2018 S-Class Facelift Spy Video Reveals New Steering Wheel

We've had our fill of Mercedes spy videos this year, especially those featuring the discrete mid-life facelift of the S-Class flagship. They've been testing everything from the Maybach to the hybrid, which is to be expected, considering the amount of tech, engines, and features that are being added.

The headlights and all the other cosmetic features on the outside of the car have been covered in our previous stories. The short of it is that nothing significant is going to happen, but the designers are going to modernize the S-Class a bit.

The part we want to focus on is the steering wheel, which has been changed quite a bit. Obviously, this element will depend on what particular model you buy, but the prototype Walko was able to get close to has features from the W213 E-Class.

Obviously, they've added Touch Control. They work like little capacitive joysticks, the left one for the screen in front of the driver and the right one for the middle screen. But there are more toggles than on the E-Class here, a scrolling wheel, buttons for dealing with phone calls and so on. Which makes you wonder why they still need the classic console-mounted controller.

Apparently, they've also upgraded the screens, as you cannot see the bezel and the divider that used to be between them. We also hear that Mercedes is experimenting with a gesture-control system that may make its debut in this car. Obviously, that's a direct response to the feature advancements made by BMW.

But the chances are that when the S-Class facelift is revealed, we won't feel like talking about any of these features because of how drastic the engine updates are. For example, the S63 will ditch its current 5.5-liter for the 4.0-liter used by the E63. As mentioned earlier, the 6-cylinder engines adopt an inline-6 configuration, benefiting from an integrated starter generator or even electric compressors.