2018 VW Atlas

17 CUPHOLDERS! VW FINALLY GETS AMERICA

- Michael Febbo

My refrigerator holds all my food, keeps it perfectly chilled, and has never broken down—I still don’t love my refrigerator. I have that exact thought every time someone tells me they love their Ford Explorer or Toyota Sienna. I get it, you like the utility and the reliability, you probably even love the memories you’ve had in the thing, but you don’t actually love that big transportation appliance, do you? That’s the question I have about Volkswagen’s jump into the three-row family-hauler segment. Is the Atlas something you can love like other VWs, or is it just another family hauler?

As you may remember, I drove the Atlas in Canada a few months back on snow-covered forest roads to get a brief impression, mostly of the interior and overall livability. For a real taste of the driving experience, I traveled to Texas to put a few hundred miles on the VR6-powered version and get an idea of what daily life would be like with the American-built, yet still-somewhat-German-by-nature SUV.

Let’s start with a quick recap of Atlas’ size. While huge in terms of VWs, it is in fact a very mid-sized SUV competing with the likes of Ford Explorer, Toyota Highlander, Honda Pilot, Mazda CX-9, Nissan Pathfinder, and a mall parking lot full of others. There have been some questions about where the new Tiguan fits in with its latest redesign bumping it up to three rows as well. The Tiguan will compete against Ford Escape, Honda CR-V, Toyota Rav-4, etc. By the numbers, the Atlas has an additional 7.5 inches in wheelbase and 13.2 inches in overall length when compared to Tiguan. The long and short of it is you can fit adults in the third row of an Atlas, whereas the way back of the Tiguan is for kids or maybe small adults.