2021 Subaru Outback variant review: Base vs Sport

If you were to look up “practical” in the dictionary, you may well find a picture of the Subaru Outback.

Since the mid-90s, families with an eye to the outdoors have been drawn to the jacked-up wagon for its combination of all-wheel-drive and massive interior space.

The sixth-generation Outback launched this year carries over this appeal and continues to be something of a jack of all trades.

Sometimes cars aiming to please everyone end up making compromises everywhere and pleasing no one — though thankfully, it’s not the case here: the Outback was the biggest selling large SUV in Australia in March.

We had the base model and mid-spec Sport variants back-to-back over two weeks (we missed out on the top-spec Touring), which included a family trip to Balingup where the Outback’s appeal was plain to see.

As always, it absolutely swallowed every bit of luggage we could throw at it with space to spare, while we all enjoyed great head and legroom and visibility.

But a real highlight was the ride quality. The Outback was comfortable and composed on just about every surface, despite 18-inch wheels as standard.

That said, coarse surfaces could throw up noticeable road noise at high speeds.

Though not a genuine off-roader, the Outback certainly isn’t a soft-roader either.

The elevated ground clearance and all-wheel-drive easily handled gravel roads and mild tracks without even needing to engage the more off-road-capable drive modes on offer.

A big change has been made to the Outback’s interior.

Subaru’s signature dash-mounted display has been ditched in favour of a massive 11.4-inch portrait display.

It largely works well, though takes a bit of time to work out how to navigate.

Subaru has wisely left the heating and cooling controls as physical buttons — there is nothing worse than waiting for loading screens when sitting in a scorching hot car.

A lot was made at launch about Australian market Outbacks not receiving the turbo engine available overseas.

The naturally aspirated unit we get is a capable and frugal-enough engine. A tad more oomph would make the Outback a more solid proposition given Subaru is pitching it as its flagship model.

But while prices have gone up compared with the previous generation, it feels worth it.

Among standard gear is Subaru’s Eyesight safety suite, which now includes lane centring, autonomous emergency steering, reverse cross traffic alert with auto braking, emergency lane-keep assist, speed sign recognition with intelligent speed limiter and more.

We’ve long found Eyesight to be too intrusive and while you do get somewhat accustomed to the constant beeping, we still found ourselves angrily telling the car to zip it on regular occasion.

A lack of front parking sensors was also a bummer.

The Sport variant adds $4500 to the asking price but also adds water-repellent sports seat trim, heated front and rear outboard seats, front and side-view monitors, black exterior highlights, a hands-free powered tailgate with height memory, roof rails with green highlights, built-in sat nav and a dark metallic finish for the alloy wheels.

On paper, it seems worth it, but in practice we’d opt for the base model.

It offers the same engine and fundamental appeal without missing out on anything we deem essential (thought the Sport seat trim is very plush).

Not to mention, the Sport’s built-in sat nav is one of the more annoying and fiddly to use.

VERDICT

The Outback retains its core appeal while leaping forward in other areas. We’d pick the base model over the Sport given it has the same engine, AWD and practicality while still having a generous features list. Eyesight is still an annoyance, mind.

2021 SUBARU OUTBACK AUSTRALIAN SPECIFICATIONS

• Variants reviewed Outback; Sport
• Prices $39,990; $44,490
• Engine 2.5-litre four-cylinder petrol
• Output 138kW/245Nm
• Transmission CVT automatic, AWD
• Fuel economy 7.3L/100km