2025 Acura MDX Kind S Advance Evaluate

Discovering myself alone as I enter the roundabout-style freeway on-ramp, I stab the throttle and begin to slide across the partially moist patch of pavement. The 2025 Acura MDX Kind S Advance holds the highway remarkably nicely, because the SH-AWD system transfers torque in varied methods to all 4 corners and retains it monitoring true, which permits me to speed up onto the interstate at automobile chase speeds. Good enjoyable!

Mechanically talking, this expertise rightly feels similar to the 2022 Acura MDX Kind S did, as just about nothing modified. However this Kind S now has Advance on the finish of the title, which provides a number of comforts, not least of which incorporates nine-way massaging seats. It additionally contains heated and ventilated seats up entrance, a heated steering wheel, heated second-row seats, and extra driving aids.

I spent a couple of days in chilly and snowy southeast Michigan to see how all these comforts have an effect on my sensibilities of what a Kind S is and the way it’s supposed to really feel. Did Acura’s updates preserve the Kind S as a related three-row efficiency crossover? Or is the competitors transferring too quick? 

Briefly: The 2025 Acura MDX Kind S Advance properly combines efficiency and luxurious in a three-row crossover SUV package deal. Courtesy of superior suspension expertise and a muscular engine, the Kind S engages the driving force and delights by way of a pleasant sequence of corners. The Kind S, like all MDX trims, falls quick in grownup consolation within the second and third rows. It additionally delivers underwhelming gas financial system. However, lovers with a household will discover these drawbacks nicely price trying previous.

2025 Acura MDX Kind S Advance Evaluate

What Acura Modified for 2025

To begin, Acura tweaked the styling of the entrance fascia, altering the mesh sample of the grille and giving the entrance bumper a brand new, extra aggressive look. Whereas a 2024 versus a 2025 mannequin back-to-back makes the modifications clear, you’re excused from not noticing in any other case.

In profile, the physique maintains the identical traces, although hanging new 21-inch wheels with black accents stand out and showcase the four-piston Brembo calipers extra clearly than earlier than. A brand new paint coloration, City Grey Pearl, reveals the traces of the physique otherwise as nicely. In the event you go along with a non-Kind S MDX, Acura provides a second new paint coloration: Canyon River Blue Metallic.

Inside, the MDX carries on with two 12.3-inch screens, one for the instrument cluster, and the opposite for the middle show. However Acura carried out a brand new person interface to function the middle show (ditching the previous touchpad), which works extra intuitively than earlier than. Furthermore, Google Constructed-in (Assistant, Maps, and Retailer) in addition to wi-fi Apple CarPlay and Android Auto now come as commonplace tools for the MDX.

Oh, and Acura moved the wi-fi smartphone charged subsequent to the cupholders and upgraded the sound methods supplied, too.

What Makes a Kind S Advance?

Maybe most importantly, Acura did away with the Advance package deal for the MDX Kind S, and as a substitute making it commonplace tools and renaming the trim Kind S Advance. That largely explains the $8,705 enhance in base value from the 2022 Kind S. However it additionally means a way more luxurious efficiency SUV.

You get 16-way power-adjusting seats upholstered in Milano leather-based. These seats are additionally heated, ventilated, and massaging. Actually, you select from 9 completely different therapeutic massage sorts and three completely different depth ranges. My private favourite is Shiatzu on excessive depth. Second-row seats, apart from the center seat, provide warmth as nicely.

Again within the driver’s seat, the Kind S Advance retains your arms heat courtesy of a heated steering wheel — and also you get pertinent data through a head-up show.

Lastly, a 31-speaker Bang & Olufsen sound system belts out music — or podcasts in my case. Mid-level MDXs get a 19-speaker model, the bottom mannequin makes do with 11 audio system.

Mechanically Talking

Other than some new garnish and toys inside, the MDX Kind S largely stays the identical. Below the hood nonetheless lies a turbocharged 3.0L V6 that delivers 355 horsepower and 354 pound-feet of torque and sends energy by way of a 10-speed automated transmission earlier than heading to all 4 wheels.

And it’s a torque vectoring AWD system, which Acura named SH-AWD or Tremendous Dealing with, all-wheel-drive. SH-AWD will switch as a lot as 70% of whole torque to the rear axle and 100% of that to the skin wheel, if driving situations benefit it.

Sadly, gas financial system didn’t change both: 17 mpg within the metropolis, 21 on the freeway, and 19 mpg mixed. That’s much less environment friendly than a V8-powered BMW X5 M60i, not to mention the brand new Toyota Grand Highlander and far of the remainder of the household crossovers available on the market.

With regard to chassis, the MDX carries on with a double-wishbone entrance suspension geometry and a multilink rear, four-wheel unbiased. And the Kind S nonetheless replaces metal springs with an adjustable air setup. That enables the driving force to essentially agency up all the chassis within the Sport plus driving mode and have approach extra enjoyable than you’d anticipate in a three-row crossover.

By the way in which, the usual MDX additionally stays unchanged. It receives energy from a naturally aspirated 3.5L V6, which churns out 290 horsepower and 267 pound-feet of torque.

Driving Pleasure

Simply because it did in 2022, the MDX Kind S Advance drives phenomenally nicely. Sure, it is a almost 200-inch-long, 68-inch-tall, nearly 4,800-pound three-row crossover. And but, every thing about this machine caters to the driving force. Particularly within the sport plus driving mode, which stiffens and lowers the air suspension, companies up the steering, and encourages extra torque despatched to the rear axle.

Couple that with the better-than-average front-to-rear weight distribution for an SUV (57% entrance/43% rear), and you’ve got a responsive entrance finish. And, front-to-rear chassis stability stays a lot nearer to impartial than you’d anticipate.

The MDX understeers on the restrict — particularly on a humid freeway on-ramp at sub-freezing temperatures — however courtesy of SH-AWD, the rear-end rotates on energy and tracks your required path brilliantly.

Acura additionally maintains really feel by way of the steering and your bottom. Moreover, whereas it’s not a drag automobile, the 10-speed automated shifts rapidly and retains you within the energy band to ship sturdy pull into triple-digit speeds.

Freeway Cruising With Extra Driving Aids

After you full your on-ramp shenanigans and enter the freeway, the Acura up to date its suite of driving aids for cruising. The Kind S Advance makes use of recent sensors and cameras to extend the methods imaginative and prescient of the highway. That led to a brand new title, AcuraWatch 360, as a substitute of merely AcuraWatch. You additionally get extra driving aids: Entrance Cross Site visitors Warning, Lane Change Collision Mitigation, and Energetic Lane Change Help.

Just like Hyundai’s Freeway Driving Help, Acura inches nearer to sustained hands-free driving with out but reaching something like GM’s Tremendous Cruise tech. Child steps.

Regardless of, I like driving. And I discover the seats comfy and supportive. Kind S Advance fashions particularly present a lot of bolstering within the seats to carry you snugly in place. And now you may get pleasure from a therapeutic massage too.

Sadly, second-row passengers cope with much less legroom and decrease seat bottoms than a lot of the family-size crossover competitors, making it uncomfortable for adults on a highway journey. The MDX appears extra constructed for a younger household than a bunch of adults.

2025 Acura MDX Kind S Advance Evaluate: Abstract

The beginning value for a 2025 Acura MDX Kind S Advance is $76,600, which will get you nicely into BMW X5 territory and even inside hanging distance of a Porsche Cayenne. Stiff competitors, to make certain. And but, it holds its personal. For the cash, you get a really pleasant driver’s automobile dressed as much as appear to be a family-sized crossover SUV. And 99 occasions out of 100, it can efficiently idiot the plenty.

Acura’s replace saved the expertise march updated and sweetened the pot in relation to luxurious appointments, which finally solely enhanced the general driving expertise. You continue to get all of the driving enjoyable, but additionally extra consolation for the occasions you merely must make it from level A to level B. 

The problem for the MDX is that extra giant crossovers entered the market. And current ones noticed large enhancements. That exposes the MDX’s weaknesses greater than earlier than. Accepting 21 mpg on the interstate is a harder promote nowadays. And, if household wants outweigh a enjoyable driving expertise, the MDX Kind S has an uphill climb to achieve consumers.

However, for the driving fanatic who wants the house, the 2025 MDX Kind S Advance remains to be the one to beat.