If you want the ultimate expression of prestige and class wrapped in a grand touring body, then you want a Bentley Continental GT. It’s big, stylish, has a super-smooth ride, and plenty of power. While some feel that Rolls-Royce has become the ultimate expression of extravagance, Bentley has retained its class and appeal by building cars for people who love to drive, not just show off their wealth.
The Continental GT Speed combines Bentley’s long history of large, powerful, luxury coupes and leans into its racing heritage with power coming from a twin-turbocharged 12-cylinder engine, making a relentless 650 horsepower and 664 lb-ft of torque. It may have the Speed badge, but the Conti GT Speed doesn’t compromise on the true luxury or detail demanded by Bentley’s clients – and so it’s priced accordingly. Our tester came with a $370,000 price tag, with around $80,000 of that being options.
Unfortunately, this isn’t just a test drive review of a phenomenal car; it’s also a goodbye to the W12 engine in series production form, as Bentley has announced the end of its production by the end of April 2024.
Exterior: Stealth Wealth
To the average person in traffic, the Bentley Continental GT, even in Speed form, isn’t as instantly identifiable as a Rolls-Royce. That’s part of its appeal, to our mind, as it doesn’t demand attention in traffic outside of looking like an impressively elegant – yet muscular – car. When you give it attention, however, you’re rewarded with details like the cut-crystal-styled LED Matrix headlights, intricately detailed rear lights, and wonderfully sharp bodywork creases. Then there’s what you don’t see, which is an ugly third brake light. Instead, that’s blended in as a narrow strip between the top of the trunk and the roof line. If you’re really paying attention, you’ll notice the shape of the tail lights match the exhaust outlet.
Typically, the classic long hood and short rear deck would result in a small trunk, but the Continental GT is long and wide. There’s plenty of room in the trunk for long weekends, and it’s treated like the rest of the interior with soft carpeting that makes it feel incredibly luxurious.
Interior: Pure Comfort
Despite the use of Alcantara, a hardwearing yet velvety synthetic suede material, and carbon fiber stretching across the dashboard, there’s no true race car feeling inside the Bentley Continental GT. The seats are adjustable to the nth degree, heated, ventilated, and will give you a massage while you cruise down the freeway. The carpeting is plush, the analog clock is understated yet beautiful, and the steering wheel is wrapped in a combination of leather and Alcantara. The seats are leather, the dash is leather, the door cards are leather, and the stitching is perfect throughout. Everywhere you touch has texture, and even the glove box is lined with a velvety material.
There’s fine detail in the knurling of switches and dials, while the aluminum stalks you push and pull to adjust the air vents bring a lovely old-school touch to the interior, reminding you that Bentley has history. The center console is full of switches and dials, yet it has been beautifully thought through and we never found ourselves hunting for a button. It’s a lesson in tactile ergonomics and a sophisticated middle finger to the idea everything should be on a tablet or massive display mounted in or on the dash.
Infotainment: A Missed Opportunity
When you start the Bentley Continental GT, a section of the carbon fiber across the dash rotates to reveal a touchscreen, and it’s a satisfying feature with some intricate engineering behind it. However, you’re greeted with Audi’s touchscreen interface which, while functionally is one of the best on the market, isn’t as graphically beautiful as it should be in a Bentley by a long shot.
The same goes for the driver’s digital gauge display. However, all the feature boxes for a luxury vehicle have been ticked, including wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.
Powertrain: A Masterpiece
The beast of a hand-built twin-turbo 12-cylinder engine is the headline, but there’s a lot more going on that. The Continental GT speed uses a slick active all-wheel-drive system with a torque-vectoring rear differential. It needs to be one of the best all-wheel-drive systems in the world as it has to handle 650 hp and 664 lb-ft of torque when the driver drops the hammer. Up to 97 percent of the torque can be sent to the back wheels, meaning the GT Speed can leave a standing start with real venom, hitting 60 mph in 3.5 seconds.
Only the most uncouth lead-footed driver would be so unseemly as to use the launch control feature… so we tried it. The engine starts burbling and popping, the back squats down, then the front lifts up, and the world starts whooshing past alarmingly quickly. This car has the ability to embarrass some much lighter, smaller American muscle cars. All this happens while you and your passenger enjoy a back massage from the seats.
On The Road: Balanced Perfection
The Continental GT Speed has four drive modes: Comfort, Bentley, Sport, and Custom. Comfort puts the suspension at its softest and the engine at its quietest with reduced throttle response. Sport hardens the suspensions, opens up the pipes, and increases throttle response, while the Bentley mode is somewhere in between. Bentley mode is the standard and gives the car a relaxing yet authoritative demeanor. It’s the mode you want when traffic is light, and there’s a long winding road ahead, but you’re in no real hurry and just enjoying the act of driving. There’s no harshness from the suspension in any of the modes, mainly due to the magic of the adaptive stabilizer bars. It allows the suspension to remain compliant but reduces chassis lean dramatically in Bentley and Sport mode.
Comfort mode is perfect for restrictive traffic or when there’s a passenger to impress in the car. The ride is cushioned and the car is easy to drive smoothly, once you master the initial heavy bite from the upgraded brakes. The ride is never quite serene, but it feels like old-school luxury, and that’s as much of an emotional feeling as a physical one. It’s quiet in the cabin without sacrificing the important sensation sound brings from the outside; likewise, bumps in the road don’t disappear but they are smoothed out, and the chassis never leans too much on a bend or a corner. These are impressive considering the Continental GT Speed weighs over 5,000 pounds.
The power from the W12 and its ability to move the Conti GT from a standing start is astounding, but in the real world, that power will be used for overtaking slow, dull traffic. From any speed, it seems, the GT Speed just goes, and goes, and goes. Overtaking is a big whoosh of controlled power – dispatched with no fuss. Get heavier with the peddle, and it becomes hilariously fast. It’s a car worth taking to a track at least once just to see what it can do without the throttling of road law.
Sport mode is for when there’s no passenger, and the driver wants to have some fun and manhandle 5,000 pounds of engineering magic on a backroad. While it’s not an outright sports car, the GT Speed is surprisingly nimble, maintaining a huge amount of grip. The steering also doesn’t have that sports car feel, but there’s not much to fault in Sport mode – to be fair, there’s nothing to fault in any other mode, either.
Overall, the Continental GT never feels as big to drive as its footprint suggests and the speed has some serious legs on it. It’s a Grand Tourer in the traditional sense of the word – we can’t think of a better or easier way on four wheels to cover serious ground.
Conclusion: Getting What You Pay For
We spent a glorious two weeks with Continental GT Speed, and it helped us understand the difference between luxury and premium. Premium is nice, but luxury is in the details that add up to a full experience. For example, when you open the trunk of the Continental GT, the rear badge is the button, and it opens incredibly quietly and smoothly and at just the right speed. Someone has spent time and effort engineering a way to ensure that opening and closing the trunk is not just effortless with no need to hunt for a button, but also that they won’t be waiting for it to open or getting caught off guard in a rush. And that’s just the trunk.
Conversely, the infotainment system doesn’t have much Bentley magic dust sprinkled over it, which is a disappointment after the way the rotating display presents it. It’s not a big blight on the overall package, though, as it’s still one of the best systems in terms of usability and functionality.
What do you compare the Bentley Continental GT Speed to? The Rolls-Royce Wraith is the closest match, but the last models of that ultra-lux coupe rolled off the production line in 2023 and now the Spectre takes up the mantle as the only coupe in the lineup – and that’s fully electric. The Wraith was arguably the better pure luxury car, as evidenced by its superlative price tag. However, it lacks the Bentley’s old-money feel and driving thrill. BMW offers the M8 Coupe as a purer driver’s car, but that can’t deliver the Bentley’s prestige or luxury feel and ride.
The Bentley Continental GT Speed delivers something special as a blend of luxury and performance that also marries the old-school with the new – despite all the electronic wizardry, the Continental GT feels like an analog car to drive. It also has the W12 engine that takes 65 hours to be built by hand and ends production in April. We will never see anything like it again. It is truly a special car that justifies its price tag for those who can afford it.