionality issues here, but from a design and style perspective they look a little basic and lack the refinement a buyer may expect from a Maserati.
There’s a lack of technological pizazz inside as well. For example, there’s no head-up display or large virtual instrument cluster as you’ll find in the Levante’s competitors.
Despite the Jeep-looking bits the Levante is truly Italian. The chief designer Giovanni Ribotta is Italian and the Levante is made at FCA's Mirafiori plant in Turin.
What are the Levante’s dimensions? The Levante is 5.0m long, 2.0m wide and 1.7m tall. So that means space inside is enormous right? Um… let’s talk about that in the next section, shall we?Â
Practicality
Volvo XC90
Seven-seaters are a boon for large and growing families, for people who are often carrying the kids’ friends, or if you just want some extra space. The XC90 has the latter in spades with plenty of room for long legs and big heads although the third row is naturally better suited to children instead of adults.
Comforts back there in the third row include air vents and cup holders as well as decently-shaped seats.
Oh, and much greater odds of being able to gulp down those dodgy marshmallows you found at the bottom of the swimming bag before your mother spots you.
There are similar offerings for passengers in the second row – climate control and storage I mean, not marshmallows – with integrated booster seats and two ISOFIX points also adding shine.
The outer seats in the second row slide forward and tip over to facilitate access to the back while both the second and third rows fold flat, individually if need be, to increase the load compartment.
The boot features a pair of sturdy shopping bag hooks, too, which may not raise an eyebrow in your world but are invaluable if you want to arrive home with the box of eggs intact and not crying over spilt milk.Â
Maserati Levante7/10
You know the Tardis from Dr Who? The time machine police phone box that is much bigger on the inside than it appears from the outside? The Levante’s cabin is a reverse Tardis (a Sidrat?) in that even at five metres long and two metres wide, legroom in the second row is tight and at 191cm tall I can only just sit behind my driving position.
Headroom is also getting tight back there because of the swooping roofline. These aren’t major issues, but If you were thinking of using the Levante as a SUV limousine of sorts then the limited room back there just won’t be enough to let your taller passengers stretch out comfortably.
Also ruling it out as a chauffeur car in my view is the ride experience in the second row. I’ll cover this in the driving section below.
The Levante’s cargo capacity is 580 litres (with second row seats up) which is on the small side, and less than the Porsche Cayenne’s 770 litre boot space.
Cabin storage is pretty good, with a giant centre console bin up front with two cupholders inside. There are another two cupholders near the shifter and two more in the fold-down armrest in the rear. Door pockets are on the smaller side, however.
Price and features
Volvo XC90
You have a choice of three XC90s – a diesel, petrol and electric/petrol hybrid – each available in three trim levels.Â
With a price tag over $120,000, our hybrid Inscription will take more than spare change to own but does come with a fairly generous inclusions list.
Standard fare features seven seats, tri-zone climate control, 9.0-inch tablet-style multimedia colour touchscreen with 12.3-inch digital driver display, Bluetooth connectivity, USB ports and 12 volt connections, auto lights and wipers, powered tailgate, reverse camera and sensors and an impressive suite of safety systems.
Our car was also equipped with a $3000 'Technology Pack' (Apple CarPlay, 360-degree camera, head-up display, DAB radio tuner) and the $8000 'Premium Pack' with Bowers & Wilkins audio, air suspension and heated seats for front and middle row passengers.
Am I the only one thinking it's a bit stingy to expect you to hand over more for these features in car that already costs in excess of $100,000?
Maserati Levante7/10
Guessing you want to know just how much more affordable this Levante is compared to the other grades in the range? Okay, the entry-level Levante lists for $125,000, before on-road costs.
That may sound expensive but look at it like this: the entry Levante has the same Maserati-designed and Ferrari-made 3.0-litre twin-turbo petrol V6 as the $179,990 Levante S and an almost identical standard features list.Â
So how on this planet is it possible there could be a $55K price difference and yet the cars be almost the same? What’s missing?
Horsepower is missing – the base grade Levante may have the same V6 as the Levante S but it doesn’t have as much grunt. But we’ll get to that in the engine section.
As for the other differences – there aren’t many, almost none. The Levante S comes with a sunroof as standard and front seats that adjust to more positions than the Levante, but both grades come with an 8.4-inch touchscreen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, sat nav, leather upholstery (the S does get more premium leather), a proximity key and 19-inch alloy wheels.
Those standard features are also identical to those in the Turbo-Diesel which sits above the Levante at $159,990.
Apart from less horsepower, no standard sunroof (as on the S) and upholstery which isn’t quite as nice as the S’s another downside to the base grade Levante is that optioning the GranLusso and GranSport packs is expensive… really expensive.
The GranLusso adds luxurious touches to the exterior in the form of metallic trim to the roof rails, the window frames and protection plates to the front bumper, while in the cabin thee front seats come in a choice of Ermenegildo Zegna silk upholstery, Pieno Fiore (full-grain) leather or premium Italian hide.
The GranSport toughens up the exterior with a more aggressive body kit with black elements and adds 12-way power adjustable sports seats, brushed-chrome shifting paddles and aluminium-face sports pedals.
The features those packages offer are nice – those silk and leather seats are sumptuous for example, but each pack costs $35,000. That’s almost 30 per cent of the list price of the entire vehicle, extra. The same packages on the Levante S costs just $10,000.
While the Levante is the most affordable Levante, and also the cheapest Maserati you can buy, it’s more expensive than its Porsche Cayenne (entry V6 petrol) rival which lists for $116,000, while the Range Rover Sport 3.0 SC HSE is $130,000 and the Mercedes-Benz GLE 43 is $135,529.
Is the new entry-grade Levante good value, then? Yes, for a Maserati, if you don’t option the packages, and yes compared to most of its rivals.
Under the bonnet
Volvo XC90
Naturally, there is much to be said about a V8 engine, as available in previous XC90s; superlatives in the main, but the combination 'twin-charged' four in our T8 is hardly struggling for words of praise either, especially from buyers who are not only environmentally aware but have the means to add action to ideology.
This plug-in hybrid is powered by a supercharged and turbocharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol engine that delivers 235kW/400Nm to the front wheels, blended with a twin-battery 65kW/240Nm electric motor on the rear axle, that improves the economy and range of Volvo’s signature offering.
They can be used alone or in combination, with the torque figures and actual performance varying accordingly. Volvo suggests that on electric power only, you would be good for 30km, perfect for average city commutes, although we couldn’t muster more than 24km during our test week.
A charging connector that suits most household power sockets is a handy advantage, meaning you can recharge in your garage, or at work – anywhere really, that you can sidle up to an electric socket. Charge time is usually around four hours.Â
The 2.0-litre petrol engine with its turbocharger, and supercharger, and of course superpowers (made that last one up), is a handy unit given the XC90’s bulk, and has a willing accomplice in form of a silky smooth eight-speed transmission.
Maserati Levante8/10
If you’ve just read the section above on price and features, you’re now probably wondering how much less powerful the Levante is compared to the Levante S.
The Levante has a 3.0-litre twin-turbo petrol V6 and it sounds magnificent. Yup, the entry-grade Levante lets loose that Maserati high-pitched scream when you open the throttle, just like the S. It may sound the same as the S but the Levante’s V6 has less horsepower. At 257kW/500Nm, the Levante makes 59kW less in power and 80Nm less in torque.
Is there a noticeable difference? Not much. Acceleration isn’t as rapid in the Levante with 0-100km/h coming in six seconds compared to 5.2 seconds in the Levante S.
Shifting gears is an eight-speed ZF-sorced automatic transmission which is super smooth, but a little slow.
Efficiency
Volvo XC90
Well, technically, in automatic hybrid mode you should be, if official figures are to be relied upon, returning figures of 2.1L/100km.Â
Real life rarely works like that though, with our readings closer to 7.6L/100km. Still credible for a 2.3 tonne SUV, although interestingly, we managed 6.0L/100km in the 2.0-litre diesel.
Maserati Levante7/10
Even if you were to drive your Levante conservatively Maserati says you can expect it to use at best 11.6L/100km over a combination of urban and open roads, the Levante S is a bit thirstier at an official 11.8L/100km.Â
In reality you can expect the twin-turbo petrol V6 to want more – just open road driving was seeing the trip computer report 12.3L/100km, You can bet that’ll go up in the city and climb higher if you like to keep raising the Levante's beautiful voice.
Driving
Volvo XC90
Thanks to semi-autonomous technology, this XC90 can pretty much drive itself, although taking your hands off the steering wheel for more than 20 seconds will very quickly remind you of the law.
So, provided you touch the steering at those regular intervals and the road is clearly marked, this car can stay within its lane in city confines, follow confidently behind the car in front, braking, accelerating and stopping when necessary.
It is less confident on narrower poorly marked or inconsistently edged roads, but that doesn’t detract from the wow factor, and in all honesty has more to do with our infrastructure problems than Volvo’s technical wizardry.
The thing is that even though this car can carry out most of the mundane functions of driving, it has such a sense of ease about it that you will want to drive yourself.
In slow, stop-start city commuting the electric engine comes into its own, allowing you to shuffle along without troubling its petrol wing man. You have to remember to recharge when you get to the office or back from the school run, however, or it sort of defeats the purpose.
The petrol unit, with a more than competent eight-speed transmission to facilitate performance, sticks fastidiously to the task, although it can sometimes feel a tad lethargic.
It is hard to find fault with the petrol and electric engines working in unison, a combined peak torque of 640Nm giving you all the oomph you need.
The twin engine XC90 is nicely balanced, easy to manoeuvre and an excellent cruiser. You can occasionally feel its weight around tight corners but that is to be expected.
The brakes took a bit of getting used to as the car initially uses regenerative braking to capture energy, but then stops quickly as speed drops. It's a bit of a surprise, but easy enough to accommodate.
Maserati Levante8/10
When I reviewed the Levante S at its launch in 2017 I enjoyed its good handling and comfortable ride. But impressed as I was with performance from the engine I felt the car could be quicker.
So how then would a less powerful version of the same car feel? Not much different, actually. The base grade Levante is only 0.8s slower to 100km/h than the S at six seconds. The air suspension is the same as the S’s and returns a comfortable and compliant ride, and handling with the dampers in the firm setting is impressive for a two tonne, five-metre long vehicle.
Front brakes in the Levante base grade car are smaller (345 x 32mm) than in the S (380 x 34mm) and the tyres aren’t staggered either with 265/50 R19 all around.
The variable-ratio, electrically-assisted power steering is well weighted, but too quick. I found the car turned in too far, too quickly, with regular mid-corner corrections a tiresome necessity.
To me there’s no point going for the S based on the assumption that it’s going to be a much higher performing car. The Levante and Levante S and are both mild in their power delivery and have better dynamics than an average large SUV.
If you are after a true high-performance Maserati SUV then you might be best off waiting for the Levante GTS coming in 2020 with a 404kW V8.
The base grade Levante V6 sounds just as beautiful as the S’s, but there's one place where it isn’t very pleasant. The back seat.
At the launch of the Levante S in 2017 I didn’t have the chance to ride in the rear seats. This time around I let my co-driver steer for half-an-hour while I sat in the left rear position.Â
For starters it’s louder back there – the exhaust note is almost too loud to be pleasant. Plus, the seats aren’t supportive or comfortable.Â
There’s also a slightly claustrophobic, cave-like feeling in the second row, largely due to the roof's accentuated slope towards the rear. This, to me, rules it out almost completely as something to ferry guests around in comfort.
Safety
Volvo XC90
It is no secret that safety features are one of the foundations of the Volvo ethos. It was after all Volvo engineer Nils Bohlin who invented the three-point seat belt in 1959 which turned out to be the most important safety device ever created.
Instead of cashing in on the patent, and in keeping with their guiding principle of safety, Volvo shared it with other car manufacturers which has of course resulted in untold lives being saved.
This XC90 boasts other marvellous safety inventions, including blind spot monitoring, lane departure warning, AEB, pedestrian detection and a rear collision system. An extra $2600 will give you the 'Intellisafe' system which includes adaptive cruise control, semi-autonomous 'Pilot Assist' and lane keeping assist.
Maserati Levante8/10
The Levante is yet to be tested by ANCAP. That said, the Levante has six airbags and is equipped with advanced safety equipment such as AEB, lane keeping assistance and lane departure warning, blind spot warning with steering assistance, traffic sign recognition and adaptive cruise control.
A puncture repair kit is under the boot floor.
Ownership
Volvo XC90
Warranty is three year/unlimited kilometres with free roadside assist for that period.
A 'SmartCare' service program gives you fixed-price servicing for up to five years/75,000km for $4075.
Maserati Levante6/10
The Levante is covered by Maserati’s three year/unlimited kilometre warranty. Servicing is recommended at two year or 20,000km intervals. More brands are moving to longer warranties and it would be good to see Maserati offer its buyers longer coverage.