McLaren 720S vs McLaren Artura

What's the difference?

Past McLarens have been accused of being a bit soulless, but this one is alive. The last time I felt like this in a car was a Ferrari F12, one of the scariest but most brilliant cars I've ever driven. Except the 720S isn't scary on the road, just sheer genius.

The 720S doesn't necessarily beat the competition but it opens up new ways of doing supercar things. It's a car that looks amazing, is more than fit for purpose but has a wider range of talents than the others. 

That makes it ever more compelling, both as a piece of automotive brilliance to admire, andl as something to consider when you've got half a Sydney apartment to spend on a car.

Australian roads await, but the drive through rural English country roads and villages was a great preview. All I can say is: gimme one.

McLaren’s most liveable offering proves hybrid heroes have a place in the supercar stable of tomorrow. Angry and affable in near-equal measure, it is utterly docile during the week and completely bonkers on the weekend.

Note: CarsGuide attended this event as a guest of the manufacturer, with travel, accommodation and meals provided.

The 720S has received mixed reviews but nobody will say it isn't striking. I love it - every designer says their influence is a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird (designer Melville even jokes about it), but you really can see it in the 720S, especially in the cockpit design, which looks like a glass canopy from that surveillance jet.

McLaren's signature dihedral doors, which go all the way back to the 1994 McLaren F1, are substantial, with a double skin to act as a serious piece of aero kit.

Melville told me in January that he thinks the cars look shaped by nature, using the example of a stone left in a stream to erode. The 720S is full of details evoking that image, with a clean, taut surface. Where everyone complained that the 12C was "designed in a wind tunnel", the 720S looks designed by the wind. In the carbon and aluminium, it looks extraordinary.

One of the most talked about features are those headlights - almost always finished in black, they're known as "the socket". When you get close you see slim LED DRLs, small but powerful headlights, and you then discover two radiators behind them. Follow it through and the air exits through the bumper, around the wheels and then through the door. It's quite something.

Inside is the McLaren we've come to know and love, but with a clever kicker. The dash panel looks lifted from a race car - but with far nicer graphics. Switch to "active" mode, turn everything up to Track and the panel swings down and presents you with a minimised set of instruments to reduce distraction and make up for a lack of head-up display - just speed, get and, revs.

As is pretty par for the course with McLarens, the Artura's design is more about aerodynamics than aesthetics, with everything you see outside designed to either help you slip through the air, or stick to the road.

There is, however, one important new part of the design, and that is the roof, which opens in 11 seconds and at speeds of up to 50km/h, meaning you should never be caught in sudden rain.

Elsewhere, you’ll find it is all angles and alloys outside, while inside, it is a pretty driver-focused experience. I particularly love the steering wheel, which is totally free of buttons – a refreshing change which means it has one job and one job only.

Then there’s the central screen, which looks a bit like it’s just been plonked in the cabin, but works seamlessly. One note, though. It's positioned a little too low, meaning you have to take your eyes right off the road to look at it when driving.

For a supercar, there is a surprising amount of space in the cabin. You can strap 220 litres of (hopefully) soft stuff on the rear shelf behind the seats and there's a 150-litre boot under the nose. You can store your track gear under there, including helmet, or even cram in a few soft bags for a weekend away.

Again, unusually a for a supercar, you're also  treated to a couple of storage cubbies in the centre console.

There's plenty of room in cabin for two bodies and the driver's seat offers lots of adjustment. Despite being so close to the front wheels, your feet have space even for my ridiculous duck feet to fit easily. There's even enough headroom for those over six feet, although the glass portholes in the top of dihedral doors might not be so welcome in an Australian summer.

Practical? Not really, but then, what were you expecting? There are two seats, some 124 litres of luggage space in its under-bonnet boot, phone connections and… well, that’s about it.

One design element I do love, which counts as a practicality perk, is the glass finish applied to the rear buttresses, which don’t just look cool, but help you see out the back when peering over your shoulder.

Prepare to enter the rarefied air of the supercar world. The McLaren Artura Spider lists at $525,010, or about $50K more than the hardtop Artura, which has also been updated for 2025 and lists at $477,310.

Either way you’re staring down the barrel of around half a million to climb into the new Artura. But kudos to McLaren for offering the new model’s power upgrades, courtesy of a relatively straightforward software update, to owners of the current-gen Artura at no charge.

Anyway, for that spend you get a whole heap of power and performance, of course, but there’s also some new safety stuff and a new launch control designed to unleash your inner hooligan.

It’s called the 'Spinning Wheel Pull-Away' feature, which is essentially a burnout mode allowing you to light up the rear tyres, and even flick through the gears as they’re spinning, attracting the attention of passers-by and the local police in equal measure.

Add to that a redesigned exhaust that delivers a louder and more natural soundtrack, and it begins to become clear the Artura wants to leave any suggestion that it is somehow a mild supercar in its rear-view mirror.

Elsewhere, you’re riding on staggered alloys which are 19 inches up front and 20 inches at the rear, wrapped in Pirelli P-Zero rubber.

And then there’s the roof, which is a lightweight carbon-fibre and composite design operated by eight individual e-motors.

Also new in the cabin is a wireless charge pocket, while a digital dash is joined by a slightly off-looking but effective low-mounted central screen. Standard is a five-speaker McLaren-branded stereo, and rear glass screen is automatic and heated.

The 720S runs a 4.0-litre version of McLaren's familiar flat-plane crank twin-turbo V8. Power is up to 537kW (or 720PS, hence the name) and torque up almost 100Nm to 770Nm, from 678. McLaren says 41 percent of the components are new.

A seven-speed twin clutch sends power to the rear wheels and the 1283kg dry (down 106kg from the 650S) monster hits 100km/h in 2.9 seconds, surely a cautious claim. The more alarming 0-200km/h clam is a terrifying 7.8 seconds, half a second quicker than its closest rival, the 488 GTB. That is seriously, insanely quick, while top speed is equally bonkers at 341km/h.

Instead of a complicated and heavy active differential, the 720S uses the rear brakes and various other methods to get the same effect. It's one of several ideas pinched from F1, some of them now banned.

The magic of the Artura’s powertrain isn’t the twin-turbocharged V6, but its dinner-plate-sized e-motor, which adds 70kW and 225Nm to the total outputs.

In EV mode, which lasts around 33km, that’s all the power you get. But when both power sources are in use, the e-motor essentially plugs any turbo lag or power holes, delivering smooth, constant and massively ample power.

How much power? Try 515kW and 720Nm — up some 15kW on the existing Artura — unlocking a sprint to 100km/h in 3.0 seconds, a run to 200km/h in 8.4 seconds and from a standstill to 300km/h in 21.6 seconds.

That power is fed through an eight-speed automatic and channelled to the rear tyres, with the help of an 'E-Diff', while pre-configured 'Electric', 'Comfort', 'Sport' and 'Track' modes arrive as standard, too.

There are also a heap of suspension and software enhancements, longer-laster braking, stiffer engine mounts to tighten the entire vehicle, faster damping, significantly quicker gearshifts and a broader rev range.

McLaren claims the European combined cycle could return 10.7L/100km, but we have no way of knowing if that is accurate because we weren't mucking about on the day we had the car.

You can plug the Artura in, of course, and taking the 7.4kWh battery from zero to 80 per cent charged will take around 2.5 hours. McLaren reckons you can expect fuel use of around 4.8L/100km when both powertrains are in operation.

Be warned, though, there’s enough magic used to fill Hogwarts when it comes to calculating that number, and you can expect that figure to likely double if driving sedately, and skyrocket if you get on Tinder terms with the accelerator.

One of the biggest changes from 650 to 720 is the new Monocage II carbon fibre tub. The drop in overall weight is partly because the cage now includes the windscreen hoop, which previously was metal. Kerb weight with all fluids and a 90 percent full fuel tank (don't ask why 90 percent, I don't know either) it weighs 1419kg, giving it the same power-to-weight ratio as a Bugatti Veyron. Yikes.

The 720S is an astonishing car. We always say you can pootle in a modern supercar, but the 720S is so user-friendly, maneouvreable and so easy to see out of - there are no significant blind spots with an almost entirely glass roof - you can tackle city and country in comfort mode and actually be comfortable. Comparatively, a Huracan goes all blergh in Strada mode and the 488 GTB never stops begging you to kick it in the guts. The McLaren is easy, liveable and smooth. 

I was driving a left-hand drive car in the UK, which should have been a complete nightmare, but it was fine - the vision is excellent, particularly over the shoulder. 

But when you do decide to kick the 720S into action, it's wild. The acceleration is brutal, the handling impeccable and the ride, oh, the ride. No supercar can handle bumps, irregularities and flat out poor surfaces like the McLaren. The 540C's ride is incredible as it is, but the 720 is just wow.

Because it's quite light, the nose goes where you point it, the huge brakes have less to stop, the towering power less to push. The steering in the 720S is well-weighted but has tons of feel - you know what's going on underneath the double-wishbone sprung front wheels and you can adjust what you're up to accordingly. The stability system is excellent, too. Never overbearing or abrupt, where talent ends and the help begins is delightfully blurry.

The new engine is a bit more tuneful than past McLarens - there's even a loud-start party trick - but it's not loud and overbearing. You'll hear turbos whisting, sighing and pshawing, a deep bassy exhaust note and some awesome intake roar. But there's not much off-throttle character. It does at least do away with the histrionics of the Italians.

The only serious drama is the amount of noise bouncing around the cabin over about 100km/h. There's a lot more glass than sound-soaking Alcantara, which explains some of the extra tyre racket over a 650S. You can't have everything, I guess.

I know it sounds strange, given how knife-sharp and angular the McLaren Artura Spider looks, but perhaps this plug-in powerhouse's biggest party trick is not how it operates at its 8500rpm redline, but how it behaves at low speeds in town or cruising on the freeway.

This is a properly comfortable supercar, happily tootling around in near-silence in in EV mode, or just cruising around, the improved damping smoothing out the road below and the exhaust note barely noticeable.

Honestly, there was a moment on this test drive when I found myself in EV mode with the roof down while travelling at around 70km/h, and I could hear birds chirping as I passed them, such was the calm ambience of the cabin.

Supercars aren't designed as daily drivers, but the McLaren Artura Spider is so effortlessly easy to live with you could use it as your weekday runabout, before unleashing it on the weekends.

Open the taps a little more, though, and suddenly that nature changes, unlocking a darker and more dynamic side to the McLaren's personality, courtesy of the 3.0-litre twin-turbo V6, putting the entire 515kW and 720Nm at your disposal.

I don't think I've driven a car in which the distance between its twin personalities is so vast. Plant your right foot and the acceleration (0-100km/h in just 3.0 seconds) is properly violent, while the gearing has been set up in a way that it is near impossible to hit the redline on a public road – at least without obliterating the speed limit.

The steering is a predictable highlight – super direct, and near-telepathic in the way it responds to your inputs. The eight-speed auto goes about its work with seamless efficiency, too.

The biggest highlight, though, is the Artura's agility. McLaren is famed for taking an approach to removing weight from its vehicles that is so ruthless it's a miracle they don't make prospective owners step on a scale before handing over the keys. And while its true convertibles are heavier than their hardtop counterparts, you can't tell in the Artura Spider.

Instead, the brand has worked to remove weight and tighten the drive experience, mostly through new and stiffer engine mounts and that single piece carbon-fibre tub, which is why there is no additional body stiffening required in the convertible over the coupe.

As a result, the Spider feels light, lithe and super reactive, devouring corners with no jiggling or roll and no different (in that sense) to the hardtop version we drove last year.

One of the other big changes the brand made this time around is to retune the exhaust, making it louder and more natural-sounding, and you can take advantage of that in the Spider, with the rich bass filling the cabin as though your own personal orchestra is being conducted by your right foot.

So, if you're in the camp that says electrification has no place in the world of supercars, you're wrong. Electrification doesn't hamper excitement here, it enhances it.

There's new stuff in the world of safety, too. For one, there’s lane monitoring, which McLaren — ever keen to maintain the purity of its drive experience — is quick to point out you can switch off, and when you do, that it stays off until you switch it back on again.

That said, blind-spot monitoring and rear cross-traffic alert are optional, and you’re more chance of a Powerball win than seeing a Artura Spider crash-tested by ANCAP for an independent safety rating.

The 720S comes with McLaren's three-year/unlimited kilometre warranty with roadside assist. McLaren will want to see you every 12 months or 20,000km, which is quite unusual at this level.

The Artura arrives with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty as standard, while the battery is covered for six years or 75,000km. Five years of roadside assistance is thrown in, as are your first three years of services.