2021 Mercedes-Benz S-Class vs Bentley Flying Spur review _ The world's best luxury saloon _ Autocar

The Joy of Driving: A Comparison Between the Bentley and Mercedes-Benz

As I set off on this road ride, I couldn't help but feel a sense of excitement and anticipation. The first edition Bentley, with its 22-inch wheels, was an interesting choice for me to test out. But, as I soon discovered, it wasn't just about the car itself, but also the experience that came with driving one. As I navigated through the winding roads, I couldn't help but notice the differences between this Bentley and the Mercedes-Benz S-Class I had been testing earlier.

One of the first things that struck me was the noisier and bumpier ride. The Bentley's larger wheels seemed to make a difference in terms of comfort and smoothness. While it wasn't uncomfortable, it felt more " keyed in" to the ground, which was a bit jarring at times. In contrast, the Mercedes-Benz S-Class I had been testing earlier felt smoother and more refined.

As I drove on, I couldn't help but notice the level of attention to detail that Bentley has brought to this car. From the stitching on the steering wheel, done by hand and with individual needleworkers having their own fork, to the bright work and wood trim, everything about this car screams luxury. The leather upholstery is also top-notch, sourced from bulls that are only raised in huge Spanish fields without barbed wire, ensuring they don't get stretch marks.

In terms of luxury, I think Bentley really outdoes Mercedes-Benz. While the S-Class has all the bells and whistles, Bentley goes to town in a way that its rival cannot match. The stitching on the steering wheel, for example, is done by hand, and each individual needleworker has their own fork, resulting in unique points of contact with the leather. This level of attention to detail and craft is evident throughout the car, making it truly special.

As I continued driving, I found myself appreciating the fact that this Bentley doesn't try to compete with the Mercedes-Benz S-Class on every level. In a world where luxury cars are all about options and choices, this Bentley offers a different kind of luxury – the freedom to disconnect from the world. With its sleek design and quiet cabin, it's the perfect escape from the stresses of everyday life.

When I got back in the car and turned on the navigation system, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I didn't want to use it. The Mercedes-Benz S-Class had a plethora of options and features that made me feel like I needed to be constantly connected to the world outside. But this Bentley – with its simple, intuitive interface – felt like a breath of fresh air. I could switch off, relax, and simply enjoy the drive.

As I drove around Chichester, near the factory where the Bentley is manufactured, I couldn't help but think about the Rolls-Royce Ghost that was also available for testing. While it's not commonly used for tests like this, I think it would be an interesting comparison to make. However, in the end, I don't think the Ghost would come out of it badly – it's a really nice car, but the Bentley has a certain character that suits it perfectly.

In terms of dynamics, the Bentley feels more responsive and accurate than the Mercedes-Benz S-Class. It's not just about the handling; it's also about the sense of involvement in the driving experience. When I'm in this car, I feel like I'm truly connected to the road, which is a feeling that's hard to match.

Ultimately, as someone who values luxury and refinement above all else, I think this Bentley is my choice. While the Mercedes-Benz S-Class has its own merits, it can't compete with the Bentley's level of craftsmanship, attention to detail, and sheer sense of relaxation. Whether you're looking for a luxurious saloon or just want to escape from the stresses of everyday life, this Bentley feels like the perfect choice.

The key to understanding why I chose this car over the Mercedes-Benz S-Class is that it doesn't try to compete with me on every level. It understands that luxury isn't just about options and choices, but also about giving you space to breathe. When I'm in this car, I feel like I can truly disconnect from the world and just enjoy the drive.

Of course, there are some downsides to this Bentley – it's not as comfortable as the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, and it's definitely noisier. But for me, that's part of its charm. It feels more "real" than a car like the S-Class, which can sometimes feel too sterile or soulless.

In the end, I think this is what sets this Bentley apart from other luxury cars on the market. It's not just about the features and options; it's about creating an experience that makes you feel truly alive. Whether I'm driving through winding roads or simply cruising around town, this Bentley always feels like a treat – a chance to relax, unwind, and enjoy the simple pleasures in life.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhello and welcome back to the channel where if you are in the market for a new luxury saloon car you're in luck because there are two which have just been very heavily updated one is the mercedes-benz s-class that sort of archetypal luxury saloon car and the other is bentley's rather fabulous flying spur now there are more as well but we'll come to that in a minute question is which is the world's best luxurious four-door so let's take a look at them both inside and then see what they're like to drive and we'll start with the new mercedes s-class okay so welcome to the all-new mercedes-benz s-class which comes in short or long wheelbase forms but at the moment in this spec which is 105 grand for reasons i come on to later it comes in long wheelbase form only so i'm in my driving position but there's actually loads of head and leg room behind me as well and it is a cabin which is dominated by these two big screens to the expense of a lot of other separate buttons now that gives you certain advantages there's a lot of room in here there's also a lot of room in there but what it does mean is that all of the functions are basically through a touch screen and you may know how we feel about putting too much on a touch screen and also this is the latest s-class so there is loads that you can get through so if i just push the home screen i've got one two three four five six seven eight nine different menus in there sub menus in there to go through to change everything from the ambient lighting through to and actually this is quite good the 3d 2d effect on the dashboard which can have a million different effects of its own there is a lot to think about in here and that doesn't always mean i don't think that it's ergonomically for the benefit of the driver more physical buttons would be handy and yes it would look less clean but also mean these vents weren't out of reach and i just think the reason we're here in part is because the tesla rocked up with a massive screen front and center and people have gone hmm that's gone down quite well we should have that there are ergonomic limitations with huge screens and mercedes-benz the ben's patent motor bargain was from 1885 1886 and in the last 135 years mercedes-benz has got quite good at making functional interiors and there are things worth keeping about them so i like this car so far but there are things that i would just rather have as old-fashioned even if they seem old-fashioned old-fashioned physical buttons but let's go and see what it's like to drive and so the s-class to drive now some people at bentley would get a little bit sniffy about the idea of comparing these two cars because they would say well look you know the bentley is a luxury car and the mercedes really is only an executive car and we operate in two different spheres and when it comes to this particular car well they may have a bit of a point because instead of a big lusty petrol engine if you look at the back of this it says 400d because it has a straight six diesel which is more common in a car like this but it's not the full spec luxury version of the s-class we did have one booked but another magazine managed to damage it before it arrived to us which is why we've got this one but i think no matter this is the archetypal engine for an s-class an easy-going long-range i filled it with diesel earlier this morning it's saying it's got 550 miles this is the kind of car that is meant to just sit and waft away a thousand miles hundreds of miles in a day absolutely no bother leaving you calm and unruffled and unfocused and for example hey mercedes i'm stressed maybe the program will help you enjoy it i will turn it on maybe it will i now have cat paws massaging my back and well i don't know if you can hear that it's playing whales singing and there's a sort of thing on the screen which actually i don't think there should be a sort of moving bubbly type thing on the screen it seems to have gone away again now hey mercedes i'm no longer stressed i'm sorry can you say that again please hey mercedes i'm not stressed i'm sorry but i can't help you with it right now hey mercedes cancel the stress thing you see now i'm stressed now now cancel the stress thing i'm sorry but i can't help you with that right now no no you can't no you can't right away from let's try and shut that up right right away from the ridiculous stress stuff there's a lot going on in this car there's still a lot going on when you're driving as well as when you're as when you're stationary there's a lot to look through there is there's a lot going on in terms of electronics in terms of functions but fundamentally at heart beneath all of that stuff there is a sound car in here this engine just mooches into the background you can occasionally get a bit of a diesel grumble if you just you know accelerate hard but it's got response it's got quietness it's got all the things you could realistically want from an engine like this and the ride is quiet and the ride is isolated and the steering is direct and accurate enough i'm really tired of the cat poor thing on my back about now it's very irritating but i just wish a few more things were rather more straightforward to use so the entertainment volume sometimes i mean i've been going up and down on it and sometimes i just get it a bit wrong i do a flick and it goes up or it goes down the other way to which i want or it doesn't move at all and then therefore it's easier to do that that shouldn't be the case it shouldn't be the case that it's easier to reach there than it is to flick something on here and although the climate buttons are always visible they are there which requires something more significant movement wise than it would be if they were just on a dial and that sort of stuff is the sort of stuff that i shouldn't be complaining about in 2021 i know cars have a lot of technology but it shouldn't be that hard to use it but fundamentally beneath it all this is a really capable car and it's actually quite enjoyable to drive in its own way as well as being refined and smooth and quiet although this isn't one of the high spec petrol versions i have driven one which has active rear steer this does not and it really makes it feel even more agile again so if you're starting to spend the kind of money that would get you into the bentley with one of these you do get a car that feels more agile than this and also has a much nicer sounding petrol engine than this it's a good car the s cost i like this car and in the back there is a lot of room whether you prefer this or the bentley in the back i think largely comes down to which you would rather be seen in they both have stacks of room they're both quite comfortable i think in the mercedes i would think people would assume i was being taken to an airport and in the bentley perhaps they would assume i was being taken to the opera that's pretty much the difference they're both really comfy and really spacious but my interest and probably your interest as well is kind of what they're like as drivers cars and as it goes if you can look past all of the fripperies some of which are great some of which are not so great the s-class is a really comfortable capable impressive car and i wish the massage would now stop hey mercedes turn off this turn off the seat massage i'm switching off the massage for you oh you see maybe i'll bond with it after all but right that's enough of this i'll jump out jump into the bentley give it a little walk around the cabin of there and then go for a drive and come to a conclusion okay so welcome to the interior of the flying spur yeah another week another bentley video you will find elsewhere on this channel either in a panel above my head or we'll link it down below a bentayga versus range rover group test there is also a video on the base v8 flying spur which we did which this one isn't this is the full fat w12 not just that it's the first edition which gets extra kit and is even more expensive again so it's about twice the money as the mercedes benz that we've got and also by the way i didn't realize i was going to clash slash compliment the interior leather when i got dressed this morning but the shops open again soon and i'll i'll get a new hoodie however this is largely a beautifully finished interior material quality is high on the wood leather front mixed with some slightly older feeling buttons and switchgear for good and bad the bad thing right if you have this many buttons obviously you get a bit less space in the dashboard i get these two cupholders a little charge pad there and this armrest slides but it doesn't go up and down so there's less storage space it looks a little more cluttered than the s-class does on the plus side there are actual physical buttons for doing stuff so if i want to change the temperature i don't have to look away from the road for very long it does have a screen it's not the latest generation volkswagen screen even so it doesn't look and feel as nice as the mercedes one but in terms of functionality it's got everything that i need and less than the mercedes i grant you in terms of changing the ambient lighting and i can't tell it i'm stressed and it won't play whale music at me but i don't necessarily need all that what it feels like is a nice driving environment so let's go and see what it's like to drive and so to the bentley to drive now first thing to note that because this has got a w12 cylinder petrol engine with an awful lot of power this is a very very fast car i don't think you would necessarily think to yourself oh the s-class is a bit underpowered i mean these are big luxury executive saloon cars neither of them is a supercar so i don't think you you know would say either of them are a down on power but there is there's only so fast you want to go in a two point x ton 5.3 meter long luxury ceiling but there's no question that this engine is more befitting of a car of its price but then it's a lot more expensive than the s-class that we have it's not as quite as smooth as this w12 it's got 12 cylinders but it's never quite as smooth as a v12 because that has six cylinders in line they are perfectly imbalanced and a w12 is never quite the same but it is quiet at a cruise and if you back off and you want to accelerate and get it to make some noise just make quite a nice noise while it's at it the way it goes with bentley's large loons i mean kind of inclined to think that usually the v8 is preferable it's a bit lighter in the nose it makes a very pleasant noise no worse than the the w12 so it's maybe not as smooth and maybe not as fast but actually that suits it rather well and the rest of the driving experience is i think kind of where you would want a bentley to be it's more driver focused i think is probably the kindest and most accurate way of putting it than the s-class what's really impressive about the s-class is the amount of isolation it has from the road this the road ride they're both on air springs the road ride in this is noisier and also you feel lumps and bumps more this first edition car gets 22-inch wheels which will have something to do with that but it feels more keyed in to the ground i think in the context of a bentley that's probably okay if we were talking about something like a rolls royce ghost it would be different now my first mention of the rolls royce ghost it would be nice would it not especially as i'm driving near chichester just three or four miles away from the factory to have a rolls-royce ghost in this test i thought it would be perhaps you thought it would be too rolls royce decided it wouldn't be they don't really like giving their cars up for tests like this because they make the argument well our buyers do not make objective decisions like that they don't decide which is better they just decide that they want the rolls royce and they buy them that may well be true but i think it would be an interesting comparison to make and i don't think the ghost would come out of it badly that's the interesting thing it's a really nice car but the bentley has the sort of character that bentley has developed intentionally and i think it suits this car the steering is that bit heavier than in the mercedes it feels that bit more accurate a bit more responsive and i think it suits it rather well and when it comes to luxury well there's all the bright work and the stitching and the wood which is veneered really painstakingly likewise with the leather which is which is only garnered from bulls because they don't get stretch marks like cows and only when they live in huge spanish fields with no barbed wire around so they don't get any marks on them that sort of stuff goes you know bentley goes to town in a way that a mainstream manufacturer like mercedes-benz and let's call them a mainstream manufacturer you can get an a-class for a couple hundred quid a month bentley goes to the lengths that mercedes-benz does not this stitching for example on the steering wheel is done by hand and each of the needle workers has their own little fork and they go around and they prick the leather around the edge of the steering wheel and that tells you how far away all these little points should be and each individual needleworker has their own fork so they'll all be different on each individual wheel which i think is quite cool that level of attention to detail and craft is evident and it really it really shows in here and it really counts and then you heard me sell the mercedes benz i was a bit stressed and in part it was part it was what the mercedes doing that was making me stressed if i'm in a car like this and i think i'm a bit stressed i'll just push that button there and around it goes and i just get three plane dials when it comes to luxury i think this stuff matters i think this stuff is important the world is stressing me out i'm in my bentley maybe i'm in the front maybe i'm in the back but i want some time on my own i just want time away from stuff i still got the nav here if i want it i can still change the media if i want it but i don't have to have this raft of information coming at me in my face and what is luxury if it is not choice and time and the ability to say i'm not interested i don't want to know just i want to switch off somebody else can deal with stuff because i'm too important and i'm too busy and i just want to relax for a while i'm switched off i am in a i have a luxury lifestyle somebody else can do that and i don't want to and that's what i really like about this car even though it is less isolated than the mercedes even though i think it's noisier than mercedes even though it's less comfortable if you want to put it that way than the mercedes i find it more relaxing for that reason and that doesn't go away if you choose one of the more expensive s-class models fundamentally the cabin architecture is the same in these and likewise if you come down the range in the bentley and you don't have these first edition headrests which i necessarily recommend anyway you could still have the v8 you could have a planar cheaper flying spur for the same money that you get a more expensive s-class and the same things would apply this feels more like a luxury saloon and for me that makes it despite the fact that dynamically their swings and roundabouts despite the fact that yeah the mercedes has lots of kit for me it's the finish and the involvement in a car like a bentley which makes this my choice\n"