The Artura isn’t a night-and-day different sort of a mid-engined supercar after its 2025-model-year tweaks – but it is louder and more forthcoming in its persona, as well as firmer-riding, more urgent feeling, and more powerful in how it gets down the road. It’s working quite hard at that second chance to make a first impression, in other words.
McLaren’s old Sports Series supercars were, after all, always intended for more regular ‘daily’ driving than their Super Series counterparts. Given that the McLaren Artura picks up where those cars left off, it is important to acknowledge the role that it has been designed to fulfil before we start to describe and pass comment on the effectiveness of its execution.
McLaren clearly aimed for a certain refinement and drivability for this car, as well as outright pace and excitement. But the excitement part flows primarily from the sabre-sharp way in which the Artura’s hybrid powertrain responds.
Those used to the softened mid-range pick-up of the McLaren 570S will be stunned at how crisply this car surges forward the instant you flex your toe. You needn’t hold onto a lower gear and higher revs during faster cross-country driving to keep the engine in that permanent state of readiness. Even in higher gears, the torque just floods in the split second you ask for it. The electric motor blends with the combustion engine so seamlessly, before the latter takes over the ravenous heavy lifting beyond 5000rpm, and pulls freely and forcefully to well beyond 8000rpm.
For McLaren’s 2022-spec, 671bhp Artura, our timing gear recorded a two-way-average 0-60mph standing start of 3.2sec, 0-100mph in 6.3sec and a standing quarter-mile in 10.9sec. The previous generation of Porsche 911 GT2 RS, tested in 2018, was a tenth or two faster across the same benchmarks; but in terms of real-world, any-gear, accessible roll-on performance, the Artura slays the GT2 RS by even greater margins (30-70mph in fourth gear: 4.1sec versus 5.1sec), which makes it feel energetic and ready to accelerate at any moment.
And, in 2025-model-year form, there’s certainly an appetite for speed and revs about this car even greater than it had at launch. The V6 certainly feels slightly boostier, happier still and even keener to spin beyond 5000rpm, and is generally that bit more of a presence. To listen to, it’s more interesting and charismatic on the ear also, having greater detail, and audible moments of Porsche flat six and Ferrari flat-plane V8, about its tonality. Flatten the accelerator and the electric motor still floods the lower half of the rev range pretty effectively, covering any latency in the engine’s turbo response so that the turbos can come on that bit stronger later on, and punch that bit harder when they do.
However you characterise its flavour, the Artura is certainly an objectively fast car – and very easy to drive fast. Except, that is, when you choose to dial up Electric on the powertrain mode controller. The gap in the Artura’s performance level between Sport or Track mode and here is something of a chasm, and might make it an ill-advised decision to switch to zero-emissions running when waiting at a busy junction, for example.
Once you have acclimatised to the Artura’s electric-only performance potential, however, you will find it an easy car to drive even here: still responsive if far from fast above about 40mph, ready to cruise even at gentler motorway speeds should you want it to, and good for an electric range of 17 miles on a mixed route.
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