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2021 Mercedes-Maybach GLS Spied Undisguised, Is a $200,000 SUV

At $75,200, the 2020 Mercedes GLS 450 is a leap of over five grand over the 2019 model but is still reasonably priced compared to something like a BMW X7 or Range Rover. Many of its features are top-notch, but for two and half times more money, you will be able to buy the Maybach GLS next year.
Mercedes-Maybach GLS Spied Undisguised, Is the $200,000 SUV 12 photos
Photo: SB-Medien
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Our spies in Germany have captured a fully uncamouflaged model on the road, showing the features we've been dying to see since testing began. The main thing to look out for is the big grille. However, this is yet unfinished and many of the other design elements belong to a stock GLS, not the Maybach model.

It's kind of weird seeing the Maybach name associated with an SUV, but it's what the customers actually want. Like Bentley or Rolls-Royce, Maybach was a ye olde car brand at the dawn of the European automotive industry. It went out of business in the 1940s.

Mercedes bought the name and in 2003 started making revised its own models. They weren't successful, and the plug was eventually pulled. However, with the W222 generation - that's the current, soon-to-be-replaced S-Class - Maybach became a sort of ultra-luxurious trim level, and the same will happen with the GLS.

How will Mercedes justify asking two and a half times more money for basically the same SUV? Well, it comes to the hours spent to make it special, plus the power of the brand, the loyalty of its rich customers. Want it to be armor-plated and able to withstand the wrath of your business enemies? They can do that. Spend Porsche 911 money on the paint alone? That should be possible too.

But ask for a V12 engine and Mercedes may not oblige. Here's our logic. Currently, the Maybach S600 is the one with the twelve cylinders, but the automaker comes pretty close to the number of that nameplate with its new GLE 580, which uses a mild-hybrid 4.0-liter.

Thus, we think the GLS 600 will pack about 530 HP from a V8 while a GLS 680 should come a little later with an output in the region of 550-600 HP, courtesy of a plug-in hybrid system.
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About the author: Mihnea Radu
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Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida.
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