McLaren Artura 2022 Review

Just as with many things -- even with car brands -- it happens that a name reminds us of particular characteristics of a brand and its heritage. Hearing “Ferrari” immediately calls to mind the brand’s fabulous twelve-cylinder engines and long and glorious racing history. Hearing “McLaren” will almost certainly conjure up fantastic frames with light structures and magical road-holding.

McLaren has an impressive heritage of ceaseless striving for racing perfection, but also of a series of characteristics and qualities that have brought the McLaren brand to the top among the producers of wonderful road supercars, and its newest model is no exception. The McLaren Artura is a new point of reference, the new “state of the art,” a formidable challenge for other manufacturers that won’t be easy to surpass.

In 1969, McLaren had already opened a new chapter, a new genre even, in the field of sports cars, the “supercars” with the M6GT. Certainly, a brand world-renowned for its racing victories can produce beautiful road cars equally world-renowned for beauty and performance. But a road car with power chassis characteristics and equal to a racing car, super-light and super-fast with its 265 km per hour and an acceleration (to 160 km/h in just 8 seconds) to make enthusiasts dream? That was simply unheard of. McLaren did not rest with that achievement. The F1 with the first carbon road frame, the MP4 with 600 HP and up to 8,500 rpm, a track-on-road engine.

Now with the Artura, McLaren reaffirms its position as a forerunner and an innovator in this sector by introducing its own technologies in a totally new vehicle. A new high-performance hybrid plug-in powertrain, a 3-liter, twin-turbo V6 engine with 120° cylinders no longer derived from other brands, but innovatively, totally McLaren. Combined with a light and compact axial flux E-motor, an entirely new carbon fiber and resin platform for advanced hybrid systems called McLaren Lightweight Architecture (MCLA), the Artura delivers a performance unquestionably at the height of all expectations. 671 HP, acceleration from 0 to 60 mph in 3 seconds, and ¼ miles in just 10.7 seconds. The 94 HP electric motor and the 7.4 kWh lithium-ion battery pack, in addition to allowing a range in electric mode of about 30 km, also function as the car’s reverse gear. There are myriad innovations and details featured in the Artura, all the result of McLaren technologies and too exhausting to list in this review, so we’ll focus primarily on the quality, aesthetics, and overall feel that NAVIS readers expect.

The aesthetics and general lines of the Artura bodywork are an essential component of the McLaren brand story, so it is essential to look more carefully at the finer details, like the sinuous, clean surfaces with divisions of the bodywork pieces designed to simplify production and assembly. Here we see the slimmer head and taillights, while the seats of oval, very elongated, lenticular shapes integrate perfectly with the lines of the bodywork, as in the rear with the final lip of the large engine hood, the side panel, both in front, where the air press of the intercoolers and the seat of the headlight create a very distinctive formal group. The large, lateral air press includes the handle of its classic, vertically-opening door in the upper lip. The front, which includes a small trunk of about 150 liters, has the cooling air inlet limited at the bottom by a spoiler, which also laterally integrates the radar sensors for distance control. In addition to the carbon monocoque structure, all the body panels are of the same material, and inside the cabin, there are different points with visible carbon, allowing you to appreciate not only the high-tech, racing spirit of the car but also the quality of its build. Just as we find the carbon spoiler in front, the rear diffuser’s shape integrates with the entire black rear grouping of perforated elements to channel away the heat of the mechanics, the license plate housing, and the two large exhaust pipes.