Land Rover Defender 130 2024 long-term test

At 5358mm long (including the spare wheel), the Defender 130 is a big car by any standard – longer than the standard-wheelbase Range Rover and the Land Rover Discovery 5, whose toes I think it treads on, feeling as it does like a car made for adventures and as an accommodating family wagon.

Our Outbound had five seats, but a Defender can seat more with the optional third row. And while it can go places that most drivers could scarcely imagine, it’s also exceptionally smooth and refined when covering long distances. The next Discovery will get a different slant to differentiate it better, I hear.

Long-distance cruising, more than plunging into the wilderness, is how I’m almost embarrassed to say I used this car. Almost but not quite, because I did take it green-laning when the opportunity arose and I carried enough horse feed around during the past few months to create a sizeable haystack. Snowy the pony would be thinner if it wasn’t for this Defender.

The D300 is a 3.0-litre straight-six mild-hybrid diesel making 296bhp, driving through an eight-speed automatic gearbox. There are no shift paddles, but you can take control via the stick. I rarely did. I never needed the low range, occasionally put the suspension into a high mode and rarely touched the Terrain Response system.

That’s a bit like getting a supercar and just doing a little messing around on a track day, but it’s better than not using what it can do at all, as is the fate of a lot of 4x4s.

I can take some comfort from the fact that although this is a large car, it needn’t be that consumptive if driven well. Its aerodynamics are the biggest obstruction to good economy, and the faster one goes, the more drag it creates.

So if you routinely cruise at fast motorway speeds, it can burn fuel at closer to 30mpg than the nearer 40mpg that I got by deciding to chill out and maintain a speed in the 60s rather than the 70s. It’s more efficient at a relaxed cruise than in town too.

Trying really hard on one journey, I managed to push it past 50mpg – although I will confess that upon entering my nearest town, I stopped to snap a pic of the trip computer before it dipped back into the 40s.

The 130 didn’t need any AdBlue during its time here, so I can’t tell you what consumption of that is like, and nor did it need a service, so I can’t comment on the dealer experience. But it did receive a security update that necessitated a very nice man coming round to plug a laptop into it, which I’m told disables the ‘can bus’ if the car is deadlocked.

If you have a similar car, you can expect a call from JLR Assist to arrange it. And bar one low tyre pressure warning (an accurate one) and an occasional refusal to pair my iPhone with the infotainment to activate Apple CarPlay, which nearly all cars do from time to time, nothing else troubled me.

I sometimes wonder what I’d buy to drive day in, day out, if I had a proper job. The Defender makes it on to the shortest of shortlists.

Second Opinion

The 130 moved my partner and me into our first house so effortlessly and capably that what should have been an obscenely stressful day was one of the most enjoyable. It’s effectively a warehouse that you can take across the Cairngorms and then leave outside the Co-op. I was pretty happy with 27mpg too, before Matt beat it by almost 100%. I miss it every day.

Felix Page

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Love it:

Set up for success Driving position is commanding and forward visibility is excellent, helping to make the Defender an exceptionally relaxing drive.

Easy to banish ADAS Its ADAS are among the more unobtrusive, but a push of a single steering wheel button to enable or disable them is great.

Space to spare The 130’s rear accommodation is really generous. Unsurprising, of course, but the seats are big and give you a good view out.

Still looking good The Defender is ageing nicely. It takes enough cues from the old one that you know what it is without veering into retro. 

Loathe it:

Urban sprawl At 5358mm long, it’s not easy to park and overhangs some bays. At least there’s a great all-round camera and huge wing mirrors.

Final mileage: 11,591

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Life with a Land Rover Defender 130: Month 3

Even when the Defender is working hard, it makes sure you don’t have to - 28 August

My local area isn't served well for byways. But there is one nearby, next to a busy hobbyists' airfield and just off a route I drive often, which means it's a quick and easy diversion to get a cup of tea while being buzzed by parachutists, and then to head for a chilled spot of green-laning

The byway isn't all that long and it's not overly challenging, at least in the warmer months when it's open. (It's closed from November to March as it would be easily damaged when wet. Even earlier this summer I avoided it for that reason.)

So it's not going to trouble a Land Rover Defender but it is a good opportunity to test some of the car's systems.

The 'off-road' screen on the central display is particularly good, I think - showing how compressed or extended each suspension corner is, the angle of the front wheels, and whether the centre or rear differentials have needed to lock.

'Not often' will be the state in most Defender use cases. Very much useful in any kinds of terrain, though, are the all-round cameras, which can show close-ups of individual corners and even a virtual look underneath the car.

This is not a live camera angle but one based on what the cameras saw on approach to its current position.

When it comes to placing the Defender precisely where you want it, even on modest green lanes that will give you no more than a wet boot if you step out of the vehicle, the camera view is great for steering around, rather than into, objects like rocks or tree stumps. I know from previous experience that in very serious off-road situations it's

invaluable for placing the tyres where you need to. Did I need to raise the ride height? No, but it probably kept the underside of the car cleaner. Did I need to engage low ratio? No, so I didn't bother.

If this sounds like I've taken a Ferrari to a track day and then pootled around it at no more than 4000pm before sitting with a coffee and looking at it beaming with pride, then, well, probably guilty as charged.

But I take what limited opportunities I get. And it comes out the other end with some grime on the flanks, so it at least looks like I've tried.

Love it

Bump proof

All-round cameras are also great for reversing into car park bays – this is a wide, long car

Loathe it

Black ops

Very personal, but black wheels are sufficiently not my thing that I’ll get them and keep them dirty.

Mileage: £11,100

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Gary and his laptop go places that an over-the-air update simply can’t - 14 August

A nice man arrives one morning after a few phone calls and an "I'm half an hour away" text to carry out what has variously been described as an 'update' and a 'recall' to the Land Rover Defender 130.

Most of its updates happen over the air, but not this one, which requires plugging in a diagnostic laptop to a 16-pin socket in the driver's footwell, because it's a security update. It disables the 'can bus' when the car is locked, to make it harder to steal.

Gary says theft isn't a Land Rover-specific problem but is an issue for all premium car makers, so updates/recalls/whatever like this are just part of the game of cat and mouse with increasingly sophisticated criminals.

I wondered if a lot of pinched cars end up in Russia, given sanctions mean they can't officially be sold there (though some unscrupulous neighbouring countries are experiencing a curiously unexpected sales volume boost), but I'm told the UAE is a more typical end point.

The job of reinforcing this Defender starts at 0825hr and is all done by 0835hr, after a couple of checks that the windows still work; the update occasionally upsets a few supplementary systems, necessitating a second reboot, but all is well here.

While the work's being done, I'm also advised not to use a Land Rover Remote app - which I had to download as part of the insurance requirements - to lock the car if I've inadvertently left the keys inside it (if, say, I remember while standing in line at a filling station).

The app won't then unlock it, and my keys will be inside, which is suboptimal. Duly noted. Anyway, 10 minutes after Gary arrives, he's on his way again and the Defender feels no different to me but is more secure. Happy days.

I thought I might have to wait longer so I've been clearing and tidying the car up while the update has been happening.

A colleague might need to use it without much notice, and handing over a filthy car to somebody important is seldom advisable. And yet the Outbound spec is a rufty-tufty lifestyley variant so I've been trying to use it like one as much as possible and have a boot sullied by hay and horse feed.

So I pull the brushable, hoseable, rubber mat onto the floor and set about it. It has a small flap too, which can have a dual purpose of protecting the bumper if you're loading a potentially scratchy object into the boot or, more likely, protecting you from grime on the bumper if you're sitting on the boot lip to change your wellies. The front and rear footwells have similarly utilitarian mats.

Incidentally, inside the boot lip is a button that can lower or raise the cars ride height while stationary to boot floor, which is good if the boot is full, and there's also a storage cubby in the door that would be handy for hi-vis vests, or cleaning kit, gloves, dog leads, whatever.

JLR may well think of itself as a luxury design house these days, but credit to the designers and engineers who still think of utility things like this in a car like this. It's an expensive wagon, certainly, but still an exceptionally useful one.

I've yet to tow anything with this Defender - there's an electrically deploying towbar and you have no idea at all that it's there when it's stowed - but having pulled stuff with them before, I know they are terrific at it. I'll have to think of a reason to try it.

Meantime, I get back into the tidied, and now apparently more secure, driver's seat of one of the most practical and easygoing cars on the market, and have it melt into my life as easily as it ever does.

Love it

Utility belter

So many cubbies and pockets that none of my car cleaning gear rattles around the cabin.

Loathe it

Knee-jerk questions

People asking me if it has broken (no) or been nicked (obviously not).

Mileage: 10,700

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Life with a Land Rover Defender 130: Month 2

Economy is more impressive than you might think - 31 July

I did it. Not for long, and it took motorway cruising at a leisurely pace and treating the throttle like there was a hamster loose in the footwell, but still, I did it: averaging 52mpg for more than 50 miles, between Bracknell and Bicester. You can’t keep it up once junctions arrive but, still, I’m impressed.

Mileage: 10,017

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Accurate tyre readouts are handy - 17 July

The tyre pressure monitor threw up a warning and has incredibly accurate readouts for the current pressure, plus recommended settings. All tyres were slightly under recommended, presumably deliberately set that way, with the rear right flagging lower still. I pumped them all to their recommended setting and they have all stayed that way since.

Mileage: 10,479

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Our go-anywhere, do-anything 4x4 is finally taken out of its comfort zone. Or is it? - 10 July

Matt Prior texts me a couple of hours after I tried to call him. "I missed you. You’ll want something,” he says. Offended by his unwarranted(ish) cynicism, I reply that I only wanted to offer him a week or two in my Abarth 500e, because I know how much of a fan of small cars he is. “When do you need the Defender?” comes the blunt reply.

Ah, now there’s a thought. I had completely forgotten you were running the van-backed 130, Matt, but now you mention it, I do have two sofas, some desks and a chest of drawers that need collecting. Oh, and I’ve got a couple of long weekends on the road coming up where a punchy yet frugal diesel straight six would be most useful…

Funny how things work out.

And so it is, with a luminescent electric city car and a slightly miffed editor-at-large shrinking in the 130’s colossal mirrors a couple of days later, that I come to reacquaint myself with one of the largest cars currently available in the UK.

I first drove a mega-Defender last year, on a mix of wide, sweeping B-roads and tough but spacious off-road trails – both environments where the 130 can relax into some personal space and it’s quite easy to forget about the extra 340mm of metal that it carries over the already colossal 110.

I don’t live halfway up Ben Nevis, though, so now I’ll be able to try taking the 130 well and truly out of its comfort zone with a few long motorway schleps, a fortnight of Ikea runs, tip trips and commuting through the tight, twisting, traffic-choked veins of suburban London.

In fact, I’m not sure I haven’t found this car’s limit. I was expecting to achieve 16mpg and get stuck at every T-junction. Instead, it consumes about as much as I would expect of a Volkswagen Golf GTI over 400 miles and proves itself as manoeuvrable as your average estate car (with a bit of practice and a lot of help from the parking aids).

It’s whisper-quiet at motorway speeds and hassle-free in city traffic; it sneaks under every height restrictor and comfortably accommodates untold quantities of flat-pack flotsam; it reverses down my tight cul-de-sac and slots into the tiny space outside my house (while blocking all natural light to my living room); and it saves me hundreds of pounds in moving costs by doubling up as a mid-sized van.

Our 130’s particularly sinister specification does nothing to ease the glares and tuts that such large and darkened vehicles attract in urban areas. And yet, even when I fire up the grumbly diesel, even when I remind its detractors that the alternative is a screaming supercharged petrol V8.

But if you can stomach the quite obvious dissent from some quarters and you’re especially careful not to inadvertently run over any Smart cars (or supermarkets) on the commute, it really is a surprisingly docile and malleable beast.

Rear-wheel steering would make it easier to parallel park and negotiate helter-skelter multi-storey ramps, and I wouldn’t mind some meatier rubber to protect the 20in alloys from kerb rash, but ultimately I can’t help but wonder at this 4x4 behemoth’s almost inconceivable duality.

Something so brash and brawny has no right to be so easy to live with in town, but then maybe that’s why every third car inside the M25 seems to be a Defender: they just work.

It’s not the politically correct choice of runaround for anyone, except perhaps if you’re one of those hardy volunteers who look after small islands in the Outer Hebrides, but there’s no denying its fitness for multiple purposes.

Felix Page

Love it 

Torque of the town

I'm down to driving just a handful of big diesels a year, and the creamy brute force of the D300 reminds me what a shame that is.

Loathe it

Back in full swing

The tailgate being side-hinged means you need to leave a big gap behind you when reverse parking, but the 130 already takes up every inch of a space.

Mileage: 10,030

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Life with a Land Rover Defender 130: Month 1

Our XXL Defender is surprisingly economical - 16 June

Having said in the car’s introduction that 40mpg was in the offing and smarting from an acquaintance saying that he wouldn’t get in a car as consumptive as the Defender, I thought I’d see what it could do. This 44.8mpg was let down by some roadworks, so now I’m wondering if I can get 50mpg out of it. Probably not.

Mileage: 9992

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Welcoming the Defender 130 to the fleet - 5 June 2024

No sooner had I written that the Ford Ranger Raptor had left Autocar's long-term fleet (to join Steve Cropley's personal fleet, and fair play to him), a similarly large vehicle has arrived to replace it.

It's a Land Rover Defender 130, the longest variant yet of JLR's most rugged 4x4, the car that represented the final peg of a "three-legged stool" when it was launched in 2020, alongside the Discovery and Range Rover. (And given there are multiples of Discovery and Range Rover, I still wonder if there's room for more than one Defender type.)

The 130 lives on the same 3022mm wheelbase as the Defender 110 but has had 340mm added behind the back axle, with a slight lower-body lift back there at the same time to reduce compromise to the car's departure angle.

The Defender was a pretty big car already, and now it's a really big one, at 5099mm long without a spare wheel and 5358mm long with it, as here. Like a 110 it can be optioned with a third row of seats, although in that form it can't also be specified with the jump seat in the front, because nine seats are too many for a passenger car.

The last time a Defender joined Autocar's long-term fleet, a very pleasant 90, I had the pleasure of working through the configurator and picking the choice options: steel wheels, blue paint, white root, chunky tyres.

It's one of life's simple pleasures (I can recommend the Indian motorcycle configurator as my current deadline dodging obsession). But then somebody else ended up running that Defender.

This time around, it's different: I'm looking after the car, but it arrived pre-specced. The 130 has come to us in Outbound trim, with a 3.0-litre six-cylinder twin-turbo mild-hybrid diesel making 296bhp. 

(This D300 was registered a few months ago; now this trim comes with a minimum D350 diesel.) As you might expect, given the name, the Outbound is one of the more lifestyley variants of the Defender.

If you want to get deeply involved in the model range, it has the basic specification of an X-Dynamic SE but with added gloss black wheels, mats and extended rubber flooring inside, a body-coloured exterior panel and a powder-coated cross-car beam.

Crucially, the Outbound is avallable only with five seats, rather than eight, to prioritise load bay capacity over passenger carrying.

A 130 with all eight seats raised has 400 litres of room behind the third row. The volume on this five-seater is at least 1329 litres, rising to 2516 litres with the back seats folded. I haven't raised a six-a-side football team, so five seats suits me fine, as does the Outbound's easily cleanable rubber flooring, for when I fill the back with hay and the front with mud. Which, with due apologies to colleagues who will borrow the car from me, I will.

There are some options, of course, on top of a £80,390 base price when it was registered. The Defender in standard specification comes very well covered, but this car has a few packs and standalone options as well, most notably upgraded leather seats (£920), an upgrade for the interior (£2275), a towing pack (£1415), an electronic active rear differential (£1020) and more besides, including a tracker with a three-year subscription (£530).

The grey paint adds £1800 and the priciest option is the £4000 satin protective film over that, so that I look like an extra from a Guy Ritchie film. In all, £16,355's worth of kit takes the price to £96,745.

When the new Defender arrived, Commercial versions started at £35,000 but it was just about possible to spend £100,000 on a heavily optioned five-door. Now a Defender Hard Top is £57,420 and you can get pretty close to £140,000. JLR isn't alone here, though. Everything has quickly become more expensive.

Besides, the Defender has found its feet as a luxury car. And the most expensive ones now get a petrol V8. Goody gumdrops.

Anyway, back to this one: it's settling into my routine very easily. I will take it off road, or at least onto green lanes, but during its initial miles, I've been using it as a daily wagon.

I know it's big and tall and heavy, but it's such a good motorway car, with great visibility, big comfortable seats, a relaxed driving position and exceptional stability and isolation, even in bad conditions.

And sure, it's a 4x4, but ease off and relax and it can return 40mpg on a long cruise. Not many years ago, a 1.4-litre petrol supermini wouldn't have done that.

Like the Raptor that went before it, it's not the simplest thing to park, but I can be in a Suzuki Swift and I will still head to a quiet car park bay right at the end of a row and then scooch up against the wall or kerb, so it doesn't make much difference.

And there's a really good reversing camera that shows how much room the spare wheel requires, plus the space needed if you want to still open the rear door. There are lots of little niche features like that around the Defender. More on them in the weeks to come.

Second Opinion

We’ve all seen a lot of new Defenders, yet never one as well specced as the 90 we ran a few years ago (well done, Matt). It was memorable and is still missed; a bigger, more accessible boot was its only real weakness. The 130 takes a sledgehammer (or is that a shipping container?) to that problem, so I’m intrigued to see if it retains the 90’s charm.

Mark Tisshaw

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Land Rover Defender 130 D300 Outbound specification

Specs: Price New £80,390 Price as tested £96,745 Options Satin film £4000, Premium Interior Pack £2275, paint £1800, Towing Pack £1415, Driver Assist Pack £1175, head-up display £1080, rear e-diff £1020, leather upgrade £920, Comfort and Convenience Pack £800, matrix headlights £760, tracker £530, Cold Climate Pack £260, laminated UVproof windscreen £220, domestic plug socket £100