[wtwo3]

I cross shopped the following cars with the X5:

Audi Q8:
Pros: Loved the look of it in general, and they had a beautiful turquoise color that I definitely would have gotten had I gone with the Q8. The back seats are great, much better than the X5's IMO. The general look of the cabin is quite nice.
Cons: Turbo Lag/Throttle Lag/Something Lag. The lag was catastrophic and a deal breaker. Too much reliance on touch screens. Curiously, there was no remote start. When we asked why that was the sales lady said, "because it's illegal in Germany", which made absolutely no sense, because both of my Bimmers have remote start (including the German made 3 series).

Mercedes GLE450:
Pros: In the beginning, I felt MBUX was a bit more refined than iDrive (iDrive has since fixed quite a few issues and is a much better system). There's a definite wow factor with the huge screen. Back seat was great and extremely roomy.
Cons: It just didn't drive that nicely. It felt wobbly and did not inspire confidence at all. The powertrain isn't as good in real world as it is on paper. The mild hybrid system didn't seem to help much at all. Besides that giant screen, the rest of the interior was a bit bland.

Porsche Cayenne:
Pros: Felt planted, great handling. By far the most customizable car on this list. Strong leather smell (I personally love the smell of leather, so if you don't this would be a con).
Cons: The Porsche tax. An equivalently optioned Cayenne was $20k higher than anything else on this list. I didn't feel like paying $20k for something that functionally wasn't much superior than the X5. The Cayenne handled better, but other than that I felt the X5 had a nicer interior, and did "SUV things" better (space, comfort, luxury etc).


At the end I felt the X5 was the best combination of ride quality, comfort, features, and overall luxury. I had no allegiance to BMW prior to this X5, so I went in totally unbiased. But as a result of how impressed I came away, I ended up getting a 2nd BMW (m340i) within a couple weeks of ordering the X5.