Category: Executive 
Price Range: £22,245 to £36,745
Comfortable ride, powerful yet quite economical, a good car for chauffeurs.
Engine not that quiet, wallowing of comfort chassis, slow-reacting auto gearbox, lacks flair, not as desirable as Volvo's estates.
Great to be driven in, not so great to drive.
The S80 D5 meets the Euro 5 emissions standards; the manual version emits 164g/km and the auto 178g/km, meaning relatively low tax bandings for such a large car. It returns 45.6mpg (manual) and 42.2mpg (auto), and insurance, maintenance and Volvo servicing should all be reasonable.
The lower-powered models will, of course, be cheaper to run (the DRIVe promises 57.7mpg and 129g/km) but the D5 does well for a 200bhp-plus vehicle.
However, it's no class-leader: the similarly-powerful Mercedes-Benz E250 CDI does a highly impressive 53.3mpg and emits just 139g/km.
