Land Rover Range Rover Sport review

The Range Rover Sport provides generous space for long-legged people up front. There’s plenty of elbow room, too. Less impressive is the car’s outright head room, which isn’t in the same league as that in the standard Range Rover – or as generous as that of key rivals. It’s not so scant that it’ll affect most drivers, but if you’re particularly tall, you’ll be better off in a Volvo XC90.

Two cupholders are located on the centre console and can be neatly covered by a sliding lid; they’re both big enough for larger paper cups and 1.0-litre bottles. The glovebox and centre cubby are also a good size, although the door pockets are quite slim.

The Range Rover Sport isn’t the most commodious car in its class for rear passengers, but it’s certainly big. There’s good head and knee room, for example, so a couple of six-footers are unlikely to feel cramped. A middle passenger might do, though. The two outer seats are sculpted, while the middle one is relatively narrow and uncomfortable. It’s fine for children or smaller adults on short hops, but if you want a car to regularly seat five adults for any moderate length of time, you should shop elsewhere.

On this front, the SVR model makes the situation worse; by exaggerating the bolsters of the outer seats, the middle seat is even less comfortable.

The Range Rover Sport is a five-seat car as standard, but you can pay extra to have two additional seats that fit in the boot. These are nowhere near as usable as the ones in the back of a Land Rover Discovery or Mercedes-Benz GLS; access is a slightly awkward clamber through a narrow gap and space is sufficient for children and small adults only. Still, having up to seven seats will be useful for some people. Just remember that you can't have those extra seats in the P400e; the space they require under the boot floor is taken up by the batteries.

Just as they are in the front, the rear door pockets are quite small, but they will swallow a 1.0-litre bottle. There are, however, few other places to transfer the contents of your pockets into other than small nets on the front seatbacks.

Broadly speaking, the Range Rover Sport does well to make the most of what it’s got. The second-row seats slide forward and backwards, as well as reclining to several positions, but the access they grant to the optional third row isn’t great. The two outer seats slide and tilt forward to allow just enough space to plant a foot or a knee on your way into the rearmost row – but nothing more. The tilted middle-row seats don’t revert to their original position afterwards, either, stopping instead in their most forward setting; that's annoying if you’re an adult getting into row two.

The third-row seats are raised and lowered individually via electric motors. This can be done via buttons at the rear doors or just inside the boot opening. It takes a while for the electric motors to get the seats up or down, and they don’t save you from manual handling entirely, because there’s still a load bay cover to remove and replace. At least this is relatively light and easy to handle.

Depending on the trim level you choose, the front passenger seat gets either 16 or 18-way electric adjustment, although it’s disappointing that adjustable lumbar support is included only on high-end Autobiography Dynamic versions (it’s an optional extra on cheaper models).

The SVR is the only model in the range to benefit from lightweight Supersport front seats that offer more lateral support than the standard ones. And despite the seats being remarkably thin, the Special Vehicle Operations division has managed to integrate both heating and cooling functions within (something that’s available as an option).

Here, too, the Range Rover Sport has a good but not outstanding hand to play. While some rivals offer split tailgates or separate-opening rear windows, it has neither – so accessing a fully loaded boot without disturbing its contents isn't always easy.

The boot itself is wide and fairly tall. Straight sides and a broad opening grant easy access and make loading bulky items simple, and the boot’s generous capacity means you can fit a lot in. The boots in several rivals are longer, though, plus there’s no additional underfloor storage space in the Range Rover Sport if you go for the seven-seat option; the two extra seats sit under the boot floor when not in use. If you go for the P400e, the boot floor is slightly raised, because of the large battery pack underneath, making its boot slightly smaller.

There are lashing points in all four corners of the boot, while load space stowage rails with divider bars are on the options list.

If you need to carry particularly big loads, dropping the rear seats reveals a huge load area that’ll take practically anything you throw at it. The standard hands-free, electrically controlled tailgate is another neat touch.