BMW M5 Touring Review & Prices

This is actually only the third time that BMW has made an estate version of its big-hitting super-saloon M5. The first was way back in the 1980s, and was never made in right-hand drive. The second was in the early 2000s, when the M5 had a Formula-One-style V10 engine and a horrible gearbox. Is this new M5 Touring going to be a charming third time for UK buyers?

As with the saloon, this M5 Touring is a plug-in hybrid. You still get the steroidal V8 turbo engine up front, but now there’s an 18.6kWh battery under the floor and an electric motor buried within the gearbox so this is the first M5 which gets an all-electric range — a useful 41 miles according to the official tests. It’s the high-performance car which even Greta Thunberg might be able to get on board with.

Alternatives are thin on the ground at the moment, but include the Audi RS6 - soon to be discontinued - and the Mercedes-AMG E53 Estate, which is so far the hottest in the range until an E63 model arrives.

However, it is still a proper high-performance car. With the V8 and the electric motor working together, the M5 Touring develops a frankly silly 727hp, and can get to 62mph just 3.6 seconds after it was standing still. Actually, that’s a bit slower than the old M5, but you can blame this new model’s 2,550kg kerb weight for that — that makes the M5 Touring as lardy as an Audi Q7 SUV.

Style-wise, the M5 Touring closely follows the template of the saloon, not very surprisingly. Up front there’s a chunky bumper with massive air intakes, and the partially blanked-off grille gets slightly tacky LED surround lighting. Down the side are swollen wheelarches, while at the back there’s a big, black rear diffuser under the bumper with four exhaust pipes sticking out like a pair of side-by-side shotguns. It’s not exactly subtle, but then again for most people it will just look like a regular 5 Series estate — handy when you want to keep a low profile.

It’s very much as-you-were 5 Series inside too, with only a few bright red flashes — on the top of the steering wheel, as if you’re going to take your M5 Touring drift racing, and on the engine starter button — to tell you that you’re in an M5. The only really big difference are the front seats, which are sporty, but still luxurious, buckets with a light-up badge in the backrest and the carbon-fibre paddle shifters and M1 and M2 driving setting memory buttons on the steering wheel. The big sweeping digital screens on top of the dashboard are also lifted from the regular 5 Series, but they do get some special M-car graphics and displays. Generally speaking, the screens look easy enough to use, but we’d really appreciate some extra buttons.

There’s lots of space in the M5 Touring’s cabin, both front and rear, although space for small items isn’t great as the big storage area under the armrest is quite shallow, and the space under the touchscreen is taken up by a pair of wireless phone charging pads. Rear seat space is very good though, and there’s a bit more light for those in the back of the Touring estate than there is in the saloon.

There are a couple of practicality issues, though. At 500 litres (up to the luggage cover) the M5 Touring’s boot is actually quite a bit smaller than that of the regular 5 Series or electric i5 Touring (blame the need to package the M5’s electronic rear differential and battery). With the seats folded down there’s a more useful 1,630 litres but, as with the standard Touring model, you don’t get a separate opening rear tailgate glass section, something that every other version of the 5 Series Touring has previously had. We miss that.

At least there’s a practical towing weight — up to 2,000kg — and the option of an electric foldaway tow-bar, although is anyone actually going to pull a caravan with their M5 Touring?

Whatever about the practical stuff, BMW has certainly loaded up the M5 Touring for some serious driving pleasure. Adaptive dampers are added to M-specific suspension, and active steering – which can change its speed and angle depending on whether you’re manoeuvring in a car park or heading down a favourite stretch of road – and M-Compound brakes are all standard. Optionally, you can fit carbon-ceramic brake discs, just like a Formula One car (sort of). You can also fiddle with just about every aspect of how the car drives, from the throttle response to how savage the gearshifts feel.

Keep an eye on this page for our full BMW M5 Touring review, and we'll update you as soon as we've driven the car. In the meantime, check out our best BMW M5 Touring deals, or click here to see our best deals on other BMW models. You can find a used BMW for sale here, and click here to get help when the time comes to sell your old car.

The M5 Touring has a chunky, six-figure price tag, but while that looks expensive, it’s actually not too bad considering that you now get all of this model’s electric abilities (which the old one never had) and it’s competitive with alternatives from Audi and Mercedes. The only worry for the M5 Touring might be the fact that the all-electric i5 M60 Touring — currently the best-selling model with an M-badge around the world — is just as quick to get to 62mph, yet costs tens of thousands less and would be vastly cheaper to run.