2026 Subaru Forester SUV is a “pleasant surprise”
Automotive critic Mark Phelan spent a day with the 2026 Subaru Forester SUV and found the car to be effortless in the wilderness.
Strong Points
- rugged powertrain
- stylish interior
- smooth large screen
Cons
- There’s no air suspension – and it feels like it
- The quality of the interior is okay
- strange rear end appearance
What’s new in 2025, lincoln navigator Looks great on paper. The brand’s signature 48-inch dashboard display not only looks great, but is also extremely easy to use and displays useful information. The rest of the interior is also stylish. If you’re a fan of big wheels, the 22-inch and 24-inch rims available on the Lincoln are class-standard, at least in terms of size, but the way the designers placed the Navigator’s new, larger body higher over those wheels makes it appear larger, a trick rivals the Cadillac Escalade and Jeep Grand Wagoneer can’t match. And since navigators cost a fortune these days, onlookers should be able to see that the driver is doing well.
below Sleek new wrapper for the 2025 Lincoln NavigatorBut it’s not much different than before. It’s once again powered by a twin-turbo 3.5-liter V-6 engine, making the same 440 horsepower and 510 pound-feet of torque as last year’s model, and uses the same 10-speed automatic transmission. But Lincoln engineers somehow squeezed nearly 60 pounds out of this top-of-the-line 2025 Navigator Black Label model. Last version we tested (2022) Despite adding a more complex power-folding clamshell-style split tailgate, a huge display, and many other niceties.
First the numbers
We were surprised at how completely the new Navigator outperformed the old Navigator, despite using almost the same bits at the bottom. This Navigator shaves 0.7 seconds off the 2022 Navigator Black Label’s 0-60 mph acceleration time, bringing it down to 5.1 seconds. The quarter-mile time is down to just 13.7 seconds from the previous 14.4 seconds, and the big Lincoln moves forward aggressively with every push of the gas pedal.
Navigator isn’t just fast. It can now stop from 60 mph in just 119 feet, compared to 135 feet previously, reducing the Navigator’s overall length (17.5 feet) by almost one. Near the skidpad, the 22-inch tires that come with the new Black Label hung at an average of 0.76 g to 0.79 g. The new SUV also improved figure-eight lap times by 0.3 seconds and increased average lateral acceleration from an average of 0.63 g to 0.67 g during handling tests.
While these numbers place the Lincoln roughly between the Jeep Grand Wagoneer and Cadillac Escalade in terms of acceleration, the Navigator’s grip numbers far exceed both. The Cadillac feels sportier to drive, even though objective test numbers (limited primarily to stability control) fall short of the Lincoln. The Jeep seems about as athletic as the Lincoln in real-world driving, especially with more comfort and cushioning.
But what does it feel like to produce these numbers?
That’s a great question. With a large body-on-frame vehicle like this, hard performance numbers are one thing, but how the truck drives in the real world may be another. The 2025 Lincoln Navigator drives about as well as the numbers suggest, but only when the road is relatively flat.
Turning Lincoln’s signature square steering wheel rim (more of a “squeakle” shape) starts with a strong reaction from the front tires, with the body setting right away with minimal lean and no sensation of riding up on the outside front tire. Finally, carve a smooth line around the bend. However, bumps and undulations in the road can easily upset the Navigator’s suspension. It’s as if the springs can’t absorb anything else when the corners are loaded. This can cause pogoing (a bouncy vertical movement of the body) or twist the tires, requiring corrective inputs at the wheel.
In part, this may be due to the Lincoln’s lack of air springs, which all of its major competitors (including the Escalade and Grand Wagoneer) offer. Equipped with multiple air chambers, the air spring can remain cushioned even under slight loads. Lincoln doesn’t have that kind of bandwidth. So the ride quality is good until it’s not, but the Navigator can seem well-tuned on washboard surfaces and sharp bumps, which can create some unpleasant wheel movement that you don’t feel in, say, an Escalade (which has a firmer suspension tuning) or a Grand Wagoneer (which is ultra-luxury).
Lincoln equips the Navigator with electronically adjustable suspension dampers, but they seem over-fitted here. We also noticed that Lincoln’s structure had more wobble than its competitors. And keep in mind, our test vehicle was equipped with standard 22-inch wheels. Black Label models like this one have a 24-inch option, but you’ll still be able to ride the Flint.
I have no complaints about the Navigator’s straight-line performance. It’s accompanied by a vulgar and just-enough-loud pseudo-soundtrack that plays into the cabin from the audio speakers. Fake engine sounds cannot be pinpointed. This isn’t just a reproduction of, say, a Ford V-8 engine. But whatever you’re trying to imitate, it sounds good. Bystanders and other traffic can hear the loud whirring of the Navigator’s turbocharger, but Navigator passengers are treated to a far superior, raspy, powerful sound.
There’s also a drive mode, but it’s somewhat buried in the central touchscreen and doesn’t seem to have much of an impact on how the navigator works. There are also many of them, but not all are labeled in a simple way.
(Almost) Amazing Style Overhaul
Few Navigator pilots will notice the nuances of the tuning we do when delving into the handling performance of a full-size luxury SUV, but everyone can appreciate Lincoln’s new look. From almost any angle, it exudes an understated, classy feel.
It appears that both Lincoln and Ford were similarly struggling with the appearance of their tails. Again, like the mechanical Ford Expedition, the butt is just…weird. The Navigator has a fairly simple box-like shape, so the weird recess below the full-width taillights (filled with an even weirder smoked plastic panel with a subtle pattern) looks as out of place as a cutout for a refrigerator’s water dispenser. The corners of the taillights are pointed upwards at a sharp angle, which does not blend with the rest of the body line and gives the impression of being out of place.
Perhaps this was Lincoln’s way of dressing up a new split tailgate with a lower section that swings downward in addition to an upper swinging upwards section. There’s also an attachment that turns the bottom of the tailgate into a kind of picnic table. I think it depends on the person whether they like this tailgate setup or not. Other luxury SUVs include BMW’s X5 and Land Rover’s Range Rover. This works well and prevents loose items from rolling off too quickly, but you may need to lean into the bottom section to reach items deep in the cargo area.
The interior is almost a home run as well. We dig the new dashboard layout, which brings a large screen into view that wraps around the base of the windshield. Push-button shifter controls are a matter of preference, but due to the horizontal layout, smaller drivers may find they have to stretch a long distance from the cockpit to the buttons.
We certainly praised the 48-inch display, controlled by buttons on the steering wheel, and the small touchscreen in the center. It looks incredibly beautiful and yet runs flat. (It would have been better if it was smaller) Lincoln Nautilus wins 2025 SUV of the Year.) I wish the touchscreen controlling the larger display was located higher up and closer to the driver’s line of sight, like in the Nautilus. We found ourselves taking our eyes off the road long enough to drive, long enough to hear the reprimanding beep from BlueCruise’s hands-free driving system to pay attention to the road ahead.
back side
The latest Navigator is a major step forward for the vehicle that has put America at the heart of the full-size luxury SUV space. It’s faster, more eye-catching, and packed with great new technology. If you look closely, there are a few things that make it fall behind its direct competitors. First, the interior, which looks amazing, is only worth admiring from the waist up for passengers. Below that point, there’s a lot of hard, plain plastic you might recognize from this Navigator’s distant relative, the Ford F-150 pickup truck. The same applies to the back of the navigator. When you get to the third row, the things you touch start to get softer and softer.
The Navigator we tested also had wrinkled leather on the door handles and dashboard elbows. Basically, the leather-covered concave surface looked like the back of an elderly person’s knee. Some of our staff think this adds a handmade, authentic feel to the material, while others think it could be tightened with Botox or fillers. Lincoln also relies more on piano black plastic than some competitors in areas with high fingerprint traffic. The cabins of the Escalade and Grand Wagoneer are more thoroughly enriched with premium materials.
Personally, the 2025 Lincoln Navigator’s sins aren’t particularly egregious, but this top-of-the-line Black Label trim starts at a higher price than ever: $118,490. The $2,000 package with copper-tinted trim and special 22-inch wheels brought the total cost to $120,490. If you pay this much money, you won’t see or feel hard plastic anywhere. And this American luxury SUV should definitely ride on air suspension too. Please fight against Also updated for the 2025 Cadillac Escalade And the Jeep Grand Wagoneer, which has led its class to date, has no room for such mistakes.
Photo credit: Jim Fetts
