Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium 2019 Review

What a welcome relief, being in a Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium after a week in a Nissan GT-R 50th Anniversary.

Don't be mistaken, the GT-R is an undeniably exciting car, but the concessions you make to enjoy the uncompromising Nissan quickly wear thin. It's a weekend fun car, not a daily driver.

In marked contrast to the GT-R, the Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium is comfortable, practical and refined – and doesn't require a lot of brain power to drive. Where the GT-R was hard-riding, noisy and tight inside, the Outback is the polar opposite.

Indeed, the Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium wafts along serenely, never unsettling driver or passengers. Even on one blustery day the Subaru just forged a passage through the air without constant correction or buffeting.

What particularly sets the Outback apart from SUV competitors and low-riding wagon counterparts is its supple ride quality. This is a car that's equally composed over potholes and speed humps. The damping is up to scratch and the Outback's body control at speed is good.

It has to be asked then, how is it that the Outback's ride comfort is so good, when the smaller Levorg feels undersprung and underdamped?

While the Outback steers reasonably well for a large SUV, with acceptably good steering response on a trailing throttle, the steering is light at times. It is very secure in terms of roadholding, and the brakes are strong too, although the progressive pedal feel is a little soft for my liking. It does at least allow for the Outback to glide to a halt gently.

At parking speeds the Outback impresses with the way it copes in the tight confines of a multi-storey car park; the car's cameras and its excellent field of vision (low hip line, large mirrors) provide the means of parking millimetre-perfect.

At night, the Outback’s auto high-beam headlights are very effective, dipping in sequence as a car approaches. It's almost balletic, the way the lights dance around in different directions and at different levels to save the driver of the on-coming car from being blinded. Even on low beam, the headlights cast a white light a long way ahead.

Being able to see and be aware of one's situation is a safety cause celebre for Subaru designers and engineers. The company's EyeSight system is not much more at home with Australia's parlous country-road markings than similar systems from other brands, but it will certainly keep you safe from nose-to-tail prangs if you're looking the wrong way at the time.

On paper, the 2.5-litre flat four in the Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium looks to be at a disadvantage against the four-cylinder diesel in its obvious competitor, the Volkswagen Passat Alltrack. The diesel VW not only produces more power than the petrol Subaru – with an associated gain in power-to-weight ratio – it also develops something like 70 per cent more torque than the Outback.

Where you're likely to feel that difference is in towing a loaded trailer or overtaking with a full complement of passengers and luggage on board.

In the real world, during a daily commute with just the driver and one passenger aboard, the Subaru doesn't feel undernourished. The Outback delivers reasonably brisk acceleration around town, and feels livelier still with the S/I engine drive mode system set to the sportier mapping.

And while the diesel VW should hold all the trump cards where fuel consumption is concerned, there is little actual difference between the Outback and the Passat Alltrack in my experience. The VW uses about the same amount of (more expensive) diesel fuel in daily commuting.

On that point, the Outback can be unexpectedly frugal for a large, petrol-engined car, returning 8.1L/100km on an 80km test run and around 9L/100km overall. At freeway speeds, when the engine is revving at just under 1600rpm, the Subaru showed potential to get into the sevens.

It's like the horizontally-opposed engine was made for an idle-stop system. In the case of the Outback, the fuel-conserving tech works well. It's fairly unobtrusive when stopping or re-starting the engine, but does occasionally take its time.

Lift your foot off the brake pedal and there's sometimes a small but significant delay before the engine fires back into life. Interesting point though, if you press harder on the brake pedal it will trigger the idle-stop system to re-start the engine – should you anticipate the need to move away from rest but don't want to lift off the brake pedal and have the Outback charge away too soon.

Coupled to a continuously variable transmission (CVT), the engine provides generally consistent power and torque right across the rev range and doesn't drone unnecessarily. In manual mode the engine will pull through to redline and provide acceleration every inch of the way. It won't kick down in that mode either, which might be very handy for off-road work.

Yet the combination of CVT and the engine's native torque will also keep revs at a steady rate climbing a hill with the cruise control set. Unlike CVTs in earlier Subarus, this one doesn't whine under full load, contributing to the Outback's low noise levels in the cabin.

Cruising at open-road speeds the Outback is quiet, with little more than the lightest hum from the powertrain in evidence. Wind noise is well controlled and while there's the usual rumble on coarse-chip country roads, on better roads there's little in the way of noise from the Bridgestone 255/60 R18 tyres.

During our days with Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium there was no opportunity to take it off-road, but we know previous versions have been relatively competent in this regard – notwithstanding the approach and departure constraints of a high-riding wagon.

And the Outback's X-Mode system has proven its worth in its stablemate, the Subaru Forester.

The towing capacity for the Outback is 1500kg, well short of the 2200kg rating for the Volkswagen Passat Alltrack Wolfsburg Edition.

With a hip point that's almost ideal, entering and leaving the Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium could hardly be simpler, whether for kids or adults. Younger kids may find it a bit of a climb, but they probably should be lifted into a booster seat anyway.

The driving position of the Subaru is generally good. While the seats are flat in the cushion and not aggressively bolstered to resist higher g forces, they are comfortable over longer touring distances. The distance to wheel and pedals is about right and the controls are where they should be. Only the starter button is obscured, hidden by one of the spokes of the steering wheel.

In the past, Subaru's dash layout, switchgear location and functions have left something to be desired, but everything's fairly rational in the Outback. The information display in the instrument binnacle still looks convoluted – especially with the adaptive cruise control engaged – but the major instruments are easy to read and are presented in a restful style of white on black, with a light-blue ring around the circumference.

The infotainment screen in the centre fascia is also simple to use, although it may take a while to work your way through the various programmable features. And some of those functions (an auto-play facility for streaming music from a connected device, for instance) may take a while to find and enable..

There's a strange quirk present in the satellite navigation voice prompts; the preposition 'towards' is pronounced as 'tow'rds' rather than 'to-wards', with 'tow' the phoneme usually heard in 'towel'. It's all a little strange – rather like the voice model was given all the sounds of the English language to record and the wrong sounds have been used for this one specific word.

The Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium is a vehicle that punches above its weight for fit and finish. Take for instance the wiper and headlight stalks, which are soft-damped, and the doors that close so easily that few kids will feel the need to slam them shut.

The kids and adults alike will also appreciate the accommodation in the rear of the Outback It's very spacious back there for headroom and legroom, plus there are adjustable vents and USB ports for recharging in the rear of the centre console.

At 512 litres, the boot of the Outback is large, but not huge. The Volkswagen Passat Alltrack does better, with a luggage capacity of 639 litres. Ground clearance favours the Subaru (213mm versus 174), but that may also mean a higher load height for the boot. As a consequence, loading goods in the boot of the Outback could be hard work for those who are a bit shorter. The rear seats fold almost flat and flush with the boot floor for longer loads.

Like the VW, the Subaru Outback has a full-size spare in the boot, under the floor. It's a matching alloy wheel fitted with the same size of Bridgestone tyre as the road wheels.

Right about now you may be asking yourself why you would buy the Outback over the Passat Alltrack. The answer is simple -- the Volkswagen costs nearly $12,000 more than this high-spec Subaru. So is the larger boot space and the shorter 0-100km/h time (2sec) worth the extra $11,500?

VFACTS sales figures and yours truly both suggest not.

How much does the 2019 Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium cost?
Price: $43,940 (plus on-road costs)
Engine: 2.5-litre four-cylinder petrol
Output: 129kW/235Nm
Transmission: CVT with seven preset steps
Fuel: 7.3L/100km; (8.1L/100km as tested)
CO2: 166g/km
Safety Rating: Five-star (ANCAP, 2015)