2021 Cadillac Escalade vs Mercedes-Benz GLS // $100,000 SUV Kings Face Off

Mine's pretty long dude, mine's huge, it's no bigger than mine, yeah well I have a weird curve and I didn't even count the curve, okay show me, look, it's like 39 inches, it's pretty big . You're looking at the throttle heads. I'm Thomas and James and I was talking to James the other day and we realized that being a pimp is not easy, but with vehicles like these maybe it could be the new escalation, unapologetic, monstrous, with a presence on the road that could make a g- class blush, I would say no prisoners taken, but in reality it can take quite a bit because for this year it is now the most expansive

escalade

but longer, bigger, with more legroom and today we have it in your more expensive platinum sport finish. has taken a different approach, the heart of the gls is in the s class name, meaning that today this big bruiser not only needs to show us that it can take down a climb, but also that it has the meat to live up to the hype.

We claim to be the SUV version of one of the most luxurious cars on the planet. We do car reviews, track tests and lots of nonsense, so subscribe and ring the bell. This is the 580. That means it has a four-liter twin-turbo V8. which makes 483 horsepower and 516 pound-feet of torque and an additional 184 pound-feet of torque and 21 horsepower from an eq boost starter alternator and I won't hear any arguments from James because for a hundred and thirty thousand dollars this auto is far superior in a straight line to the james

escalade

5 700 lbs and 0-60 in 5.3 seconds and makes it smoother due to the turbos and the starter alternator aspect eq boost is not about anything at 60 times and six seconds for something that weighs 6,000 pounds it's not bad and it's also a 6.2 liter American naturally aspirated v8, not the terse four liter twin turbo v8 it's on, it actually sounds very significant when I say how strong, okay, This power plant is not very elegant, but it is very American.

It has 6.2 liters. It is all a matter of displacement. It moves a little in the corners, but when I put my foot down, it has forcefulness, but the forcefulness may not be enough for the climb. reign supreme and Thomas beckoned me to explain why Mercedes thinks it has is in the bag, okay, the new gls embodies confidence and luxury intelligence like no other vehicle says wave kelanius is like a high level guy at daimler sounds like if i were at the top of the roman senate yes, it also says here this is a quote this is the s-class of suvs, that's true, that makes it sound like it's a metaphor, but it's

mercedes

saying yes, no one uses the s kind of things well, like if you say there's a rolls-royce of something or I don't know. a

cadillac

of something p51

cadillac

of the skies, that's a good point, yeah, and as far as cadillac goes, this is the escalade, so it's the king of the cadillacs and this is the platinum sport trim, so which is standard with air suspension, fourth generation magnetic suspension control gun.

It's the solid rear axle, we now have independent suspension, so it should ride like a dream, except it doesn't handle its mass very well and doesn't lean like you'd expect, even though it makes the whole truck look like it moves like the of a car, but when it comes to impacts or small impacts and bumps, you can feel the sensations through the cabin in a way that is not entirely perfect and when we compare it to something like a gls, which apparently is the s. -SUV class, that's where it's going to fall because I'm sure Thomas is having the best ride of his life right now hmm, let me explain, generally a car sits on springs, but next to them or between them there is a shock absorber or shock absorber. and what that does is smooth out the ride and keep it controlled, generally what you want to do is match the spring rate to the damping rate so that you don't have any unwanted body movement, that's not really the case here, it's well in comfort mode which the default is when you get in it's wet and damp and never settles and then over the side bumps you just keep going back and forth and it's really annoying, it's very smooth but not well controlled so that you put it in sport mode or in my case.

I'm going to put it in individual mode because I want the transmission and transmission to be in normal condition, but I want the sport suspension to stiffen it up and what that does is make the car handle pretty well in the corners that it handles. Its mass is perfect, it's really easy to drive, except when you hit a hard bump it sends a shock wave or vibration through the entire SUV, so you get a really soft, wallowy suspension or strong vibrations, it's just not not an s class nor an s- Class, we have driven many of them, many generations of them, in fact, they are beautiful, this is not as refined as that, smooth, yes, S Class, smooth, no, but if you want, you can get even more technology, you can get the crazy Mercedes. cornering suspension, which is called e-active body control and I would like to think that this car with active body control would solve all my problems with handling and this could potentially be one of the best handling large SUVs out there. has ever existed.

You can also buy it, it has the eq boost starter alternator which is generally great for not only all the auxiliary power but also gives you a really smooth start to stop. This doesn't seem to have it, it's just a normal start stop system. where it drags you to a really hard stop and then when you start again the engine starts up quite dramatically and honestly it's impossible to drive it smoothly so you have to turn it off but then it doesn't remember that you turned it off so the Next time you come in it happens again, that's annoying.

I know I'm being very critical of these cars and honestly, if you were a person who had never driven a modern Mercedes and you got into this, you would think it was amazing because it's an amazing car, the technology is crazy, but having driven a Class S, which by the way is the same price as this, is just not at that level, so the climb is powerful, it's imposing, it's big, but I just want to go. See what that GLS is like real quick, so Thomas will remember this. I'm going to get on it and then we'll talk about the design.

Well, it drives better than this one, yes, first of all it has more power. everything yes and it drives smaller, it addresses the fact that it is giant better than the escalade. I would say yes, it's not that giant. No, it still doesn't do it perfectly. And you're right, I understand what you're saying about coming to a comfortable stop mode just isn't what makes this car comfortable it never stops, yes individual mode is better, yes I remember the x7. It was a while ago that we drove it to be fair, but I remember a lot that it drove better than this one in terms of suspension.

I remember that I didn't exactly have any problems with the ex, so we would have to back up to the bathroom to be sure, yes, but of these three I would say the x7 I think is probably the best anyway what do you think of the look of this I think is harmless. I think they could have made it more of a flagship car. Well, this is the same company that makes the G-class, which is one of the most iconic vehicles of all time and also has the greatest presence on the road. Any vehicle, I think, on the road next to a Cullinan, maybe this addresses what it's more like, I would say, but this is like it's not just under the G truck and the road presence, it's way down.

Below, very below, I think it looks like a bigger one. gle and like an infinity qx80 but an s class looks like a bigger e class and an e class looks like just part of the russian doll syndrome well that's a bigger problem with

mercedes

so I guess so the escalation on this . awesome red like we always say the masters have the sore red crystal which is like the best red on the market this has to be out there it's beautiful yeah it's a stupid name okay it's infrared like infrared like infrared light so by definition It's the red that humans come and that we can't see, yes, so this is invisible, but I know I can see it, I know, I swear, I can see it.

I can also see the displaced shark fin which now that we mentioned in the last video bothers a lot of people because you keep noticing it. I still notice it now. Why isn't it in the middle? We also said this wasn't a bad looking car. No, we like it, I like it, we like it, I think. Everyone in the video seems a little boring to some people, but in real life you have to understand that it is also like a condo building, it is like it is maximizing all the square meters it has, so how original can the design?

Yes because the interior is huge it's huge inside and this is the short one so this is not the esv this is the correct one so yes it is visually better proportioned on the side I think it wasn't the badge either monochromatic cadillac. the other one was, I prefer these colors are starting to look like data, so you can choose that option, I think so, interesting, yes, I like this better, no, it's more, it's the cadillac symbol, it's a cadillac symbol , it's out of fashion. but the rest no, no, they modernized it, it is not offensive, it is less vulgar, do you agree?

Tint aside though, yeah, this has more road presence if the point of this is what is most things besides this, oh yeah, right, yeah. you see a convoy of glasses stop somewhere yeah, it doesn't look like that if you see a convoy of this it's like it's a military operation yeah, that's the president yeah exactly yeah it's like oh wow when the football ends yeah, let's see if the interior can at least live up to s class okay ah this is a gle interior i knew you were going to say that right away because its not and this is not an s class interior james its a gle interior, a t-elite interior is not the same as an e class, the e class still has the flowing lines surrounding the doors, that's the old e class, although well yeah, we haven't seen the new new class e, I don't think we've seen it in person, we've seen pictures of it properly, anyway, the interior of an S class is a whole level above this, you have the fluidity, the leathers are hand-stitched and everything is anything else. options you can get, you can get a better headliner and this one doesn't have Burmester's high-end sound system, no, so you don't get the little tweeters that spin in such a dramatic way, what you get is some plastic mustang on Yes, it's interesting that you mentioned the Mustang because the leathers here seem to elude the Challenger, it looks honestly visually, this is one of the most beautiful interiors, I think it's on sale, yes, it's not noisy, everything works perfectly, we love the way these thumb buttons work on the steering wheel, yes the size of the screen and as we have discovered it is not as long as the escalator, yes much smoother but it's my ego, It's still significant, but this is very nice.

Set of technology that I have become accustomed to after owning about five Mercedes press cars. I will say that these seats are wonderful, they are quite nice, although the headrests are a little hard, but you can grip the cushions in the back. No you can't because they are attached in a I'll show you but anyway the ambient lighting here is next level and it's super adjustable although I have no idea how to approach the ambient lighting it's super confusing but I love the head-up display, right, it's really aggressive, it's crazy, it's like a minority report that delivers like the best weapon, it's amazing and you can change it, oh, you can change it, you can adjust everything, actually, everything that's on The gauge cluster can be put in the headers. adjustable display screen is fantastic really is this yes the steering wheel just the s class steering wheel is wonderful it is better it is better this is an e class steering wheel this is not g at least they could have done that that I admit, on this, this one is pretty toned down as for the colors of the options like this is the gray wood and yes, yes, you can hear a little more.

I'm not knocking this interior because it's great it really is yeah you just want it to be more but I want it to be an s class but if you look at the power numbers or the size number if you think of this as a line with three rows, well, I don't have to think about it like that because that's what it is, but if one were two, that's fine, it's not that different in price, you're not paying huge S class differences, so it's just a market if you consider it only as a marketing game and you need three rows and a good comfortable SUV.

I'm thinking of it just as a marketing play because that's what it is. Oh, they've done a good job, this has options, not with the captain's chairs, this is with the three seats in the middle, that's right, yes, and these seats are fine, they're comfortable enough and they come with some little pillows , there are much more than those on the ladder yes, yes, that is true, but they are not that far apart. This way or vertically to the right we make this beautiful sunroof, in addition, everything is electric, all seats go up and down automatically, everything is nice, it fulfills the task of being a great family SUV, yes, it squeaks, I was hoping you wouldn't be to push because noI wanted to have to point out one.

I have to be honest visually. It looks incredibly modern. I really like it. Beautiful. Like these. All. No. The design of this is fantastic. That and I respect it enormously. It's beautiful here, but let's go look at the climb because they've done some good things and they've done some good things, but before we do that I just did a quick test of all the seats in both vehicles without the captain's seat setup, accessing the Third row of the gls was not very easy and when I got back there, although headroom was fine, legroom was very tight for my 5ft 10in bionic frame on the ladder, the passenger seats had a lot space with the driver's seat in my driving position and things get even better as you move to the third row where both have adequate legroom. and head room, but with a little more play time I discovered that the Escalade is not without its problems, so I sat in the back, yes, and in the Escalade, the rear third row is much more comfortable .

I did, yes, I noticed that. It's a much bigger vehicle but also the Mercedes has so many buttons that electronically move the seats, yes you can lower all the seats from the back and you can also squish yourself and this is all more analogue, okay except it does. You have a button, okay, which is very strange and aggressive. Are you ready? I'm afraid to do it again. Why are you waiting? Why would you do what we are talking about? Oh my gosh, you see it hit the screen and then you bring it back. up and well, this side doesn't touch the screen, but if you leave it in that position, do it again.

I don't want to do this, wait, this is a test car, do it again, look at that, oh my God, oh God. God, I know that was me and I was being silly, but there are kids that get in these cars, yeah, and they play, yeah, all they do is push the button and smash, this is a really nice ski, it's a screen very pretty, I don't want to hurt you. I want it to hold up well, so it's a ridiculous piece of engineering, so you have to push this back each time manually, even then it still comes very close, yeah, and most of the time it just knocks it a little bit, this is In the driving position, yes. ah, 39 inches of beautiful curves, curved screen, those are some of the running boards that go up again, which you love, it's like an airplane, that's two screens and a couple of spicy wings less than a sports bar here, it which is perfect because it's a great American vote, you had to have prepared that joke, you had 100, okay, okay, anyway, this is what I like about this, it's that, but simpler, no, you don't feel that you just left the high range.

The German car does worse, this doesn't feel perfectly competitive and the thing is it has more features and more stuff inside, but I feel like Cadillac maybe didn't work out, let's make ours simpler intentionally, probably just I didn't put a lot more into this, but it was a lot for your benefit, but there are some neat things like augmented reality that I still don't think I would ever use, it's fun and it works a lot of fun and instead of having your gauge cluster sitting there while you drive, It's fun to have a digital readout of what's happening.

You know, the fun thing about real augmented reality is that what it looks like is the real world, but with the structure slider on Instagram going. all the way to the right, so maybe that's why we like it young enough so it looks better, but we need it and then also the voice command. This one actually has a return command. I don't remember that in the last one. You mean there's a microphone back there, so when they talk, yeah, it goes through here too? Oh yeah, it's not that long, like that's cool, but come on, they're literally six feet away, yeah, the next thing they're going to be like uh, what do bats do with sonar? oh, uh, sonar, no, it's called uh, echolocation, echolocation, they'll do it, yeah, science boom, um, okay, so this one has this is one updated to the last yeah, this is the platinum sport instead of just the sport we participated in last time so we have some fun things oh they have uh this like chilled is a cooler is a cooler is a cooler cup holder heated and cooled more exciting though more exciting more exciting wow, we have the Akg system of 36 speakers and I'm sure it's absolutely legendary, no I have problems with it, it's great, it really is great, yeah it's not that loud, oh it's probably louder than most people need to hear but if you really want to. to rock, it doesn't sound that loud, okay, those speakers have been buzzing a little bit, like if you mean the real thing, it's playing, yeah, it's very interesting in certain images, like the bag, and then one thing that I don't know if this is like a compliment to the sound system which is a bit creepy for a second, yeah I don't know if it's a compliment to the sound system or something negative for the head-up display, okay but when you get to any part of the bass of the song, any bass note, it shakes the head up display, so I don't know if it's like oh, this base is amazing, look how it shakes the head up display, everything or it's like this should have made it better, yeah, That's right, but the experience is not that. different here it feels bigger here it looks more spacious and it's bigger we have a nice glass just like the s class s gls yeah well I don't know I know you'll kill me if you do that yeah you know , if we comment on Mercedes, we have to comment on this which is just as squeaky, and I will say that the leather here is, in my opinion, my humble opinion, better than the leather on that Mercedes, except for the steering wheel that does whatever which feels a little low yeah but that steering wheel isn't as nice as the leather you find on some s class models but there's also more theater to the steering wheel yeah it's got like the wood inlay and chrome oh , it's nice, that's it, it's very good, I really like this interior and I think it's exactly where the staircase should be for the modern era, yes, they've got it absolutely right, be honest, do you really need it? a third row, are you buying one of these because they are the most important vehicles on the road?

If that's the case then get the climb, it seems more honest about what is said if you want a mercedes suv and not You don't really need a third row, the gle with the e-active driving control doesn't feel like a lower class for the same money, yes the escalade achieves better climbing than the gls achieves an s class and by that I mean it accommodates nausea. Instagram influence level expressions used on Cadillac's website to sell it better than the S-class. It does things like how confidence is an expression of power and how it gives you the freedom to grow your ever-expanding legend, like what removes lint and remains a solid. passenger vehicle just one that doesn't match the smoothness and refinement of the gls or the x7 but fortunately escalade buyers no longer care because, as cadillac itself says, its power to attract those around you has never been greater than Does that mean something good?

I don't know you.