Bentley Continental Review (2018-present)
Bentley Continental cars for sale
4.0
Expert review
Pros
A huge advance over its predecessor
Amazing blend of agility and continent-crossing comfort
Opulent interior is truly luxurious
Cons
Such class and quality come at a price
Extremely high running costs
A Ferrari 812 Superfast is more exciting to drive
The CarGurus verdict
If you’re looking for the most rounded grand tourer on sale today, you’ve found it. A couple of the Continental GT’s rivals are sharper on the handling side of things, notably the Aston Martin DB11 and Ferrari 812 Superfast, while the Rolls-Royce Wraith is more luxurious still. The Bentley, however, is the undisputed master at balancing those two attributes.
The Continental GT has historically sold in surprisingly strong numbers, despite its high list price, and that has meant resale values haven’t been as robust as they might have been. What’s more, the running costs on a car like this will inevitably be hefty, all of which means you should go into Continental GT ownership with your eyes wide open.
As long as you’re prepared for the attendant cost of keeping it on the road, though, you’ll discover in the Continental GT one of the most brilliantly executed cars on sale today.
What is the Bentley Continental?
The current Bentley Continental GT is a significantly better car than the model it replaced, and perhaps the best way to summarise the difference is that previous version shared its underpinnings with a Volkswagen, while the new car is more closely related to a Porsche. You probably don’t need to know much more than that.
The original Continental GT was launched way back in 2003 and, although it was an enormous sales success laid the foundations upon which Bentley’s current prosperity was built, it was also hobbled by having to use the same platform as the Volkswagen Phaeton luxury saloon. The latest model has a good deal in common with Porsche’s Panamera, which means it’s fundamentally better equipped to marry the dynamism of a sports car with the cosseting luxury of a limousine.
How practical is it?
The Bentley is one of the more practical options at this end of the market, because its quest to nail the grand tourer thing means it needs a certain amount of space to accommodate people and luggage over long distances and in serious comfort. The 358-litre boot is about average for a family hatchback and, next to the swathe of competing coupes, it’s positively massive.
There’s loads of room in the front and while space in the two rear seats isn’t what you’d call abundant, it’s miles better than anything offered by the competition. Anyone up to a medium-sized adult will be comfortable enough and you can even get a couple of child seats in there. Not something to which the likes of the Aston Martin DB11 can lay claim.
What's it like to drive?
Rivals from Aston Martin and Ferrari are more agile and keener to drive on a circuit or a mountain road, while the Rolls-Royce Wraith offers an altogether more civilised long-distance driving experience, but no car juggles those two disciplines quite like the two-door Bentley.
Just like the version that came before it, the Continental GT comes either with a fixed roof or a folding fabric hood. And again, like the earlier model, the current car can be powered either by a twin-turbo 4.0-litre V8 or a 6.0-litre W12, also with a pair of turbochargers for added thrust. Said thrust will take the W12 model up to a top speed of 207mph, should you have somewhere to do it legally.
One of the big improvements that Bentley made when it introduced the current Continental GT in 2018 was moving the engine further back in the chassis, which was made possible by that new platform, developed by Bentley’s engineers with their VW Group colleagues at Porsche. This means the new car is inherently better balanced, so it’s far more agile and responsive in corners.
With clever chassis technologies such as variable anti-roll bars, torque vectoring, and a standard four-wheel drive system that can shuffle power between the wheels with real precision, the car is comprehensively more rewarding to drive than its predecessor. It’s also quieter on the motorway and, despite that new-found athleticism, more comfortable around town, thanks in part to its triple-chamber air springs.
Technology, equipment & infotainment
A top-end grand tourer means bucketloads of equipment, and that is very much the case. The Continental GT has far too much kit to list here, but some of the highlights include a 12.3-inch infotainment system including satellite navigation, Bluetooth and WiFi streaming, Apple CarPlay, a 60GB solid-state hard drive, a 4G telephone system, full leather trim, a suite of electronic driver assistance systems and a 650-watt 10-speaker standard system. There is no shortage of opportunities to add to that, either.
Inside, you’ll find one of the most opulently appointed cabins in the business. Everything from the quality of the wood veneer to the leather, as well as the overall fit and finish and the satisfyingly weighty action of the switchgear, lends an air of luxury. Even the stitching, all done by the hand of skilled craftspeople, is first-rate.
Bentley Continental running costs
This very much falls into the ‘if you have to ask…’ category. The Continental GT W12 Convertible, for instance, is a 2.5-tonne car with a 626bhp petrol engine beneath its expansive bonnet. Bentley claims it’ll return 19.1mpg but make use of even four-fifths of its performance and you’ll see the real-world mpg figure plummet.
Meanwhile, the most frugal variant is the fixed-head V8 model. Bentley reckons it will return 23.9mpg in mixed driving, but you should probably expect fuel economy of 20mpg at best. That’s simply the reality of choosing a very powerful and exceptionally luxurious car such as this one – although if you can afford the asking price, fuel bills are unlikely to be your primary concern.
Very powerful and heavy cars like the Conti GT tend to put a lot of energy through their tyres. That means you’ll find yourself replacing them much more often than you would on a conventional family saloon, for instance. You should reckon on a four-figure bill for a full set of tyres for 22-inch wheels. Expect to shell out yet another four figures on the first year’s Vehicle Excise Duty and the highest rate from thereon out.
Servicing will prove to be rather costly, too. Bentley says its cars should go in for routine maintenance every year or 10,000 miles, whichever comes sooner. The company offers a fixed-price servicing package for cars older than four years; a minor service costs £799 and a major one £1,199. It also offers service plans that can reduce the cost of maintenance. Owners of brand-new cars can pay £1,910 upfront to cover the next two services, for instance. Similar plans are available for cars up to 10 years old.
Additionally, the company offers fixed replacement price parts for cars older than four years. For example, a new set of front brake pads costs £565 fitted, while a transmission fluid change on a W12 car costs £895 (although those prices relate to the previous Continental GT).
Bentley Continental reliability
The current Continental GT hasn’t been on the market long enough for common faults to have made themselves known. However, prospective buyers might be discouraged to learn that a 2017 survey found Bentley’s vehicles to be the least reliable of the 37 manufacturers it analysed. The same study found that only one in 10 Bentleys went trouble-free for 12 months.
Those findings concern the previous generation of Bentleys, though, and this latest generation might yet prove more dependable over time. For peace of mind, the company offers new car buyers a roadside assistance package for the duration of the warranty, albeit for an extra cost.
The standard Bentley warranty lasts three years and isn’t limited by mileage. By way of comparison, Aston Martin also includes a three-year, unlimited mileage warranty in the purchase price of its new cars. Official Bentley retailers, meanwhile, make extended warranties available for cars up to 10 years old, lasting either 12 or 24 months.
- The 626bhp W12 model is the range-topper and, in theory, the most desirable variant, but keen drivers might actually find the lighter Bentley Continental GT V8 better to drive. With 542bhp, it feels every bit as quick as you’d hope a Continental would – in fact, to drive the V8 is to wonder why anybody would need more power – and with far less weight over the nose (as much as 80kg), the steering responses are far sharper.
- Whereas the previous model featured a traditional automatic gearbox, the new Continental GT uses a more sophisticated eight-speed dual-clutch unit, which it shares with the Porsche Panamera. This means it can change gear much more rapidly than the old auto, particularly when you flick it into manual mode and change gear yourself using the paddles on the steering wheel. In early cars, the dual-clutch transmission could be jerky when pulling away, but that’s been significantly improved for later examples.
- Several years ago, there was a four-door version of the Continental GT badged ‘Flying Spur’. Today the Flying Spur is a standalone model, but it’s still very closely related to the two-door; they use fundamentally the same platform and the same engines, while their cabins, or at least the front sections of them, are almost indistinguishable. The Flying Spur is more luxury saloon than grand tourer, but it, too, is surprisingly good when hustled along a B-road.
- If you like a sporty car: the most sports car-like variant of the Continental GT is the V8 two-door model. It’s the lightest available and feels appreciably sharper to drive than other versions. In time, Bentley is likely to introduce even sportier versions still, as it did with the previous Continental GT.
- The civilised option: for cruising along promenades and being spotted in the swankier parts of town, the Continental GT Convertible with the silken W12 engine is the one to have. It’s also the heaviest, so don’t expect anything like the same agility on a twisty road.
- If you’re a petrolhead to your core: great though the Continental GT V8 is to drive spiritedly, the most enthusiastic drivers should consider one of the Bentley’s rivals. The Aston Martin DB11, for instance, is not only much lighter but more focussed, putting it in a different league when it comes to sportiness.
- If luxury matters most: it’s hard to imagine a more luxurious four-wheeled vehicle than the Continental GT W12, but that’s exactly what the Rolls-Royce Wraith is. The company’s own two-door coupe, the Wraith isn’t at all interested in handling. Instead, it seeks to cosset its occupants the way only a Rolls-Royce can.
