- GMC’s full-size SUV positive factors a brand new flagship off-road trim
- All Yukon fashions get a brand new sprint with a large central display
- Air suspension convincingly hides the Yukon’s trucky platform
In its new AT4 Final trim, the 2025 GMC Yukon tries exhausting to do a whole lot of issues, lots of which appear to cancel out each other.
Meaty all-terrain tires wrap 20-inch alloy wheels which are awfully huge for real-world off-road use. The distinctive pink tow hooks projecting from a bumper carved inward to enhance the strategy angle distinction with underbody lighting that illuminates once you strategy the automobile. Even the upholstery sends a combined sign with its buttery comfortable leather-based contrasting with rubbery textured inserts.
What precisely does the Yukon AT4 Final wish to be? A rough-and-tumble off-roader or a real Land Rover Vary Rover rival with an eye-popping six-figure price ticket?
After driving the revamped Yukon for every week, I discovered that it may be each—although it spreads itself skinny within the course of.
2025 GMC Yukon AT4 Final
2025 GMC Yukon AT4 Final
2025 GMC Yukon AT4 Final
GMC Yukon: A giant inside improve
The 2025 Yukon has a recent face and a brand new inside in comparison with final yr. Styling tweaks exterior are largely incremental; the C-clamp headlights are a bit extra advanced than final yr, every trim stage’s grille has revised floor detailing, and GMC has recent wheel designs. There’s solely a lot GMC can do to a two-box SUV that shares its bones with the Chevy Tahoe and Cadillac Escalade, in any case.
The inside is far completely different. Gone is final yr’s quirky, space-robbing push/pull transmission management panel on the sprint. As an alternative, you tug a fragile steering column stalk. (Hey, wasn’t that the way in which SUVs have been shifted as soon as upon a time?)
It’s a giant step to climb into the Yukon’s cabin, although the power-deploying working boards with the Final package deal assist out. It’s huge and spacious, if not precisely ethereal. Blame my check automobile’s all-black leather-based upholstery, trim, and headliner, although the outsized sprint and heart console handle to make the entrance seating space really feel surprisingly confined. The seats themselves have simply eight methods of adjustment even within the prime Final trim, although they’re heated and cooled, and blessed with a therapeutic massage perform.
All trim ranges from the Elevation (which mixes final yr’s SLE and SLT grades right into a single trim) as much as the highest AT4 and Denali variations get a giant 16.8-inch touchscreen on the middle of the sprint. A giant quantity knob sits within the decrease heart of the display, whereas a handful of toggle switches are nestled under. The display can really feel too huge. I needed to lean ahead to entry something on the correct facet. It’s programmed with a superb overlay of Google built-in tech. Entry to the Google Play retailer and Google Maps means some customers might not trouble with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, although they’re additionally on board.
Extra pixels are displayed on the massive digital instrument cluster in addition to the non-compulsory 8.0-inch rear-seat local weather management touchscreen. Final fashions—the package deal is obtainable on each the off-roady AT4 and the Escalade-lite Denali—embrace rear-seat leisure screens for outboard middle-row passengers. Right here, too, the Yukon leverages Google’s connectivity by way of streaming providers like YouTube.
The AT4’s newly non-compulsory Final package deal swaps in additional Bose audio system, a head-up show, energy launch for the second-row bucket seats, and the superb Tremendous Cruise hands-free/eyes-on driver-assistance tech. At almost $20,000 greater than a typical AT4, the trim stage is dear. My check automobile was loaded as much as about $102,000 with the aforementioned underside lighting, heavy-duty rubber liners, and the Enhanced Trailering Know-how Bundle that may work with trailer-mounted cameras. I actually gasped once I learn its price ticket.
2025 GMC Yukon AT4 Final
2025 GMC Yukon AT4 Final
2025 GMC Yukon AT4 Final
Yukon AT4 Final: That dreamy air suspension
Beneath, the Yukon has extra in widespread with a pickup truck than it does opponents just like the Vary Rover, Infiniti QX80, and BMW X7. Its separate ladder body connects to the wheels and tires by way of an unbiased entrance suspension and a strong rear axle. Coil springs come on most variations, although they’re augmented by magnetic dampers on the AT4. Air springs come on Final variations, although they’re non-compulsory on the usual AT4. They’re value it for as little as $2,060 within the Premium Trailering Bundle.
Between the tall tire sidewalls and the cossetting nature of an air suspension, the Yukon AT4 canceled out awful pavement under. The electrical energy steering has little in the way in which of suggestions, and the Yukon leans significantly into corners, however this huge SUV makes no effort to be sporty. Tapping Sport mode makes the journey surprisingly exhausting and jittery; I can solely think about what it might be like with the Denali Final’s obtainable 24-inch alloy wheels wrapped in a mere rubber band of rubber. Typically, the AT4 is hushed and comfy, even with the restricted rough-road use I used to be in a position to pattern because of a giant snowstorm throughout my analysis interval.
The usual Yukon stretches 210.1 inches between its bumpers and measures a gargantuan 81.0 inches huge. Add one other 15.1 inches to make the Yukon XL, which has extra legroom for riders in rows two and three plus an excellent greater cargo space. Even the quick one is just too huge to be genuinely helpful off-road, although it did a superbly wonderful job plowing by means of deep snow. It’s going to nearly actually get you to your cabin. I by no means encountered sufficient recent powder to want to lift the Yukon’s air suspension, although GMC says it might probably hike itself up by about two inches. It additionally hunkers down a bit ostensibly to enhance stability and aerodynamics at freeway speeds.
Elevation and AT4 fashions include a 355-hp 5.3-liter V-8, a model of which GM has been bolting into its huge SUVs and vans for a technology. I haven’t sampled it within the Yukon, however it’s exhausting to think about the way it will present blistering efficiency provided that the fleetest Yukon within the lineup nonetheless weighs north of 5,600 kilos. Oddly, the 5.3-liter has the best most towing score: 8,400 kilos. Different variations can lug as much as 8,200 kilos.
The very best wager right here is the 6.2-liter V-8, which places out 420 hp and 460 lb-ft of torque. It’s clean and silent, and possibly a more sensible choice for many than the curiously positioned 3.0-liter turbodiesel inline-6. That engine is an costly $9,305 improve within the AT4 and the Denali ($6,810 greater than the 6.2), but it prices $1,500 lower than the 6.2 in Final guise. V-8 fashions are estimated to return 15 mpg metropolis, 20 freeway, 17 mixed at finest; the 6.2-liter slices 1 to 2 mpg off these figures. Estimates for the late-introduction diesel have but to be posted.
All Yukons use the 10-speed computerized transmission that GM developed with Ford. Right here, it’s fairly well-tuned, although it often fumbled by means of gears in low-speed stop-and-go metropolis driving. It’s yet one more reminder that the gargantuan Yukon is best-suited to the open street—or, not less than, to suburbia. There, the Yukon’s gearbox fades into the background, solely revealing itself when easily swapping down a couple of cogs for freeway passing or when climbing lengthy grades.
Placing the Yukon in Sport mode tightened up shifts, although it additionally delayed upshifts to the purpose at which I used to be starting to surprise when the massive V-8 would calm down at freeway speeds. There’s additionally an Off-Highway mode that dials again throttle response and remaps the traction management system and the digital limited-slip rear differential
Even by huge SUV requirements, the Yukon’s big roof pillars and tall sprint make it exhausting to see site visitors under. That makes the Yukon a chore to pilot on the town, although it’s of restricted consequence on the freeway with Tremendous Cruise engaged. The system prompts with a couple of bings and bongs, after which it does an excellent job maintaining the Yukon centered in its lane and away from site visitors whereas the driving force’s fingers relaxation away from the steering wheel and eyes keep on the street. I used to be significantly stunned to see that Tremendous Cruise labored simply wonderful even accounting for the Goodyear Wrangler Territory AT tires’ knobby tread sample. The system appears to be able to accounting for the inevitable wander from knobby tires.
2025 GMC Yukon Denali Final
2025 GMC Yukon Denali Final
2025 GMC Yukon Denali Final
GMC Yukon: Is the Denali Lastly the One to Have?
The AT4 Final would possibly seem to be the Yukon you need—it’s within the identify, not less than. However at $95,795 to start out with the diesel engine and $97,295 with the 6.2-liter V-8, it’s a doubtful worth. Even at that worth level, its Tahoe roots present by means of an excessive amount of in the way in which of exhausting plastics on the door panels and so-so entrance seats. The 6.2-liter V-8 can also be sturdy and highly effective, however it’s not as sturdy because the forced-induction engines in most rivals.
With beginning costs starting from $68,895 to nearly seven figures, GMC is spreading the Yukon too skinny.
For maybe the primary time ever, one of the best ways to construct a Yukon could also be to choose the Denali trim stage. There, GMC costs $5,630 so as to add a collection of packages together with its prime trailer-tow tech, Tremendous Cruise, and the air suspension. So-equipped, it prices $88,125. That’s much more than the bottom Yukon Elevation, and but the Denali principally justifies its price ticket. It’s arguably essentially the most targeted model of the Yukon now, too; if all you need is a giant, tow-ready SUV, you would possibly as nicely stick to the Chevy Tahoe. And if you wish to be pampered, the Cadillac Escalade delivers official six-figure dazzle.
