Jaguar Land Rover unveils middle-of-the-range Velar

Jaguar Land Rover has unveiled the hotly anticipated Velar after teasing it on Twitter earlier this week.

The fourth member of the Range Rover family will be its second smallest, sitting between the Evoque and Sport models in the luxury carmaker’s line-up.

The British manufacturer describes the Velar, which will cost from £44,830, as “filling the white space” that it sees between the two. This is certainly true pricewise – the Evoque costs from £30,600, while the Sport is priced from £59,700.

It will be available with six powertrains ranging from the 178bhp 2.0-litre Ingenium diesel to the potent 375bhp supercharged 3.0-litre V6 petrol.

Range Rover claims that the Velar, which arrives at dealerships this summer, has been designed on the foundation of ‘reductionism’, which means ‘stripping away complexity to reveal true quality’. Despite this basic approach, though, it will come with a host of technological features, such as super-slim matrix laser-LED headlights, a Touch Pro Duo infotainment system with two high-definition 10-inch touchscreens, all-wheel drive with intelligent driveline dynamics, and Land Rover’s pioneering traction technologies.

Jeremy Hicks, the UK managing director of Jaguar Land Rover, said: “What really makes it stand out from the Evoque and the Sport is the design. There’s absolutely no switchgear inside and the dual infotainment screen, which is really about bringing technology to the forefront, is a step change for us. So it’s unmistakably Range Rover, but inside it’s a complete departure from where we’ve been before.”

While every Velar will feature all-wheel drive and adaptive dynamics damping technology, only the higher-powered, six-cylinder models will feature four-corner air suspension as standard.

A full suite of advanced safety systems including autonomous emergency braking with pedestrian detection, reverse traffic detection, and driver condition monitoring will also feature in the model.

“The new Range Rover Velar is a stunning addition to the Range Rover family. It enhances a model line-up that originally defined the luxury SUV segment and continues to do so,” Hicks added.

“Velar brings increased choice to new and existing customers in a growing SUV market. It leads the way in terms of design, usable technology, new materials and, of course, Land Rover’s legendary go-anywhere, do-anything capability.

“After we released the teaser and the name six days ago, we’ve had 12,000 people go online and give us their details to say ‘keep me informed’. Compare that to Evoque, and we had 3,000 names down in the same period, so I’m confident Velar will be a great success.”

By Laura Thomson