Earlier than heading on a visit to Tahoe final weekend, GM supplied me the usage of the corporate’s 9,000-pound monument to extra – the brand new 2026 electrical Escalade IQL (beginning at $130,405) – for every week to test-drive. Earlier than you proceed, observe that I’m not knowledgeable automobile reviewer. TechCrunch has glorious transportation writers; I’m not considered one of them. I do, nevertheless, drive an electrical automobile.
I used to be instantly sport. I’d first glimpsed one final summer time at a automobile present, the place some regional automobile sellers had stationed themselves on the finish of a protracted subject dotted with beautiful classic vehicles. My speedy response was “Jesus, that’s huge,” adopted by a stunning admiration for its design, which, regardless of its huge scale, reveals restraint. For lack of a greater phrase, I’m going to say it’s “strapping.” Its proportions simply work.
My pleasure waned fairly rapidly when the automobile was dropped off at my home a day earlier than our departure time. This factor is a monstrosity — at 228.5 inches lengthy and 94.1 inches large, it made our personal vehicles appear to be toys. My first condominium in San Francisco was smaller. Attempting to drive it up my driveway was slightly harrowing, too; it’s so large, and its hood is so excessive, that for those who’re ascending a highway at a sure slope – we reside halfway down a hill; our mailbox is on the high of it – you may’t see no matter is immediately in entrance of the automobile.
I thought of simply leaving it within the driveway in the course of the journey. The opposite different was doing what I may to develop extra comfy with the prospect of driving it 200 miles to Tahoe Metropolis, so I tooled round in it that night time and the subsequent day, choosing up dinner, heading to an train class — simply fundamental stuff round city. Once I ran right into a buddy on the road, I volunteered as rapidly as potential that this was not my new automobile, that I used to be going to presumably evaluate it, and wasn’t its measurement ridiculous? It felt like a tank. I assumed: aside from lodges that use SUVs just like the Escalade to ferry company round, what sort of monster chooses a automobile like this?
5 days later, it seems that I’m that type of monster.
Look, I don’t understand how or after I fell for this automobile. If I’d written this evaluate after two days, it could learn very otherwise. Even now, I’m not so blind that I don’t see its shortcomings.
It was the Escalade’s efficiency in a horrible snowstorm that basically received my coronary heart, however let me stroll you thru the steps between “Ugh, this automobile is a tank” and “Sure! This automobile is a tank.”
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Simply entering into it requires slightly extra exertion than would appear to make sense. I’m pretty athletic and I nonetheless discovered myself questioning if this factor shouldn’t include an automatic step stool.
Inside is the place digital maximalism does its work. The dashboard opens with a 55-inch curved LED display with 8K decision that reads much less like a automobile show and extra like a scenario room. Entrance passengers get their very own screens. Second-row passengers additionally get 12.6-inch private screens together with stowable tray tables, twin wi-fi chargers, and — with essentially the most lavish model of the automobile — therapeutic massage seats that may make them overlook they’re in a automobile in any respect. Google Maps handles navigation. And the polarized display expertise deserves its personal reward: whereas considered one of my youngsters binge-watched Hulu within the entrance seat, not a body of it leaked into my sightline from behind the wheel.
The cabin itself is constructed across the premise that nobody inside ought to really feel crowded, and it delivers. Entrance legroom stretches to 45.2 inches; the second row presents 41.3; even the third row manages 32.3 inches. Seven adults may share this machine for a protracted whereas with out fraying one another’s nerves. Heated and ventilated leather-based seats with 14-way energy adjustment come normal within the first two rows, and the entire operation runs on 5G Wi-Fi.
The automobile additionally comes normal with Tremendous Cruise, GM’s hands-free driving system, which I’m undecided I fairly found out. True automobile reviewers appear to find it irresistible; after I tried it, the automobile felt prefer it was drifting to an alarming diploma between the outer boundaries of the freeway lane, and when that occurs, it unleashes an escalating sequence of warnings. First, a pink steering wheel icon materializes on-screen. Then your seat pulses haptic warnings in opposition to your rump. Ignore these and a chime — each reminder and reproach — fills the cabin. GM calls this rude collection a “driver takeover request.”
Did I point out the 38-speaker AKG Studio sound system? So good.
As for the outside — it is a good-looking big, however it takes some getting used to. At first, I discovered the grille, which is only for present, virtually comically imposing. That is undoubtedly a automobile for people who find themselves the boss, or need to be the boss, or need to appear to be the boss whereas privately coping with existential crises. Pulling as much as a glass-lined restaurant one night time, I’m fairly certain I blinded half the patrons as I swung right into a parking spot perpendicular to the constructing, the Escalade’s headlights flooding via the home windows.
Then there’s the sunshine present the automobile launches every time it detects you approaching through the important thing or the MyCadillac app. It’s as if it’s saying, “Hey, chief, the place we headed?” earlier than you’ve a lot as touched a door deal with. (Within the vernacular of Cadillac, that is due to its “superior, all-LED exterior lighting system,” highlighted by a “crystal defend” illuminated grille and crest, together with vertical LED headlamps and “choreography-capable rear lights.”)
It’s, objectively, a bit a lot. I beloved it instantly.
Regardless of its measurement, the Escalade IQL is unexpectedly nimble. Not “sports activities automobile darting via site visitors” nimble, however “I can’t fairly consider one thing this colossal doesn’t deal with like a battleship” nimble.
Now we arrive on the frustrations. The entrance trunk — or “frunk” within the lexicon of EV devotees — operates in mysterious and irritating methods. Opening requires holding the button till completion. Launch prematurely and it halts mid-ascent, frozen in automotive purgatory, forcing you to restart your complete sequence. Closing calls for the identical sustained strain. The rear trunk, conversely, requires two distinct faucets adopted by speedy button abandonment. Maintain too lengthy and nothing occurs.
Relatedly, twice, the automobile refused to energy down after I’d completed driving. The automobile merely sat there, working, even when shifted to park and opened the door (which tells the automobile to show off). One clunky answer: open the frunk, shut the frunk, shift into drive, then park, then exit fully.
As for the software program, it’s completely nice except you’ve owned a Tesla, by which case, put together for disappointment. This appears to be true throughout the board — everybody I do know who owns each a Tesla and one other EV, irrespective of how excessive finish, says the identical factor. When you’ve internalized how effortlessly Tesla’s software program dissolves boundaries between intention and execution, each different automaker’s software program appears like a compromise.
Which brings us to the nadir of the journey: charging in Tahoe throughout winter. For all its virtues, the Escalade IQL is, by any measure, a thirsty machine. The battery is a 205 kWh pack — huge, and it must be, as a result of the automobile burns via roughly 45 kWh per 100 miles, which is significantly greater than comparable electrical SUVs. Cadillac estimates 460 miles of vary on a full cost, and in superb circumstances that holds up. Tahoe in winter, nevertheless, is just not superb circumstances. We’d additionally arrived with much less cost than we must always have. A collection of facet journeys on the way in which up, together with an emergency detour to seek out shirts for a member of the family who had packed none, had eaten into the battery greater than anticipated. By the point we wanted to cost, we genuinely wanted to cost.
We approached a Tesla Supercharger in Tahoe Metropolis that appeared on the MyCadillac app, however once we plugged in to the designated stall, nothing occurred. We looked for solutions, discovering that even Tesla stations that settle for non-Tesla autos throttle power to six kilowatts per hour anyway, however it was a irritating expertise. A close-by EVGo had shuttered a month prior. ChargePoint’s two items on the Tahoe Metropolis Public Utility lot had been, respectively, damaged and keen to attach however to not truly cost something. We briefly contemplated a 35-mile drive to Incline Village, did the maths on what stranded would truly appear to be, and determined in opposition to it. Then I found an Electrify America station 12 miles away. We drove via gathering snow, arrived shortly earlier than 11 p.m., and it labored. We sat there for an hour preventing exhaustion earlier than driving house.
The next morning revealed one other subject through an app alert: tire strain had dropped to 53 and 56 PSI within the entrance (beneficial: 61) and 62 PSI within the rear (beneficial: 68). I do not know whether or not the automobile had been delivered that means or whether or not one thing else was happening — both means, it meant somebody standing at a fuel station filling tires whereas being pelted immediately within the face with ice. (That somebody was my husband.) The tires held regular after that, even because the week stored doing its worst. For a household journey, it was going nice.
At this level, in truth, I’d have instructed you that the Escalade IQL is certainly luxurious and superb for households of 4 or extra who worth area and expertise. I’d let you know it got here burdened by actual tradeoffs: ahead visibility obstructed by its commanding hood, parking challenges inherent to its dimensions, restricted charging infrastructure for a machine this ravenous, and tires tasked with supporting 9,000 kilos. It’s a phenomenal automobile, I’d have stated, however it’s not for me.
However the snow that had began to fall stored falling. Inside two days, eight toes had accrued, making it unimaginable to ski — your complete level of the journey — and terrifying to drive. Besides I discovered that I wasn’t terrified as a result of we had the Escalade, which, due to its weight, felt like driving a tank via the snow. What may have been harrowing felt serene. It was quiet, it was robust, it was taking cost in a foul scenario.
I additionally adjusted to the dimensions. By the top of this previous week I had stopped mouthing “I’m sorry” to whoever who was ready for me to determine the place to park it. I had stopped caring what it stated about me that I used to be driving a automobile whose complete design philosophy is: the proprietor of this automobile is just not ready in line. Eight toes of snow had fallen, we wanted groceries, and I used to be the one with the tank, suckers! I may sense my husband falling for the automobile, too.
Then, as tends to occur in Tahoe, the snow stopped unexpectedly and the solar got here out, and the Escalade was only a very soiled automobile sitting within the driveway (sorry, GM!). It was on this second that I noticed: I nonetheless prefer it, and it’s not due to the emergency alone. I like using excessive, with the speaker system flooding the automobile with a favourite soundtrack. That gentle present nonetheless will get me. The automobile’s lengthy, curved LED display is a marvel, amongst different options.
The frunk continues to be unhinged. I received’t quickly overlook the panic of not having the ability to cost the automobile the place I assumed I may. Parking this factor is actually an train in persistence. I’ve robust opinions about pointless consumption. None of that has modified.
I simply additionally, someway, need this automobile, so when the GM intermediary comes to gather it, I could conceal it beneath a tarp — a really massive tarp — and inform him he has the mistaken deal with.
