2025 Lincoln Navigator Presidential review: the SUV you'd rather be driven in

It's a Tuesday afternoon in Dubai, the weather is doing its usual February thing — sunny but not yet the kind of warm that makes you question your life choices. A Sunrise Copper Metallic Lincoln Navigator Presidential is sitting in my driveway, looking like it owns not just the parking space but the street, too. My daughters spot it from inside the house and claim the second row. This was, as it turned out, exactly the right call.

The Presidential is Lincoln's top Navigator trim, sitting AED 69,300 above the Reserve and topping out at AED 489,195 all-in. That gap buys you massaging seats with more adjustment options than most people have opinions, Opulence leather in every row, including the third, a rear entertainment system, and a set of second-row Captain's Chairs so comfortable that you can use the word 'sofa' to describe them.

Exterior: That copper paint is more interesting than you think

Photographs do not do the Sunrise Copper Metallic justice — in pictures, it looks like it's trying to make a statement. In person, parked under a Dubai afternoon sky, it's warmer and more restrained than you'd expect. There's a pearlcoat layer that shifts it from copper to bronze depending on the angle and the light, and the overall effect is confident without being loud. Will people stop and stare on Sheikh Zayed Road? Probably not. Is that a bad thing for a car positioning itself as a luxury vehicle rather than a look-at-me one? I'd argue no.

The 22-inch High-Gloss Ebony wheels work beautifully against the paint — dark multi-spoke alloys against a warm bronze body is a combination that someone at Lincoln signed off on with conviction, and they were right to do so. Look closer at the rubber, and you'll find Michelin Primacy STX tyres, a premium touring spec that quietly tells you what kind of car this is before you've opened a door.

The front face is dominated by Lincoln's signature grille: a wide, flat diamond-quilt pattern with individual chrome studs at every intersection. It's distinctive in a way that reads as architectural rather than aggressive — more boardroom than racetrack, which is absolutely the right brief for a car like this. The full LED headlights sit close to the grille and have a slim, horizontal signature that's recognisable at night from a distance.

Spin around to the back, and the Presidential has a rear end that deserves more attention than it usually gets in reviews. There's a full-width LED light bar connecting the two tail lamps, with 'LINCOLN' spelt out in large individual letters across the tailgate — not a badge, actual letterforms sitting proud of the surface. Clean, contemporary, and confident. The near-vertical glasshouse at the rear gives it a presence when parked that a sloped-fastback SUV doesn't have.

Getting in and out is aided by retractable running boards — nothing the Escalade or other large SUVs don't offer, but necessary given how high the Navigator sits. That 1,988mm ride height is part of what gives you that commanding view; the step is just the tax you pay for it.

One number to commit to memory before taking delivery: 2,404mm wide with mirrors extended. Certain car parks in Dubai such as Town Centre in Jumeirah will test your relationship with this vehicle's proportions. You've been warned.

Inside, the Presidential actually earns that name

There's a moment when you first sit in the driver's seat and just... look around. The interior is dark charcoal Opulence leather with copper piping on the seat bolsters — a deliberate echo of the exterior paint, and the kind of detail that costs almost nothing to execute but signals that someone was paying attention when they designed this thing. Everything in the cabin references everything else. Even the steering wheel has copper contrast stitching to match — a detail you notice on day one and stop noticing by day two, which means it's doing its job correctly.

That steering wheel shape — flattened at both top and bottom — looks bold and modern but feels less natural in your hands than a conventional round rim, particularly when you're doing small-input corrections at motorway speeds. The important part is that the design coherence it adds to the cabin is real and intentional.

The driver's seat adjusts 30 ways, the passenger's 28, both with massage. And the adjustment system actually has two layers: there are physical controls on the seat base — a dial and two levers — for quick repositioning, and a full touchscreen interface for the finer adjustments. The dial in particular has a premium tactile quality that's satisfying to use. The full menu on the screen, with Massage, Seat, and Headrest tabs plus individual control points, is thorough but not something you'll visit often once you've found your position.

Now. The second row. This is where the Presidential makes its real argument. The optional Dual Captain's Chairs — a 40/Console/40 layout — transform what would be a back seat into something that belongs in a different category of vehicle entirely.

Having sat in those chairs myself while someone else drove, I can confirm this is accurate. They're heated, ventilated, massaging, finished in the same Opulence leather as the front, and positioned high enough that rear passengers get the exact same commanding view over traffic as the driver. For anyone who does their commuting from the back seat — or just anyone who occasionally has passengers worth impressing — this is worth the conversation.

The second-row console between the Captain's Chairs is finished in walnut-effect wood trim with a small embedded display for the time, audio and climate controls, two cup holders, a wireless charging pad, and its own USB and power ports. Rear passengers are genuinely well looked after here.

What's not here, though, is a refrigerator. The Escalade offers chilled storage in its centre console at this price point — and at Dhs 489,000, in this market, that's the kind of omission that registers. A fridge doesn't make or break a half-million-dirham purchase. But the things that aren't there always get noticed more than they probably should.

The third row is also trimmed in Opulence leather with power recline controls — a meaningful upgrade over the Reserve's unheated Soft Touch back there. Getting there from the second row involves the Captain's Chair tipping and sliding forward on a mechanism that's smooth and doesn't require much thought, though it does make you temporarily crouch in an undignified way.

Here's the caveat: the Captain's Chairs do not fold. The bench configuration in the Reserve gives you up to 2,720 litres of maximum cargo. With the Captain's Chairs, you're working with 411 litres behind the third row when everyone's seated. If you have an IKEA run or a weekend that requires fitting a bicycle somewhere, the Captain's Chairs will haunt you. The Presidential is a magnificent car to be transported in. It is a less practical car to own.

One detail I liked in the boot: a full power outlet suite in the cargo wall — a universal multi-region socket, USB-C ports, and a 12V connection. For anyone who does long UAE road trips and needs to charge or run equipment in the back, that's genuinely useful and not something you typically find at this position in a car. Small thing, right detail.

The 48-inch screen is magnificent. Everything else needs a chat.

The 48-inch panoramic display is genuinely impressive, and I say that as someone who has become somewhat immune to large screens in cars. I deliberately parked in the sun in the middle of a February afternoon to test it, and it was bright, sharp, and fully legible without any squinting. The animations are smooth, the response is immediate, and it looks — there's no other word for it — spectacular. Good job, Lincoln.

Now. The software. The display splits into a larger left section for navigation and driver information, and a right section with three customisable widgets. The available widget options are: music, fuel economy, compass, tyre pressure, two trip computers, and trailer settings. Trailer settings. On a Dhs 489,000 luxury SUV. There's no calendar widget. No weather. No seat shortcut. The music widget earns its spot; the rest feel like they were borrowed from a Ford Ranger without anyone asking whether they belong here. Lincoln — whoever is responsible for this widget list — needs to be promoted to a different project.

The connectivity situation requires a specific explanation for UAE buyers. The Navigator runs full Android with Google Play Store access — you can download apps like YouTube, PocketCasts and Spotify. But the built-in 5G modem does not support streaming in this region. So apps such as Spotify need a hotspot from your phone.

Native Google Maps looks wonderful on that 48-inch display and will work with the car's data package. But for everything else, your best option is to hotspot your phone to the car and use the native system — it works well, but calling it a connected car feature when it requires your phone to do the connecting is a stretch. The other option is to use CarPlay or Android Auto, both of which work well and wirelessly.

The Revel Ultima 3D system with 28 speakers is a different matter entirely. It's outstanding — spatial, detailed, capable of filling this very large cabin with sound in a way that makes even a motorway commute feel like an event. Lincoln preloads a demo track specifically designed to show off what the system can do, and the first time you play it, you'll understand what 28 speakers in a well-tuned space actually sound like. Spotify also sounds good, but not demo-track good. That's a streaming compression problem, not a speaker problem.

I should also mention the Digital Scent system — three fragrances diffused through the ventilation: Mystic Forest, Ozonic Azure, and Violet Cashmere. I tried Mystic Forest, which smells of pine, and appreciated that it was subtle enough to stop registering consciously after a few minutes. That's the right calibration. A car fragrance feature should feel like a room that smells nice, not like you've been locked in a candle warehouse.

Rear entertainment: two eight-inch Android tablets in the headrests with HDMI ports, USB ports, Bluetooth headphones and screen mirroring between them. In theory, these support online streaming — in practice, you'll need a paid ScreenHits TV subscription for that. Bring an HDMI or a USB stick on longer trips.

The Lincoln Way app does remote start, lock/unlock, location, and fuel level. Remote start activates the AC, which in the UAE context is the only button on the app that really matters. The app does what it needs to do- just don't expect Tesla-level functionality from it.

On the road, this thing is almost unfairly smooth

The engine is the same across both trims: 440hp and 691Nm from a 3.5-litre twin-turbo V6 through a 10-speed automatic to all four wheels. This is not a performance car. Lincoln isn't pretending it is. What it is, is a car that has been tuned to make driving feel like the least effortful activity you do in your day — and at that, it is exceptional.

Speed bumps that rattle through my Tesla Model Y's cabin like a mild seismic event just... didn't happen in the Navigator. The adaptive suspension absorbs UAE road surfaces with a composure that's almost unsettling until you get used to it. The 10-speed gearbox is similarly transparent — gear changes are essentially theoretical at both city speeds and highway. You know they must be happening because of physics, but you cannot feel them.

On the highway, the cabin is quiet enough for a normal conversation at 120km/h without raising your voice. There is some tyre noise from the 22-inch rubber — audible if you're listening for it, but it falls short of the near-complete silence that a Range Rover achieves at speed. What I found more interesting is a consistent sensation that the car is moving faster than it actually is. At 100km/h, the experience felt closer to 120. Lincoln has suppressed vibration, road noise, and wind buffet so effectively that your body loses its normal speed calibration. I checked the speedometer more than I expected to. Real-world fuel consumption came to 14.0L/100km — a useful figure for your calculations.

The steering is slow-ratio by design, and it's the right call for a 2,700kg SUV at motorway speeds. The trade-off is that U-turns and parking require more wheel input than you're probably used to. My Tesla needs about one full rotation for a U-turn; the Navigator wants closer to two.

The piano key gear shifter is the one interior element that never clicked for me — and I mean that literally, because I kept reaching for a stalk out of muscle memory. Stylish? Yes. Something I'd choose over a conventional shifter? Not a chance.

One safety note: the blind spot is substantial, largely due to the thick B-pillar, and the warning system responds with a mirror indicator light only — no steering vibration, no seat buzz, no sound. At 120km/h on Sheikh Zayed Road with the usual lane-change choreography, a blinking mirror light is easier to miss than I'd like. The 360-degree camera system compensates well in low-speed situations — the rear camera caught two cats sitting directly behind my car during a reversing manoeuvre that I had no other way of knowing about. Cameras: excellent. Blind spot alert: needs more urgency.

One last observation: you sit very high in this car. Meaningfully, noticeably higher than almost anything else on UAE roads. I could see across the highway to junctions and buildings I'd genuinely never registered from my Tesla's driver seat. That elevation brings real authority in UAE traffic, where seeing three cars ahead changes how you drive. You get the same commanding view from the second row, which tells you Lincoln got the Captain's Chair height right as well.

So is the Dhs 69,300 premium worth it?

The AED 69,300 gap between the Reserve and the Presidential gets you: 30-way massaging front seats instead of 24-way, Opulence leather in all three rows, including heated third row, Lincoln Play rear entertainment, second-row wireless charging, two extra USB ports, High-Gloss Ebony wheels, and the Dual Captain's Chairs.

My honest take: if you're the one driving every day, the Reserve at Dhs 419,895 is the sensible choice. The road, the engine, the ride quality — identical. The Dhs 69,300 is paying for things behind you, not in front of you. But if you regularly carry passengers, have a driver, take many family trips, or simply spend more time in the back than the front, the Presidential's rear cabin is a completely different experience. The Captain's Chairs alone close that gap for that buyer.

Verdict

On day two, I ended up in the passenger seat while someone else drove — not by plan, just by circumstance. And somewhere on a stretch of road between Dubai and nowhere in particular, with the Revel system playing through all 28 speakers, the ride doing its quietly spectacular thing over a surface that had no business feeling that smooth, and the Captain's Chair holding me at a recline that Emirates business class would recognise — I stopped reviewing the car and just sat in it.

That's the Presidential's best quality: it makes you forget to be critical. The hardware is magnificent. The audio is outstanding. The ride quality is a genuine achievement. And the rear cabin, with those Captain's Chairs, is where the money went.

The software, though. The connectivity limitations, the widget situation, the rear screen subscription — frustrations that shouldn't exist at this price point and that Lincoln could fix with a software update if someone at HQ decided they wanted to. Until then, carry a hotspot.

At AED 489,195, the Presidential is a car you'd choose to be driven in. Whether you'd choose to drive it yourself is a slightly more complicated question — and the answer depends entirely on whether you ever plan to sit anywhere other than the front left seat.

Full specifications

Review unit provided by Lincoln UAE. All opinions are those of tbreak Media.

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