2025 BMW M5 First Drive Review: Hyperpowered Heavyweight

There is only one instance during my time with the 2025 BMW M5 where it feels its chunky, 5,390-pound (2,445-kilogram) curb weight.

It’s a derestricted part of the autobahn, somewhere north of Munich. With a fortuitous Audi RS e-tron acting as sweeper in front of us, I use up all of the throttle pedal’s travel and hold on around a gentle left curve. My drive partner and I see an indicated 255 km/h (158 mph) flash onto the instrument cluster just as an unassuming hatchback pulls in front of the Audi. Hard on the brakes. Harder.

It’s impossible to talk about BMW’s new super-sedan without the 1,000-pound increase, and I get it, I do. Yet after a day of blasting around the German countryside, it barely registers. Like M5s before it, the latest model is super accomplished. It’s not perfect, but my reservations center on aspects other than that weight.

It’s not as if the M5 has gained all this girth by way of nuggets of depleted uranium deposited around the chassis. In addition to the latest evolution of the brand’s twin-turbo “hot vee” V8 engine, the M5 is also packing an electric motor and a large 14.8-kilowatt-hour (usable) battery pack to feed it. The motor provides 194 horsepower and 207 pound-feet all on its own. Throw in standard all-wheel drive and no wonder the M5 is verging on forming its own gravitational pull.

There’s no more Competition option, at least for now. Every M5 will thus have the same outputs at launch: a big 717 horsepower and 738 lb-ft of torque. That’s just 21 horsepower shy of the XM Label, and the same torque figure, both new peaks for BMW cars. An eight-speed automatic remains the one transmission on offer.

The M treatment does a good job muscling up the latest 5 Series shape. For the first time in the model’s history it features wider rear fenders than the regular model, resulting in a mean stance. The lead designer explains that there is a focus on triangles here: the angular lower intakes pointing towards the roundel up front, and an inverted shape out back care of that enormous diffuser. Four 100-mm exhaust tips poke out below, just in case you weren’t sure of what this is. The kidney grille is the right shape, though it's now mostly filled in with black plastic, and lights up.

BMW arguably leads the market on fun colors, and the M5 is no exception, with a Skittles-like selection at the event including Isle of Man Green, Fire Red, Speed Yellow, and this wicked Daytona Violet.

Rather (in)famously, the new car isn’t quicker to 62 mph (100 km/h) than the outgoing model, accomplishing the task in the mid-to-low 3s. But like the first in a two-movie franchise capper, that only tells part of the story. With the near-instant torque-fill of the electric motor, the M5’s powertrain is primed and ready at any time to take a bite out of the horizon. It is silly quick, as the in-gear acceleration times attest. The 50–75 mph sprint, or 80–120 km/h, is done in just 2.2 seconds in fourth gear. It feels even quicker, because this is an M car we’re talking about, and that headline horsepower figure is seemingly just a starting point. There are of course multiple drive modes, as well as a Boost mode: hold the left paddle in for a second and everything switches to maximum attack for 10 seconds. Which is about 7 more than you need to hit jail speeds.

This isn’t a lazy turbo V8 either, but one that happily revs to 7,200 rpm. It won’t shift up if you bounce off the limiter in manual mode, either. It’s a muffled soundtrack though; there’s piped in fakeness, but even the most aggressive driving mode keeps the hooliganism at bay from outside. Thank (or blame) the extra particulate filter for the European market.

On the flip side, the M5 will cruise along on nothing but electrons with nearly the same grace as a regular i5 xDrive40. 194 horsepower doesn’t sound like much, but it’s enough to comfortably get up to (North American) highway speeds without waking the 4.4-liter V8.

Not that we keep it in electric mode for long. Even with both propulsion sources working in unison, the M5’s battery pack has generous recharge. Our early morning drive is over 80 miles (129 km), and yet the electric range estimate only drops by 10 miles (16 km). BMW expects range of about 30 or so miles (50 km) in North America, but I suspect that too is conservative, much like the electric range of the X5 PHEV.

If there’s a problem with the powertrain, it’s the shifter: a surprise given the exceptional work of the eight-speed in the last model. Select the most aggressive shift mode and each gear drives home with a thud, breaking up the performance flow. A spokesperson tells us this was an intentional move to increase drama for track driving, but to this butt, it feels awkward, not exciting. The middle setting is better, yet still has the occasional judder on half-throttle manual upshifts.

The country roads that make up our drive route are not wide. On more than one occasion, the M5’s outside steamroller rubber has to do the slightest of off-roading to avoid oncoming traffic. While this generation gains rear-wheel steer for even more agility, the M5 never gets to that “shrinks around you” feel. I am keenly aware of its embiggened proportions. Nonetheless, it is an obedient drive, the quick steering providing sharp responses even as the rain comes and goes a half-dozen times between lunch and the hotel. The weighting can be adjusted—like so many aspects of the experience, and then mapped to one of the two red M buttons on the steering wheel for quick access to tailored setups. No matter the setting, feedback through the rim is light.

The team has lined up one such set of custom settings, and when I prod the left M button, the M5 asks me to confirm stability control deactivation and the switch to rear drive. With 717 horsepower. As I learn here, it isn’t just the electronic trickery that’s keeping the M5 so ruthlessly grippy. The M active differential shuffles power between the rear wheels, tightening lines and vanquishing understeer. Switch back to AWD and it’s so aggressive the M5 grumbles in low-speed corners, like an SUV left in 4WD. Turn-is is sizzling, and the even the standard brakes have prodigious bite and fade resistance. Carbon ceramics are optional.

Listen to BMW tell it, and an M5 buyer profile is quite a lot different from that of an M3 or M4. Those models are the fun weekenders, the second (or third) cars. The M5 is likely to share the garage with a few other toys too, but it’s the car that will be pressed into duty throughout the week. It needs to be able to coddle as well as it excites.

And it delivers. The double-wishbone front suspension and five-link rear ably handle the rougher roads around Munich. The adaptive suspension is straight-up cushy in Comfort mode, the thwack of expansion joints under those wide tires the only giveaway of the M5’s potency.

The rest of the cabin sticks to the usual M script: plenty of black in leather or alcantara, with sprinklings of carbon fiber trim and various bits of M-color stitching for taste. The flat-bottom steering wheel gains a bright red 12-o’clock hash mark, and the “interaction bar” stretched along the dashboard will now glow the appropriate blue and red. I naturally switch it to more purple.

There are new sport seats for the M5, and they are excellent. Something of a blend between the standard seats and the thigh-spreader units of other models, the front thrones have plenty of lower back and shoulder support, keeping us firmly in place as the lateral gs build. A whole day of driving sees zero aches, too.

If the dark cabin is a little too business-like for your tastes, BMW will sell you bright red versions of the seats.

iDrive 8.5 is so close to being a truly great infotainment system. It looks slick, the rotary dial is still the best physical input device, and phone pairing is a cinch. It’s the details that dull the shine: a drive mode menu that doesn’t quickly fade back to the previous screen, too few physical buttons for basic controls, and an over-reliance on a tile-based menu. The little touch controls for the air-con vents take some getting used to, as well.

Dig some electronic vrooms? Iconic Sounds are alive and well, piped through the powerful Bowers & Wilkins audio system. A large and clear head-up display improves mission control, especially when you’re navigating unfamiliar German countryside.

The cost of entry for all this excess is $120,675 ($137,480 CAD) including destination. There isn’t much in the way of options for the M5, at least at launch. A carbon roof shaves 66 pounds off the top; the CC brakes another 55. There will be a Touring model, which comes with two firsts: this is the first time a long-roof has launched simultaneously with the sedan, and it’s the first time it will be available in North America. More on that one next week…

An optional M Driver’s Package tells the electronic nannies to look past the 155 mph (250 km/h) and to come back at 190 mph (305 km/h). Based on the evidence of at least one other driver at the event, that latter figure isn’t all the M5 has left in the tank either, though it’s probably not Corvette ZR1 fast. The M Driver’s Package is included as standard in Canada.

The 2025 BMW M5 left me perplexed. It is undoubtedly rapid, has grip for days, and will still shuttle four adults in comfort across vast distances. So it’s an M5, alright.

It also feels ever more removed from what M used to be. I can’t fault BMW for meeting customers where they are—it was another record year for M products in 2023—but I don’t believe a little more driver engagement would be a bad thing. As freakishly talented as the M5 is, it keeps you at arms’ length, all of the rear-steer this, adaptive everything that, and myriad drive settings layering in fuzzy interference. On the other hand, a plug-in approach might be the only way to maintain a V8 in the face of ever-tightening emissions standards. To keep the old, we must embrace the new—all 5,390 pounds of it.

Become an AutoGuide insider. Get the latest from the automotive world first by subscribing to our newsletter here.