{"id":39831,"date":"2026-06-19T13:48:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T13:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/39831\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T13:48:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T13:48:09","slug":"the-2026-mercedes-benz-amg-e53-wagon-packs-a-lot-of-punch-without-packing-a-v8","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/39831\/","title":{"rendered":"The 2026 Mercedes-Benz AMG E53 Wagon Packs a Lot of Punch Without Packing a V8"},"content":{"rendered":"

The biggest car news and reviews, no BS<\/p>\n

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What do you call a five-seat, four-door, long-roof car with 577 horsepower and 41 miles of all-electric range? With a 0-60 in the sub-4-second range and a top speed of 174 mph (with the proper package, mind you), you could certainly call it quick. Mercedes, meanwhile, calls it B-tier. <\/p>\n

Officially, it\u2019s called the Mercedes-Benz AMG E53 Wagon, and while you may scoff at the notion of something with nearly 600 hp playing second fiddle to anything, in this case, the name really says it all\u2014\u201d53\u2033. Not \u201c63\u201d or \u201c65\u201d\u2014the numerical designations for the company\u2019s top-flight, many-piston-powered monsters. Why? Simple; this get the bulk of its power not from a V8, but from a hybrid inline-six. Suffice it to say, Mercedes learned its lesson with the C63<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The Engine<\/p>\n

Benz\u2019s new 3.0-liter inline six makes 443 hp and 413 lb-ft of torque just by itself. It\u2019s smooth, linear and sounds quite good. This isn\u2019t the only car where we\u2019ve seen this engine<\/a>; it has taken over where Mercedes previously would have employed either a naturally-aspirated V8 or \u201cbiturbo\u201d V6.<\/p>\n

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In a world where Mercedes-Benz could get more volume out of a wagon, we imagine this engine (sans the electrical accompaniment) would have made for a solid AMG 45 model. <\/p>\n

The Motor<\/p>\n

The rest of the E53\u2019s oomph comes from an electric motor producing 161 hp and 354 lb-ft just by itself. That\u2019s plenty of torque to get the hefty E53 moving on its own, but not particularly quickly. With 161 hp and 5,401 pounds, it has the power-to-weight ratio of a diesel Chevy Suburban\u2026 in 1990.<\/p>\n

I gotta say it: That\u2019s not very AMG. <\/p>\n

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The Drive<\/p>\n

We often call out cars for their duality of character, but nothing really says \u201cDr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde\u201d quite like a car that transitions from 161 to 577 hp with the simple flick of a steering wheel knob. That\u2019s the E53 in a nutshell. And with the default drive program, you\u2019ll be doing exactly that every time you fire it up, because if the battery is sufficiently charged, the E53 wants to be an EV. Soon, maybe it will be<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Yep, it will start in electric-only mode so long as the battery isn\u2019t depleted. That\u2019s fine; you don\u2019t need 577 hp to get out of a parking space. And this makes a ton of sense for Europe, where many large municipalities have banned combustion-engine cars (apart from service vehicles and taxis) that aren\u2019t equipped with a hybrid system. This is why you see a lot of \u201clast-mile\u201d electric modes on European cars; they need to be compliant. Here in the States, this seems like a bit of a miss.<\/p>\n

My time with the wagon is coming to a close, and I\u2019ll have a more comprehensive review of the 2026 Mercedes-Benz AMG E53 in the coming weeks. Stay tuned!<\/p>\n

Got a news tip? Let us know at tips@thedrive.com!<\/p>\n

Byron is an editor at The Drive with a keen eye for infrastructure, sales and regulatory stories.<\/p>\n

\t\t\"The<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tCar Buying Service\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The biggest car news and reviews, no BS Our free daily newsletter sends the stories that really matter…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":39832,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20951],"tags":[35028,31298,21297,3622,21390],"class_list":["post-39831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mercedes-benz","tag-e-class-wagon","tag-hybrid-cars","tag-mercedes-amg","tag-mercedes-benz","tag-wagon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}