2026 Cadillac Escalade Road Trip Review: Dream Cruiser or Letdown?

• What's new: I took the Cadillac Escalade on a weeklong trip from New York up to New England for a friend’s wedding. 
• Why it matters: The Escalade is Cadillac’s range-topping SUV and best-seller — it's the distillation of the values of the brand. 
• Edmunds says: There's so much this car gets right, but as a flagship six-figure SUV, I had some expectations that were not met. 

Cadillac's 21-speaker AKG audio system usually impressed. A powerful subwoofer and a wide soundstage delivered the breadth and depth I'd expect here. But, there were some songs I played where a low note in a repeating bass line would consistently excite a rattle in the dash. I shouldn't be hearing that in a six-figure SUV with less than 10,000 miles on the clock. 

But ... the interior details

I appreciate the Escalade's control layout. Where some automakers put all your controls through one giant, distracting touchscreen in the spirit of minimalism (read: cost-saving), Cadillac retains physical controls for the mirrors, doors, hazard lights and volume. Plus, they give you a center control knob between the seats if you don't want to reach forward and poke at the screen. No notes.

But the details of that control knob are way off. It feels plasticky, and the force required to press it down and make a selection is way too high for a car like this. It sounds hollow and cheap when you press it down, too, like an Easy Button you'd buy at Staples in 2005. It's a nitpick, sure, but this is one of the primary control interfaces in a six-figure flagship. Luxury is sensation; it's what you see, hear, smell and touch. That part of the Escalade interior does not feel luxurious. 

Materials are mostly great elsewhere. The leather upholstery is appropriately thick and heavy, and the brushed metal detailing on the interior door handles is fabulous. I especially appreciated the depth of Cadillac's badging. As countless automakers have subtly flattened and smoothed out their badges over the past decade, the Cadillac crest on the grille, steering wheel, and tailgate is a masterclass. There's color, texture and dimension here that exhibit craftsmanship fitting of an SUV like this, especially when you press on the massive rear badge to open the tailgate. 

But what's going on with this wood on the dash? Cadillac went to great lengths to create this expansive swath of beautifully crafted marquetry to sit beneath that huge screen, balancing the tech side of modern luxury with Cadillac's heritage of traditional craftsmanship ... and then they go and cover it with shiny, cheap-feeling plasticky lacquer. The result would look more appropriate in my high school 1997.5 Buick Regal than in a 2026 luxury flagship.

But ... the driving

This is the only full-size luxury SUV left with a naturally aspirated V8, and I love it. The amount of low-end torque on tap here means I barely had to breathe on the throttle for lazy highway passes or acceleration from a stop up a steep grade, and the sound at full throttle was enticing enough for me to floor it at most highway on-ramps. Sure, our testing shows all of the Escalade's turbocharged six-cylinder competitors are actually quicker to 60 mph, but the experience of using this engine is excellent.

But it's not an efficient vehicle. To be fair, on one tank I tracked, I averaged 18.5 mpg across over 300 miles, which is better than the EPA rating and mid-pack for what we'd expect from a full-size luxury SUV. But you'll still spend a ton of money on fuel — around $92 of premium gas to cover 300 miles based on current national averages. Compared to the ~$24 you'd spend to drive the same distance in an electric Escalade IQ or the ~$58 you'd spend in a smaller but similarly luxurious BMW X5, it's a big cost. 

Super Cruise rocks. Seeing the green light on the steering wheel illuminate and knowing I'm on a mapped section of highway so I can go hands off the wheel, feet off the pedals for a while? Love it, and it's standard on the Escalade. The aid came in extra handy near the end of longer hauls during which my desire to drive was being stretched quite thin.

But I only love it when it works. Even on the same oft-traveled highways, I'd get regular interruptions saying I was entering an unmapped bit of road and that I'd need to retake control. This came way more often than it has in the Fords, BMWs and Teslas I've driven that also have hands-free driving. And when using the regular, non-hands-free lane centering, the car regularly asked me to put my hands back on the wheel when they were already there. 

Great car, but …

I like the Escalade. It's a do-almost-anything luxury car with glimpses of excellence — the screen, those badges, the engine, all that wood and leather. But it's the details where Cadillac let me down on this trip. 

Luxury is a hard thing to measure. It's the sensations and details that take a car from having the right features or ticking the right boxes to elevating those elements to something greater. The Escalade has some great elements, but at least on this trip, during a warm wedding week in southern New England, Cadillac's icon didn't quite deliver.