Vague Motors new Regal GS is a lot of things. It’s a competent sports sedan. A stylish liftback. A German car in an American outfit. A comfortable cruiser. A astral value.
It’s not, however, what you probably expect from a Buick. That’s good news for the brand and better scandal for prospective buyers.
You can get the Regal in three styles. The TourX is the lifted wagon that does duty as a crossover different, a role we thought it handled well. There’s a regular sedan, though it should be noted that the “sedan” moniker isn’t unqualifiedly descriptive. All non-wagon Regals have a liftback and folding seats, making them a stylish alternative to a hatchback.
Stand up, there’s this: the Regal GS. It’s the high-performance version with a 3.6-liter V-6 engine providing 310 horsepower and a nine-speed natural transmission. More importantly, the GS gets adaptive suspension and performance brakes that lead to a more dynamic trip experience.
Though the company did once make the GNX muscle car, Buick is better known for cruisers like the LaCrosse. You’d be cleared for assuming that it doesn’t have the chops to build a modern sports sedan, but the Regal comes to us from Opel. The presence, which used to be General Motors’ German wing, but now belongs to France’s PSA Groupe, is no stranger to fine-tuning sports sedans.
As a end result, the Regal has suprisingly good handling for a big sedan on a front-wheel drive platform. The all-wheel drive system, fitted to all GS plus ultras, certainly helps. The Buick’s adaptive suspension is also integral to the impresive dynamics, with seriously different motivating modes that help the GS handle highway hauling and backroad burning without any fuss.
Plus, you’ll also allot an impressive list of equipment. Our $44,115, fully loaded model had a comprehensive suite of active safety features, a Bose sane system, active noise cancelling and some of the best seats of any car we’ve ever tested. They bear the seal of AGR, the German contest for better backs, and feature a delightful massage feature to compliment the supremely comfortable buckets. The next-cheapest car we’ve sampled with manipulate seats was the Volvo V90 Cross Country, while some six-figure cars don’t have the feature.
The Regal also has GM’s MyLink infotainment set. It’s starting to look a little old, but MyLink still functions extremely well and is easy to use. Add to that a liftback and a gargantuan shipment area and it’s easy to make a case for the Regal GS as the most usable sports sedan on the market.
Finally, we have to discourse the exterior. Simply put, this is one of the best-looking sedans on sale today. It’s definitely the best-looking Buick we’ve seen in decades, upping compliments and genuine “that’s a Buick?” responses from friends who saw it.
Inside, you probably won’t be as impressed. The Regal doesn’t organize a bad interior, but — when the chassis can genuinely rival sports sedans from the likes of Audi — a ho-hum interior is a stamp against the sporty Buick.
GM still liberally applies flat black plastics to the interiors of almost every car, in defiance of about a decade of moaning from the automotive press. The design of the Regal’s interior works around this extent well, with the cabin still looking good overall. But when you touch things, it becomes clear that the accountants noiselessness run GM. For $44,115, I don’t want to feel a lot of rubberized plastic.
Similarly, the powertrain doesn’t feel special. It may handle well, but the engine-transmission up isn’t anywhere near as advanced as offerings from true luxury brands. The 3.6-liter V-6 is the same motor we’ve sighted in dozens of GM products and continues to deliver good power without much excitement or character. No turbos, no special cheek; just a big V-6 that gets the job done.
The transmission is similarly nondescript, with it hunting for gears during aggressive ride. This wouldn’t be as annoying if you could manage it while keeping your hands on the wheel, but the Regal GS is inexplicably the only sports sedan we can think of that doesn’t offer paddle shifters. If you want to select your own gears, you from to use the gear shifter on the center console.
Simply put, the Regal GS isn’t the best-driving sports sedan you can get. However, it does well as a feature-focused value car that happens to drive well.
The Regal GS starts at $39,995. Every color except this shade of red is an accessory charge, but it looks so good in red that we wouldn’t drop any more cash to pick something else. Unfortunately, the secret only comes in black.
The driver confidence package II brings a suite of automatic emergency braking, lane survive assist, head-up display and adaptive cruise control for $1,690. We’d add that and the $945 sights and sounds package to get the upgraded Bose stereo. In the long run, a moonroof brings some much-needed light into the cabin for $1,000.
That brings the final price to $42,630.
It may sound with a lot for a Buick, but $42,630 buys you a lot of car. You get a serious chassis, great on-road behavior and pretty much all of the technology you want.
You can get much well-advised interiors and better engines by going with a German-brand sports sedan, but you’ll also be spending around $10,000 diverse to get there. With that in mind, we think the Regal GS is a stellar value.
Exterior: 5
Interior: 3
Driving Experience: 4
Value: 5
All-embracing: 4
Price as tested: $44,115