If you’re a vehicle lover you surely know the golden rule of the auto business. Want to know what your average automobile will be doing ten years from now? Take a look at the Mercedes-Benz S-Class now.
For decades the S-Class has been the unchallenged king of luxury sedans. It’s the car that gave us radar cruise control, anti-lock brakes and airbags long before they were common equipment in daily hatchbacks. Now, Mercedes-Benz is bringing a big overhaul for the 2027 model year.
And when I say enormous, I mean enormous.
Mercedes scheduled this release to coincide with the 140th anniversary of Carl Benz creating the vehicle back in 1886. They left no penny unspent on the occasion. More than half of the car is all new engineering, with almost 2,700 parts that have been switched out. That’s what makes the 2027 S-Class the ultimate dream machine.
Exterior Design
But when you see an S-Class in your rear-view mirror, you know what it is. Mercedes has made sure presence is even more imposing for 2027.
The first thing you will observe is the grille. It is 20 per cent larger than the outgoing model. But they didn’t just increase its size. They cleaned it up. The border of the grille is nicely illuminated and gives the car a superb visual character at nite without being showy.
And sure, the famous standing star is still on the hood. But for the first time ever you may now acquire that LED hood ornament. It’s a simple detail but it adds a lot of theatrical when you unlock the car on a dark driveway.
The rear taillights are thinner and more aerodynamic. If you look attentively you’ll discover that the light elements within are actually shaped like the classic three-pointed star. It’s the minutiae, the minute obsessive details that make the S-Class so distinctive.
LED Lights
The headlights we have to talk about. Mercedes calls it DIGITAL LIGHT technology, and it will be standard for 2027. Instead of simply a few brilliant bulbs, each headlamp uses micro-LED technology with 25,000 individually-controlled pixels. So the car may actively sculpt the beam of light on the road.”
Imagine traveling along a pitch black country road. The high lights are on and you can see the road an amazing 1,968 feet in front of you . That ‘s over five football fields ! Suddenly a car comes the other way.
The S-Class doesn’t blind the other driver, it just turns off the exact pixels that are aimed at that automobile. The rest of the road is still well lit. Even the lights that swivel through the curves before you finish turning the steering wheel.
It’s like having a co-pilot whose only job is to hold a giant flashlight where you need to look.
Interior Cabin
You feel the opening of the stout, heavy door of an S-Class automobile. Inside it’s always been a work of art in leather, wood and metal. They took comfort levels to places we didn’t aware we needed them to be for 2027.”
Heated seatbelts. It sounds odd until you really feel it. On cold days, the front-seat belts are heated to a comfortable 111 degrees Fahrenheit (44 degrees Celsius). It literally seems like your car is giving you a warm hug on a frigid winter morning.
Then there’s the climate control. No more messing with the little plastic sliders on the air vents. The innovative Digital Vent Control system does that for you. You just tell the automobile where you want the air, by screen or voice, and little motors move the vents just right.
Also it features ENERGIZING AIR CONTROL system. It doesn’t just filter out the dust; it also actively monitors the outside pollution level and purifies the inside air in phases. If you’re stuck behind a smoky automobile in traffic, the S-Class lets you breathe nothing but clean fresh air.
The seats include strong massage functions, heating and cooling of course. And the P.A. ?system Or, there’s the Burmester 4D Surround Sound System with Dolby Atmos. It has built-in speakers right into the seats. You don’t hear the bass, you feel it in your back. “It’s like being in a concert hall at 150 miles an hour.”
Screens, screens, and even more screens
You can’t talk about a modern luxury car without talking about electronics. The S-Class 2027 is practically a supercomputer on wheels.The MBUX Superscreen takes center stage on the dashboard. Now this is standard equipment. There’s a huge 14.4-inch OLED screen right in the middle, flowing wonderfully into the central console.
The passenger has fun of his own. And there is a dedicated 12.3-inch display right in front of the passenger seat. They may view movies, stream shows or even play games on the go. The automobile is equipped with eye-tracking cameras for your safety. And if the driver tries to sneak a look at the passenger’s movie, the screen dims instantaneously so the driver can’t see it.
There is another 12.3-inch digital display right in front of the driver. You can choose a 3D version that makes it look like the gages and navigation charts are floating in mid-air. If you are being driven, the back seat is equally as tech-filled.
Rear passengers can hold Zoom video conversations with integrated cameras via two 13.1-inch screens as an optional MBUX High-End Rear Seat Entertainment System.
MB.OS
And all these screens run on a completely new basis called MB.OS (Mercedes-Benz Operating System).
Think of MB.OS as the car’s central brain. Older cars featured separate computers for the brakes, the radio, the engine, which didn’t talk to each other much. MB.OS is an intelligent ecosystem that integrates everything.
This technology is connected to the cloud, so your S-Class gets over-the-air upgrades much like your smartphone. In two years Mercedes may develop a new parking feature and your car will just download it overnight as it sits in your garage.
It also boasts the new MBUX Virtual Assistant, which is driven by generative AI. The voice instructions in cars used to suck. You have to talk like a robot and use correct words. Now you can just chat naturally. You inform the car that you are stressed and it could react by turning on the seat massage, decreasing the temperature of the cabin and playing relaxing music.
Power and speed
You never want the Mercedes S-Class to look too flashy. It should feel like a huge unseen hand, pushing you gently toward the horizon. Nice lineup of 2027 engines. There are three main flavors: The S 500 4MATIC sports a smooth turbocharged 3.0-liter inline-six.
The 48-volt mild hybrid makes 442 hp. That little electric push eliminates the turbo lag and increases the responsiveness. 4.3 seconds from zero to sixty. That’s fast for a 4,800-pound luxury boat. Muscle car S 580 4MATIC? Drive the S 580. That’s 530 hp and 553 lb-ft from a 4.0-liter twin-turbo V8.
It goes from 0-60mph in 3.9 seconds. Opt for this powerplant for easy highway supremacy. S 580e 4MATIC Plug-in Hybrid: Perhaps the smartest. Inline-six gets a potent electric motor and a 21.96 kWh battery. Together they make 576 horsepower. The kicker is you can run this big car on pure electricity for little about 60 miles (100 km) before the gas engine kicks in.
An EV quiets your daily drive, yet your cross country road journeys are fueled by the gas engine. All versions have grip in all situations, thanks to a fantastic 9-speed automatic transmission and 4MATIC all-wheel drive.
Riding on a cloud
Driving a big car is not easy. You want it incredibly soft over the bumps, but not rolling around like a boat while you’re going around a bend.Mercedes do this with their usual AIRMATIC air suspension. But this is 2027 so it’s a smarter than your run-of-the-mill suspension. It’s connected to the Mercedes Intelligent Cloud.
Say you are driving and a mile in front of you another Mercedes strikes a large pothole. That automobile transmits the alert to the cloud. That signal is heard by your S-Class, which actively softens the same wheel that’s going to hit the pothole before you get there. That’s real space age tech to prevent your coffee from spilling.
And then there is the steering. It’s hard to park a big car, isn’t it? Not this guy.Standard on the S-Class is rear-axle steering, which allows the back wheels to turn up to 4.5 degrees. If you go for the upgrade they can be up to 10 degrees. The rear wheels turn opposite the front wheels at low speed. That brings the car’s turning radius down to 35.4 feet from 39 feet.
Park this enormous limousine in a tight parking spot and it’s like parking a tiny hatchback. And speaking of parking, the MB.DRIVE system virtually parks itself. The automobile leverages AI to map curbs, lines, and other cars. The new 360-degree video system even provides rim protection warnings so you never scrape those costly rims on a steep curb.
MB.DRIVE ASSIST manages steering, speed and lane changes on the highway in most scenarios, making your lengthy road trips entirely stress-free.
A Rolling Fortress
Mercedes has always approached safety with a fanatical commitment. Besides conventional crash structures, this car uses its many sensors to safeguard you before a crash even happens.
It has up to 15 airbags throughout the inside. The most innovative are on the back end. Mercedes has integrated airbags directly into the rear seatbelts. In a catastrophic head on crash these belts expand to distribute the stress across the passengers chest, considerably decreasing the likelihood of injury.
And then there is the active safety package. It doesn’t simply beep at you, it jumps in. If it sees a car unexpectedly halting ahead, it prepares the brakes for maximum pressure. If you don’t respond in time, the Emergency Stop Function stops the automobile for you.
It even keeps an eye on you as you park. Exit Warning is included in the Blind Spot Assist Plus. If you’re parallel parked on a busy street and want to open your door but a bike is coming up in your blind spot, the inside ambient lighting glows red to alert you and prevent a tragic accident.
Create Your Own
The Manufaktur Program, If you’re spending this much on a car, you don’t want it to look like your neighbor’s. Mercedes is promoting their Made to Measure program for 2027. This goes beyond black, white, and silver. Over 150 exterior paint choices are available. Interior color possibilities are considerably more varied, with over 400. Make the car yours with custom leather upholstery, open-pore wood trims, and hand-crafted accents. It customizes the S-Class like ultra-exotic brands.
