Looking like one of those blasted multifunction controller knobs employed by several other luxury brands, the JaguarDrive Rotary Gear Selector is in fact a single-function knob that does its job very well. Meanwhile, a knob hidden right where your hand rests on the center console motors upward. Movement - be it powered vents or an elaborate cupholder mechanism - has true appeal. It’s just cool in a way lights and materials can’t be. I ate it up, and I would have eaten more if it had been served. No, this doesn’t serve a necessary purpose, and yes, they are powered moving parts that could break someday, but people eat this stuff up. The four air-conditioning vents in the dashboard’s expansive standard aluminum trim panel rotate 90 degrees from their closed positions. The gauges and buttons, also backlit in blue, recall a color scheme introduced by Volkswagen many years ago, but here the hue makes for more legible readouts. Press it and the engine springs to life with a characteristic growl, and the cabin is bathed in cool blue light. Without throwing out the entire brand identity, Jaguar designers modernized the shapes and many materials and elevated the whole experience through artistic use of lighting and theater (or perhaps I should spell it “theatre”): Open the door, and the engine-start button pulsates red like a heartbeat. The old-world approach had gotten, well, old. That’s where some of the XF’s greatest strengths are found, so I’ll start there.įor a brand that’s well on its way to becoming the powdered wig of luxury cars, the XF’s interior is a welcome step forward. The XF is a satisfying driver’s car, but the luxury car experience has a lot to do with the inside. Also, the muscular hindquarters and sharply raked windshield give the XF an athletic look. They’re more like gills than vents or grates. On the upside, the vents in the front fenders manage to look distinctive at a time when the entire auto industry - including modest non-luxury cars - are incorporating them. I’ve also seen much better plastic grilles on more modest cars from non-luxury brands. In fairness, the grille on Bentley’s Continental GT is just as bad at more than three times the price, but that’s just thrice the shame on Bentley. This is a more affordable car, but I still don’t think that excuses the cheap-looking chromed plastic grate. My greater concern is over the grille, which is something I harped on in my XK review, too. The front end doesn’t knock me out it recalls a 2006 Chrysler Sebring after a makeover, but that’s completely subjective, of course. The XF has exterior styling that some people love and some people don’t, and that usually translates to above-average sales. I spent most of my evaluation in a Supercharged, but also tested the Premium Luxury. The two higher XF trim levels include the Premium Luxury and the Supercharged. With a starting list price of $49,200, the base trim level, called the XF Luxury, is closer to the Mercedes-Benz E-Class ($51,200) than it is to the most affordable versions of Audi’s A6 ($42,950) and BMW’s 528i ($44,300). With new exterior styling, a more contemporary interior design and a host of high-tech features, the XF is a worthy - if relatively expensive - competitor to the leading German luxury sedans. The midsize luxury sedan replaces the S-Type, which has been underwhelming audiences since the 2000 model year. Model updates are always in the pipeline years before they appear at dealerships, but the Jaguar XF is Ford’s swan song as far as all-new models are concerned. After more than 18 years under Ford’s umbrella, Jaguar is being sold to India’s Tata Motors, certainly beginning yet another era of speculation and naysaying about a foreign company’s fitness to steer a storied British brand.
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