• Few cars are as accommodating as this
• But you pay for it in terms of length and width
• Lots of storage space for family knick-knacks

How much space is there?

The Discovery is an enormous seven-seat car, and as expected, is brilliant for everyday family life.

Up front there’s plenty of space. Row two offers three seats suitable for adults, and the final two pews are also suitable for grown ups. Only the BMW X7 beats it in this class in terms of third-row space.

The seating positions are lofty, but the front seats are relatively low set in relation to the side windows to increase headroom.

Land Rover claims there’s 45 litres of storage room alone up front. This includes a deep centre console and a hidden area behind the ventilation controls.

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Boot space and storage

The boot is as impressively massive as the rest of the car. In standard five-seat mode there’s 1,137 litres of space in the rear, which shrinks to 258 litres with all seven seats up. With only the front two seats erect, it’s truly van-like with 2,406 litres on offer.

If you want to make full use of the huge boot, you’ll have to drop at least the third row of seats. Luckily, the Intelligent Seat Fold system allows the five rear seats to be individually folded or raised from the central touch screen, buttons on the seats themselves or in the boot and also via a dedicated mobile phone app.

The system can fold all the seats in 14 seconds when operated correctly, but it takes a little practice to navigate the menus and ensure the safety measures aren’t triggered which halts the electric mechanisms.

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Is it easy to park?

Without parking aids, this would be a tough car to tuck into a typical UK-sized bay. Visibility isn’t great, and your view of the corners is pretty much non-existent. There’s also no disguising its sheer size. At least there are large door mirrors to aid rearward visibility when manoeuvring.

There are some interesting things to help you, not least the ClearSight rear-view mirror – you can see what’s behind regardless of whether the back seats are occupied or not, while a profusion of cameras and all-round parking sensors help create a 3D view displayed in the centre screen when reversing.

Safety

• Plenty of safety kit included as standard
• A full five-star rating in the Euro NCAP test
• Cutting-edge driver-assistance tech available

The Land Rover Discovery has a full suite of safety kit fitted as standard, and scored a Euro NCAP crash-test rating of five stars when tested in 2017. Bear in mind that the test has become tougher since then.

Standard equipment includes front passenger and third row Isofix, Adaptive Cruise Control with Queue Assist, Lane Departure Warning, Lane Keep Assist, Traffic Sign Recognition with Intelligent Speed Limiter, Blind Spot Monitoring and Reverse Traffic Detection Blind Spot Assist

Watch: Land Rover Discovery Euro NCAP crash test video