• Plenty of space for a family
• Boot size lacking compared to rivals
• Seven-seat RX L available

How much space is there?

The RX is a long and wide car, and doesn’t worry about trying to cram seven seats into a compact footprint. That means that it’s superbly comfortable for up to five occupants, with lots of headroom, loads of legroom and a sliding and slightly reclining rear bench that allows you to balance out passenger space and boot room.

The fifth passenger might find it a squeeze in the middle rear seat but the rear bench isn’t too sculpted, so they won’t feel too perched. And in their absence, a wide armrest can be folded down.

Isofix car seat mounting points can be found in the outer rear seats, but there isn’t one in the front passenger seat which is a shame and limits car seat flexibility.

18

Boot space and storage

There are only 453 litres of space on offer in the boot of the Lexus RX, or 924 litres with all the seats folded away. That’s not a huge amount of room – the much cheaper SEAT Tarraco offers 700 litres with five seats in place, the more expensive Range Rover Sport 647. Much of this is due to the hybrid system’s batteries, which are mounted underneath the boot floor and have the effect of raising it.

This also means that the boot’s quite a long way off the ground, and the sloping tailgate means the space isn’t very tall – worth noting if you’ve a large dog who’ll want to sit upright in the back.

A powered tailgate is a neat addition, though – you simply hold your hand over the Lexus badge on the tailgate and it’ll open.

18

Safety

• Five-star Euro NCAP rating
• Lots of safety kit as standard
• Tested to an older specification, though

The Lexus RX holds a five-star crash test safety rating from Euro NCAP. It’s worth noting, though, that it achieved this way back in 2015, when the test was significantly less stringent and didn’t test the effectiveness of items like the car’s autonomous emergency braking or lane-keeping aids.

That doesn’t mean it’s an unsafe car, though, and high scores for adult and child occupant protection will be reassuring to any who want to use this as a family vehicle.

All models get a sophisticated AEB system, updated in 2020 to detect pedestrians and cyclists, and higher trims include nice touches like a 360-degree parking camera, rear cross-traffic alert, blind-spot monitors and matrix LED headlights.