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Next-Gen BMW X5 Spied Hammering the Nürburgring With Full-Width Kidney Grille

Next-Gen BMW X5 Spied Hammering the Nürburgring With Full-Width Kidney Grille

The Drive5 days ago
The latest car news, reviews, and features.
BMW's midsize X5 SUV is due for an overhaul in not too long, and our spies recently caught a prototype on everybody's favorite public road—that quaint little German byway known as the Nürburgring. The current X5 received its mid-cycle update for the 2024 model year along side its rake-back platform mate, the X6. That may seem like only yesterday in this fast-moving news climate, but even among luxury entries, the two-row family SUV is still a hot segment, and keeping up with the Joneses is still as important as it has ever been.
After all, the X5 is no spring chicken. It was one of the early entries in the mainstream luxury SUV market in the late 1990s, and has been a staple of the segment ever since. Bear in mind that this prototype is still rocking some fairly comprehensive camouflage, so the finer details will emerge a bit different from what we're seeing here. Still, the aggressively squat rear fenders and the buttress-like d-pillars make it look lower and wider than we'd imagine from a mid-size luxury SUV—even one that has consistently been offered in a corner-carving 'M' variant.
That said, there's one element we can pretty much guarantee is here to stay: the Neue-Klasse-inspired nose job. We've seen it elsewhere on BMW's next-gen prototypes (it gives this M3 EV prototype some VW Jetta vibes) and we expect it to be incorporated into virtually everything BMW builds, electric or otherwise. And speaking of 'otherwise,' so far, these X5 prototypes fall into that category.
That's right: According to our spies, BMW has thus far only tested internal-combustion variants of its new mid-sizer in public. While we're certain there's a new battery-powered 'iX5' in the works somewhere, BMW has either put it on the back burner, or is not yet at the stage of development where on-road testing is required.
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