There's nothing quite like the Mercedes-AMG GT 63 4MATIC+ 4-Door Coupe. Jonathan Crouch drives it.

Ten Second Review

With this Mercedes-AMG GT 4-Door 63 4MATIC+ model, the Three Pointed Star maker's Affalterbach sub-brand produced its first unique four-door design - and it's quite an achievement. Let's check out this hugely impressive flagship AMG contender, now also offered in even faster PHEV 'E Performance' form.

Background

Once merely a tuning specialist, AMG, the sporting division of Mercedes-Benz, is now increasingly turning its hand to its own unique cars. Back in 2018, we were introduced to the third of these, the rare, desirable GT 4-Door Coupe. The AMG brand is scattered liberally around the Mercedes range these days, variously designating either a sporty trim level or, if you've gone further, a bespoke-engined hot version of whichever of the Stuttgart maker's products you've settled on. But AMG has only ever developed four cars that are uniquely its own - and all have been very special indeed, most recently the collectors' item AMG One hypercar. The gullwing-door SLS of 2008 was the first bespoke AMG design; the Mercedes-AMG GT 2-Door Coupe of 2014 was the second. This third design though, represented arguably the Affalterbach maker's biggest challenge. It's one thing to make a sportscar handle engagingly. It's quite another to achieve the same thing with a 5-metre-long, 2.1-tonne luxury 4-door model. Particularly when it must channel at least 639hp to the tarmac. Welcome, to the Mercedes-AMG GT 63 4MATIC+ 4-Door Coupe, updated in 2023 with an additional 'E Performance' PHEV flagship variant.

Driving Experience

It's savagely quick of course. The 639hp '63S 4MATIC+' model's 4.0-litre twin turbo V8 generates 900Nm of torque and gets to 62mph in just 3.2s en route to 196mph. The alternative is the '63S E Performance' version, which uses the same engine, but gains an extra 204hp from an electric motor mounted on the rear axle, creating a total output of 843hp. Only the AMG One Hypercar is faster. The 'E Performance' moniker means that the top variant is a plug-in hybrid, but don't get your hopes up on EV range because the 6.1kWh electric motor provides just 7.5 miles of it. Mercedes says it's there to aid performance rather than frugality. Though it doesn't have much impact on that to be honest, perhaps because the PHEV tech adds 289kg to the kerb weight (necessitating Mercedes-AMG to standardise carbon-ceramic brakes to stop it more easily). The 'E Performance' variant of this car is just 0.3s faster than the standard 63S version (at 2.9s) and its 196mph top speed is exactly the same. With both GT 63 4-Door Coupe models, the acceleration times assume you're using the provided 'RACE START' mode in the 9-speed SPEEDSHIFT MCT AMG auto gearbox, which comes with perfectly-sited steering wheel paddleshifters and software that blips the throttle on downshifts to the evocative accompaniment of popping and banging from the switchable AMG Performance exhaust system. What's even more impressive than the straight line speed though, is the way that the various chassis and drivetrain systems have been developed to interact in such a sophisticated manner. There are plenty of these, including torque vectoring and handling features developed specifically to improve the cornering stability and traction of this car, including an actively locking rear axle differential and rear wheel steering that turns the back wheels slightly in the same direction as the fronts at higher speeds. Another thing you don't get on a GT 2-Door is this car's 4MATIC+ 4WD system, which usually channels drive to the rear wheels, with those at the front called into action on the occasions (which will be frequent if you're pushing on) when all that torque twist is too much for the rears to handle on their own. The 'S' variant also features an extra 'Drift' mode for track use that disconnects the clutch from the front wheels to allow for lurid, power-sliding circuit drifts. 'Drift Mode' only works in the most extreme setting that this model's incorporated 'AMG DYNAMIC SELECT' drive programme system can offer, a 'RACE' mode that's also exclusive to the 'S' variant as part of an 'AMG DYNAMIC PLUS' package that additionally includes dynamic engine mounts. The other selectable 'DYNAMIC SELECT' options - 'Comfort', 'Slippery', 'Sport' and 'Sport+' - are common to both GT 4-Door models and as you would expect, influence throttle response, gearshift timings, steering, exhaust note and stability settings. Plus they include integrated 'AMG DYNAMICS' handling programmes, which have a lot to do with this car's sublime chassis and drivetrain interaction. The balance here has clearly been chosen to favour track behaviour rather than ordinary urban or highway use. But this model is still an eminently usable commuting tool or trans-continental luxury GT when you need it to be.

Design and Build

One look at this car is enough to convince you of the seriousness of its intent. The front end certainly offers the required level of overtaking presence, courtesy of a broad, wide 'shark nose' that sees carbon fibre-trimmed MULTIBEAM LED headlights flank a full 'Panamerica'-style vertically-slated AMG grille. At the wheel, it's certainly not much like an AMG GT 2-Door. Rather than a low-slung seating position that sees you peering out of a letter box windscreen at a bonnet stretching into the distance, it really feels more like a sportily-trimmed CLS or an E-Class. The key differences though, lie with the grippy sports seats, this AMG Performance flat-bottomed three-spoke wheel and this so-called 'AMG DRIVE UNIT' lower console. This delivers configurable buttons for the car's key dynamic features and incorporates both a tiny AMG gearstick and a touchpad for the COMMAND Online media system. This controls the infotainment part of the car's 'Widescreen Cockpit' display that as usual with a luxury Mercedes these days, sees two high-resolution 12.3-inch screens shunted together beneath a bonded glass cover. In the rear, there are three seat layouts you can order, two with a couple of separate chairs and one with a three-person rear bench. Either way, it's not actually too bad in terms of space to spread out, leg room aided by the particularly slim front seats with their scalloped knee-level cut-outs. Out back, lift the tailgate and a large, if rather shallow cargo area, is then revealed, 456-litres in size in the standard 63S model. That figure falls to 335-litres with the 'E Performance' PHEV version.

Market and Model

Two versions of this Mercedes-AMG GT 63 4MATIC+ 4-Door Coupe model are available. There's the 639hp S model, offered only in 'Premium Plus' form and priced at around £156,500. But ideally you'd prefer the manic 'E Performance' PHEV variant, which offers 843hp and is priced at just under £179,000. That's an awful lot of money but there's no doubt that in return, you're getting an awful lot of car. Let's position this contender for you within the Mercedes-AMG line-up. The engineering format here could be said to be closest to that of a Mercedes-AMG E 63 S 4MATIC+ saloon or estate, which uses a 612hp version of the same V8 engine and in saloon form costs around £100,000. But it lacks four-wheel steering and other elements of this car's dynamic configurability. And in any case of course, it's not a coupe. An arguably closer Affalterbach-engineered contender to the kind of car this is, is the Mercedes-AMG CLS 53 4MATIC, which gives you a very similar 4-Door Coupe body style and is powered by a 3.0-litre six cylinder EQ Boost twin turbo engine developing 435hp for around £82,000. Or you could have the same '53'-series engine with the Mercedes E-Class Coupe 2-Door body style for around £67,000. Either way, you'd get yourself a car that would take only a fraction more than a second longer than the GT 63 4MATIC+ S 4-Door to get you from rest to 62mph. Which might make you pause to think, given that an 'AMG 53' CLS or E-Class Coupe costs basically half as much.

Cost of Ownership

Given that this GT 4-Door model is a massive 400kgs heavier than its 2-Door GT showroom stablemate, you'd expect that it would be considerably pricier to run. But if it had been, this car would have ended up way behind the fuel and CO2 figures of its most direct segment rivals, so an enormous amount of work has gone into this car's efficiency measures. Just how much becomes obvious when you learn that the standard GT 63 S model's WLTP combined cycle fuel return (up to 21.1mpg) matches that of a much less powerful GT 2-Door. And this 4-Door design's WLTP CO2 showing (303g/km in 'S' form) is considerably better. You might hope that the stats for the alternative Plug-in Hybrid 'E Performance' 4-Door Coupe would be much better - and actually they are; 35.8mpg and 180g/km of CO2. The most obvious rivals for the base 63S variant - BMW's M8 Gran Coupe and Porsche's Panamera Turbo - both do marginally better in terms of efficiency, but there isn't a great deal in it. The key rival for this Mercedes in its 'E Performance' PHEV form is the Panamera in its fastest Turbo S E-Hybrid plug-in form.

Summary

If AMG had merely added weight, size, power and complexity to its GT sportscar to create this top 4-Door model, the result might have been impressive but ultimately, it would have been unsatisfying. The name of this car suggests that approach but thankfully, the sublime execution here is very different. For us, this is, quite simply, the most impressive piece of design that Affalterbach has brought us so far. Overall, we find ourselves rather smitten with this GT 4-Door model. It may not have the lottery-winning looks of its 2-Door sportscar showroom stablemate, but it'll be a darn sight easier to live with. Not only is it more accommodating but it'll look after you better when you're pushing on - or when conditions might be slippery. Yet it can still reward your inner F1 fantasies better than any other rival should you ever take it on track. It is quite simply, an immense achievement. And a remarkable piece of engineering.