First ride: 2021 Mercedes-Benz EQS prototype review

The all-new EQS is hugely significant as Mercedes-Benz’s new flagship luxury saloon and the first model based on its Electric Vehicle Architecture (EVA) platform.

The German manufacturer’s first three EQ electric models (the Mercedes-Benz EQC SUV, EQV MPV and EQA crossover) use adapted versions of conventional platforms, making the EQS the first ground-up Mercedes EV.

Holger Enzmann, who heads the EQS test programme, calls it “a new beginning” – and now we’ve had our first taste in a near-production prototype.

The aluminium-intensive EVA platform is key to the distinctive shape of the EQS, with its smoothly surfaced body also made exclusively from the metal. The differences from combustion-engined Mercedes are clear, with an optional panel ‘grille’ featuring small three-pointed star motifs and a new bonnet giving it a distinctly new-world look.

You can’t help noting the sheer size and presence of the EQS as you approach it. At 5210mm long, it is only slightly shorter than the long-wheelbase Mercedes-Benz S-Class, and with 21in wheels our test car looks much bolder than in the photos.

You enter through large frameless doors, revealing an interior that blends traditional design elements with new high- tech ones, including Mercedes’ Hyperscreen dashboard, which groups three expansive digital screens and most of the EQS’s controls within a single panel.

The EQS has an extremely long wheelbase of 3200mm, making it more commodious than even the S-Class, helped by a near-flat floor without a central transmission tunnel. It is impressively lavish, too, with high-grade materials and excellent build quality fully befitting the EQS’s upmarket positioning.

It has a new driveline featuring AC synchronous motors from Bosch. Buyers will have two options: a 329bhp single-motor, rear-wheel drive set-up in the EQS 400 or a 516bhp dual-motor, four-wheel- drive set-up in the EQS 580. Our prototype ride comes in the more powerful model.