Mercedes-Benz GLE400e Review

by Sean Loo, 1 July 2026

The Mercedes-Benz GLE400e, while getting on a bit in age, still proves that adding a bigger battery pack isn’t just a novel concept.

Just a few years ago, buying a luxury SUV was wonderfully uncomplicated.

If you wanted something that could climb a mountain before dropping the children off at school, you bought a Range Rover. If driving mattered above everything else, the BMW X5 was the obvious answer. And if you simply wanted to waft from one end of the country to the other wrapped in leather, wood and an enormous three-pointed star, Mercedes-Benz had you covered.

Today, things are rather less straightforward. Every premium manufacturer has an SUV. Most have several. Some promise sports car handling. Others boast limousine comfort. A few would have you believe they’re ready to tackle the Dakar Rally despite spending their entire lives shuttling between office basements and supermarket car parks.

The Mercedes-Benz GLE doesn’t seem particularly interested in playing that game.

It doesn’t shout about Nürburgring lap times. It isn’t covered in fake vents or oversized spoilers. Nor does it try to convince you that a two-and-a-half-tonne luxury SUV is secretly a sports car. It simply gets on with the job of being a Mercedes-Benz.

The GLE badge itself is relatively young, having replaced the ML-Class nomenclature in 2015. But make no mistake, this is a bloodline that stretches back nearly three decades. The original M-Class arrived in 1997, long before premium SUVs became the default family car of choice, and helped lay the foundations for a segment that is now one of the industry’s most fiercely contested.

Mercedes-Benz will happily remind you that it invented the luxury SUV. BMW and Volvo owners may disagree over dinner, but there is no denying Stuttgart has played a significant role in shaping what buyers expect from this class.

The second-generation GLE, launched in 2019 and updated in 2023, feels like the culmination of all those years of experience.

Curves in places

Walk around one in the flesh and you quickly realise Mercedes-Benz has resisted the temptation to over-style it. There are no exaggerated character lines slicing through the bodywork, no impossibly large kidney grilles attempting to inhale small wildlife, and no unnecessary aerodynamic flourishes pretending to work.

The facelift subtly sharpens what was already a handsome design. The grille is slightly more upright, the headlamps are slimmer, while the revised bumpers lend the car a cleaner, more contemporary appearance without fundamentally changing its character.

Its proportions also work remarkably well. Yes, this is a large SUV, stretching beyond five metres in length, yet clever surfacing prevents it from appearing cumbersome. From certain angles, particularly the rear three-quarter view, there’s even a touch of elegance about it. It feels like it was designed to age gracefully.

Of course, if subtlety isn’t your thing, Mercedes will happily sell you an AMG version complete with larger wheels, more aggressive styling and enough exhaust theatrics to wake an entire neighbourhood. But personally, I think the standard GLE gets the balance just about right.

Exactly where a Mercedes should excel

Open the door and the GLE reminds you exactly where your money has gone. This is somewhere you’ll want to spend time in.

The dashboard is dominated by two integrated 12.3-inch displays stretching across almost half the cabin. Even several years after its introduction, it still feels modern, avoiding the trap of looking like someone simply glued an iPad onto the dashboard.

The graphics are sharp, animations remain smooth, and Mercedes’ MBUX operating system is among the better infotainment systems currently available.

Although, like every Mercedes these days, there is perhaps a little too much of it.

There are countless display themes, ambient lighting combinations, configurable instrument layouts and menu options. Spend an afternoon exploring everything, and you’ll probably discover functions you never knew existed.

Most owners will settle on a layout during the first week of ownership and never touch it again.

What impressed more was how the cabin felt. The leather is beautifully finished. The open-pore wood trim actually looks like wood rather than laminated plastic. The dashboard materials are rich, tactile and reassuringly solid. Almost everything, anyway.

Mercedes still insists on fitting rather flimsy indicator and gear selector stalks that feel oddly out of place in a car costing this much. It’s one of those peculiar Mercedes traits that has somehow survived several generations of cars.

Likewise, I’m still not entirely convinced by the touch-sensitive steering wheel controls.

They certainly look futuristic. Unfortunately, they also have an annoying habit of interpreting your thumb brushing past them as a deliberate input, meaning you occasionally find yourself activating a function you had absolutely no intention of using.

Sometimes, an ordinary button really is the better solution.

Thankfully, Mercedes has resisted following certain rivals down the route of burying every single vehicle function inside the touchscreen.

Adjusting the climate control still doesn’t require navigating through three layers of menus, and after spending time in cars that insist on digitising absolutely everything, that alone deserves quiet applause.

Built for the long haul

If the front seats are where Mercedes reminds you of its luxury credentials, the rear seats are where it reminds you why people keep buying SUVs in the first place.

The GLE was stretched by 80mm between the wheels when this generation arrived, and Mercedes clearly spent every one of those millimetres wisely. Rear passengers enjoy acres of legroom, generous headroom and enough shoulder space that three adults won’t immediately begin negotiating over elbow territory.

The seats themselves are broad and supportive, while the backrests recline just enough to make longer journeys noticeably more relaxing. Combined with the GLE’s hushed cabin, it’s the sort of place where passengers tend to fall asleep before you’ve even cleared the city limits.

Storage is equally well thought out. Large door bins swallow oversized water bottles without complaint, the centre armrest hides additional storage, and USB-C charging ports are scattered throughout the cabin.

The standard GLE offers 630 litres of luggage capacity, expanding to over 2,000 litres with the rear seats folded. The GLE400e, however, asks for a small compromise.

Because the plug-in hybrid battery lives beneath the boot floor, luggage space drops to 490 litres. It’s still perfectly usable for everyday family duties, but more significantly, the third row of seats available in other GLE variants disappears entirely.

The luxury of doing absolutely nothing

There are cars that encourage you to attack every corner. The GLE is not one of them, and thank goodness for that.

Too many manufacturers have become obsessed with convincing us their luxury SUVs handle like sports saloons. Stiffer suspension. Sharper steering. Bigger wheels. Sportier this. Dynamic that.

The GLE knows exactly what it is. A large, heavy luxury SUV. Instead of trying to disguise its size, Mercedes simply leans into it.

Standard air suspension helps enormously here. Broken tarmac, expansion joints and poorly repaired roads are absorbed with an effortlessness that reminds you why air suspension became the benchmark for luxury cars in the first place.

It doesn’t float in the old-fashioned sense. There’s still enough body control to stop the car feeling like an overinflated waterbed, but impacts arrive softened, rounded and quietly dismissed before they ever become intrusive.

Even riding on large alloy wheels, the GLE manages to isolate its occupants from the worst Singapore’s roads can throw at it.

More impressive still is how quiet everything remains. Wind noise is exceptionally well suppressed, even when rocking highway speeds. Tyre roar barely intrudes into the cabin, while the suspension never crashes over imperfections in the way some rivals occasionally do.

There are moments when you glance down at the speedometer and realise you’re travelling considerably faster than you thought.

Not because the GLE encourages speed. It simply isolates you from it.

This is a car that seems happiest covering long distances with minimal fuss, the kilometres disappearing almost unnoticed as conversations continue at little more than a whisper.

Does it drive like a Mercedes?

Yes. But perhaps not the Mercedes some people expect.

The standard GLE isn’t designed to entertain in the same way as a Porsche Cayenne or even a BMW X5. Push it into a series of bends and you’ll quickly become aware that this is still a substantial SUV weighing well over two tonnes. Physics, as always, has the final word.

There’s noticeable body movement through tighter corners, and although grip levels remain impressively high, the GLE never encourages you to drive it with unnecessary enthusiasm.

Instead, it asks another question: “Why are you in such a hurry?”

Oddly enough, after a few hours behind the wheel, you begin asking yourself exactly the same thing. The steering is light without feeling vague, visibility is excellent for something this size, and despite its generous proportions, the GLE never feels intimidating to manoeuvre.

Mercedes has done an excellent job making a very large SUV feel surprisingly manageable.

The plug-in hybrid makes sense, but is rough

For years, plug-in hybrids have felt like an answer to a question nobody was asking, but the GLE400e shifts that goalpost directly in front of you.

Its 2.0-litre turbocharged petrol engine is paired with an electric motor producing a combined 375hp and 650Nm of torque, while a usable battery capacity of around 25kWh allows for an official electric-only driving range of about 100km (WLTP).

For many owners, it’s enough to complete the daily commute, school run and evening errands without waking the petrol engine at all. Charge it overnight, drive electrically during the week, and save the petrol engine for longer weekend journeys.

Around town, the electric motor is smooth, quiet and effortlessly responsive. Like most electric cars, maximum torque arrives almost instantly, making urban driving feel wonderfully relaxed.

There is, however, one characteristic I never completely warmed to.

Pull away from a standstill and the GLE occasionally lunges forward with more enthusiasm than expected. It’s hardly dramatic, but in slow-moving traffic, it can make smooth progress slightly more difficult than it ought to be.

Likewise, the transition between electric and petrol power isn’t always completely seamless. Occasionally, particularly when demanding sudden acceleration, you’ll feel the combustion engine joining the party with slightly less grace than the rest of the drivetrain.

These aren’t deal-breakers, but simply reminders that even the best plug-in hybrids are still trying to blend two very different power sources into one cohesive driving experience.

Overall, Mercedes has done a commendably good job. It has built a plug-in hybrid with enough electric range to genuinely change the way owners use the car.

That’s a far bigger achievement than simply posting an impressive laboratory fuel consumption figure.

Technical Specifications