Porsche Cayenne hybrid interior, dashboard & comfort

The Porsche Cayenne E-Hybrid has an interior that is understated yet impeccably finished, offering appropriately expensive materials as well as top-notch technology. Just go easy on the options, as there are some basics – including keyless entry and heated seats – that you have to pay extra for, before you get carried away with carbon fibre interior inserts and premium sound system upgrades.

Porsche Cayenne hybrid dashboard

The Cayenne E-Hybrid’s dashboard is hard to fault. There’s an appropriately expensive-feeling blend of materials that look great, while the panel of touch-sensitive buttons that control the air conditioning and adaptive car controls are all logically marked and make a satisfying click when you touch them.

The digital dials are crisp and easy to read, and can display a vast array of information, including your sat nav map or hybrid information. It can also be simplified with fairly classic-looking dials. The driving position is good, with standard electric seat adjustment for the seats, although disappointingly you’ll have to spend quite a bit extra to get adjustable lumbar support.

We’d still recommend you do this as it improves the driving position and helps to stave off an achy back on long journeys. The raised central spine separates the driver and passenger, providing a useful armrest and also a sense of having your own, comfortable zone.

Equipment, options & accessories

Porsche are masters at making a car that appears to be well equipped as standard when you start delving into the configurator, but you’ll still want to add many, many thousands of pounds of optional kit if you want to get the best from the car.

The Cayenne E-Hybrid is no different, coming with automatic wipers and LED headlights, cruise control, two-zone climate control, leather upholstery, and front and rear parking sensors. However, the list of items that you’ll probably want to add is even longer, and includes keyless entry, heated front seats, ambient interior lighting, a panoramic glass roof, reversing camera, adaptive cruise control and lane keep assist with traffic sign recognition.

The only standard paint colour is white, too, so you’re probably going to want to pay for metallic paint, and there’s an array of interior finishes including carbon fibre and Alcantara upgrades that you could easily get carried away with. And don’t forget the air suspension and public charging cable.

2022 brought a slightly sportier-styled version of the Cayenne E-Hybrid and E-Hybrid coupe, known as the Platinum Edition. It’s immediately distinguishable from the standard model by its paint finish and 21-inch ‘Spyder’ alloy wheels. Exterior trim pieces are also painted with a co-ordinating finish exclusive to this model. Other sporty touches include different tailpipes and darker side-window surrounds. The Platinum Edition is also available in a choice of other colours, including an exclusive grey known as ‘Crayon’.

The theme is continued inside, with Platinum Edition branding as well as ‘Crayon’-coloured seatbelts, silver and aluminium trim pieces, tinted windows and a panoramic sunroof. Extra technology and driver convenience equipment includes adaptive headlights, a Bose sound system, ambient lighting, eight-way power-adjustable leather sports seats and an analogue dashboard clock.

Infotainment, apps & sat nav

This is one area where Porsche really has upped its game with standard equipment. The only optional extras for the infotainment are Bose (included with the Platinum Edition) or range-topping Burmester sound systems, or you can add a CD changer as well. Otherwise, the wide touchscreen system comes with everything you’d want, including sat-nav, digital radio, Bluetooth and audio streaming, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

It’s a great touchscreen system that responds quickly and benefits from top-notch graphics as well as physical shortcut buttons to help you navigate, not to mention the ability to control much of the system via the steering wheel. Those buttons and wheel-mounted scroll functions are useful, too, as the sheer array of features and menus can be a bit overwhelming at first.

Spend a bit of time prodding the menus and you’ll also find dedicated hybrid information giving you kWh readouts and instant power-flow graphics, as well as the setting to activate pre-warming or cooling, and dedicated charging times to make the most of off-peak tariffs.

Despite all this, it doesn’t take much time to get used to just how extensive the system is and where the core features and controls are, and there’s no doubting that this is one of the best systems in the class – right up there with BMW’s iDrive.