The Mercedes S-Class has been the benchmark of luxury limousine comfort since 1972. Now we are at the W223 series, and it is still unsurpassed in terms of comfort, workmanship, mechanical and electronic excellence, and last but not least, panache.

Our test car is the plug-in hybrid version of the S-Class, designated as the S 450 e. Furthermore, we drive the “L” or long version, which, of course gives you totally superb rear passenger comfort.
 

Don’t think that this imposing S Class version will be difficult to drive in town: thanks to the rear-axle steering (optional) the turning circle of the S-Class is reduced by up to two metres. The steering angle at the rear axle goes up to 10 degrees…The steering is also surprisingly direct: only 2 turns are needed to steer from full right to left.   

Stepping behind the wheel in this magnificent limousine will however still require some caution, certainly if you wear a hat. The a-pillar is  raked rather steeply for good aerodynamic reasons, but this means that you will still have to tilt your head slightly…

Once your are sitting down you are enveloped in superb somfort. The front seats have a 4 way back support, electronically adjusted, and of course there is a whole (optional) massage program waiting for you, just touch the “comfort” symbol on the large central control screen and you can choose your favorite session…

You can also opt for an active “multi-contour” package, which gives you extra lateral support when you are cornering at speed.
 The cabin bathes you in a wonderful light ambiance, which, of course you can adjust at will.

The instrumentation is clear, the immense screens both in front of the driver and the central screen are largely self-explanatory, although we would still suggest that you take some time to get acquainted with all its wonderful features.

Superb and ultra-refined performance…

The fourth generation of the hybrid drive celebrated its premiere in the S-Class in 2021. The present 450 e version has a 3 litre straight-six cylinder under the hood, developing 220 kW or 299 hp, combined with a rather powerful 110 kW or 150 hp electric motor. The battery is not enormous with 21,96 kWh, but powerful enough to give the 2,5 tonne “e” S-Class a range between 105 and 70 km.

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You can calculate it for yourself on the simulator which you can find on the Mercedes website.

We show you it here in two screenshots: assuming 35 % of the trip made on the Autobahn, the electric only range with an outside temperature of 20° is 100 km, when the ambient temperature drops to 10°, the range drops to 77 km. Quite sufficient in our opinion to perform a daily commute on E-power…

You can charge the battery with a maximum power of 60 kW, and on an ordinary wallbox or public charging point (Max 20 kW on DC) you can charge the battery from 10 to 80 pct in merely 20 minutes.

The outright performance leaves nothing to be desired: this S-Class will sprint from 0 to 100 km/h in merely 5,9 seconds. The top speed is electronically limited to 250 km/h.

But the beauty lies of course, in the smooth way all this performance unfolds. The electric engine is totally inaudible, the 6 cylinder 3 litre engine is ideally balanced and vibrationless, and only a soft purr is heard when accelerating hard. The engine is mated to a smooth and alert 9G-TRONIC Plus automatic gearbox, which makes imperceptible gear changes. You have gearchange paddles at the steering wheel, but with 9 gears to choose from, one is soon overwhelmed… and we chose to let the clever gearbox do the work. The 9^th gear allows very relaxed cruising at very low revs. At 120 km/h,  the engine exceeds barely 1500 rpm.

Consumption is, of course, very much in function of the battery status, or rather, whether you drive on e-power or not. The WLTP standard consumption is officially quoted at 2,4 l/100km. The manufacturer’s official figure for average e-consumption is 17,4 kWh/100km, which I find a rather more realistic indicator. On the open road, your flagship is still quite economical, due also to its excellent aerodynamics: it has a Cw coefficient of merely 0,22. When you drive at fast cruising speeds, the consumption hardly exceeds 11 l/100 km. Town driving will cost you around 10,5 l/100 km.

Floating carpet comfort…

The S-Class can be considered to be the ultimate standard in limousine driving comfort. It has standard an air suspension with adaptive dampers, and you can opt for E-Active body control, which keeps the car body stable even under very fast cornering. The suspension swallows any road irregularities totally smoothly and this even at very slow speeds, and one truly enjoys a “floating carpet” ride. You can choose between different suspension settings, but even in the “sport” mode the ride remains totally smooth.

Heating and ventilation are also in a class of its own. Two-zone airco is standard, but you can opt for four-zone airco. Of course the rear passengers are spoilt too. You can obtain all conceivable extras, from heated side panels to heated and ventilated seats fore and aft, dark window curtains at the rear; you name it..

Infotainment reaches into the stars…

Mercedes is quite proud of its MBUX infotainment system, and deservedly so. As we said above, the system is quite intuitive, provided you take the effort to study the system and carefully go through all the menus. The indications are chrystal clear and seen on a massive 12,8 inch central touchscreen.  

The sliding volume control for the superb Burmeister (31-speaker!) sound system takes some practice, but soon you become a master at it. You can also choose the instrument layout on the screen in front of you, and the overhead display of our test car was also eminently readable. You can also enjoy the optional augmented reality feature on this display, which shows you, with clearly visible arrows, which route to take…

This flagship Mercedes was updated last year, and has further optimized the MBUX user interface: suggestions for assisted parking are now located more intuitively in the menu. The Mercedes-Benz Automatic Lane Change (ALC) function now offers a further intelligent development: if a slower vehicle is traveling ahead, the car can initiate a lane change itself.

Indeed, if the radar recognizes sufficient open space and lane markings are detected, it can overtake the slower vehicle in front… fully automatically(!). The prerequisites are a motorway-like road with at least two lanes and a speed limit as well as a vehicle equipped with MBUX Navigation. The system does not require any further input from the driver to carry out the automatic lane change. Brave new world, we would say…

Let there be light…

The LED headlights are state of the art, with light shining in bends, combined with excellent long-range visibility with dynamic headlight assistant and extra powerful LED elements. The headlights shine up to a distance of … 650 meters (!).

 

The Long version of the 450 is as you can expect enormously spacious at the rear. But also in front there is enough head- and legroom for 2 metre tall adults. Boot space is of course also sufficient with 450 liters.
 
 Conclusion

The Mercedes S Class continues to be the absolute benchmark in luxury, mechanical and electronic perfection, comfort and sheer performance. Add to this the legendary quality seen in the perfect fit and quality of the materials used, and you know that this car is built for a lifetime of superb motoring.

Of course, all this doesn’t come cheap, even more so when you take into account the long list of optional extras.

But then, when one reaches the pinnacle of what a series production luxury saloon can embody and represent, it is still quite reasonable when compared with exotic supercars…

Hans Knol ten Bensel

Photographer’s notes: I used for this test exclusively the Sony Alpha 5100 with the Zeiss Vario Tessar E 4/16-70 ZA OSS lens, again proving to be the ideal companion in difficult low light conditions. One exception, however, is the photo of the driver’s door under the blue ambient lighting. It was taken with our Xiaomi 11T smartphone at f/1.8, handheld at 1/9 sec, with ISO 7800. Proving again how formidable today’s smartphones have become. As the photo was taken in the darkness of an underground garage, we overexposed it 3,3 times using the “pro” mode on our phone to get details of the door and cabin surfaces. The photo below of our Sony camera with its Zeiss lens was also shot with our Xiaomi 11 T. F 1,8 at 1/60 sec with no exposure compensation.

Hans Knol ten Bensel