2019 Mercedes-Benz A220: The entry-level luxury sedan to beat

[MUSIC] Okay let's not pull any punches. I paid it the [UNKNOWN] Mercedes Benz CLA. It was uncomfortable, [UNKNOWN] proportioned and frankly a bit. [INAUDIBLE] Feeling to where the tri-point star if you were to ask me. That's it, this 2019 Mercedes Benz A220 4Matic feels like a complete reversal of that opinion. It is amazing how much I'm enjoying this car, [MUSIC] For starters it's a proper seat in, with an upright greenhouse, and a backseat that is small, but still usable with enough head room for an adult, unlike the old CLA which was kind of weird. Coupe four door thing. Also the exterior in this car looks a lot better sort of like a tiny little Mercedes Benz CLS and the interior finally has materials and build quality that feel on par with the car that shares it's pedigree with the mighty Mercedes S Class Especially with the options we've got here, well done. Now one of my favorite features is the $310 ambient lighting package with three zones 64 color, RGB illumination, it looks amazing at nighttime. Don't buy this car without checking that box. Trust me, it's jaw dropping. Now feature that I'm on the fence about are the kinetic feats, which basically make periodic adjustments to the position of the seat and the seat back to reduce driver fatigue. And yeah, that feels a bit like a poor substitute for an actual massage function, but on longer trip, so when you fit it to a longer interval, it actually does a lot to reduce fatigue. However, the short interval feels just weird like the seats constantly squirming underneath you and it. [MUSIC] [INAUDIBLE] really good for [INAUDIBLE] a friendly [INAUDIBLE] you can turn it off and on very easily from the menu. [MUSIC] Now, under the [INAUDIBLE] A 220 is [INAUDIBLE] charge [INAUDIBLE] engine that make the 188 horsepower and 221 [INAUDIBLE] And it's gonna put that to all for contact patches by a dual clutch transmission and Mercedes Benz is automatic system that last bit is optional. Now that engine is a peach it has really good low end torque which means that around town and off the line it feels really good And the DCT Wow, feeling really good when you're hammering it and Sport mode kinda sometimes feels a little bit clunky around town. Still I trade a little bit of smoothness for shift this good any day of the week. I'll just Just leave it in sport mode and it will be fine, right. [MUSIC] Now if I am going to leave it in sport mode all the time it's going to cost me a couple of MPG. Fortunately were still doing a little bit better than we were with the CLA with an EPA estimate of around 30 miles per gallon combined versus the old 28 miles per gallon. I'm averaging a little bit less than that but I think we're still gonna call it a net positive. [MUSIC] Now we We talk a lot about technology in a separate video but I got a mention the Mercedes Benz in Bucks infotainment system which is a huge improvement over the old command system. We've got two large 10.25 inch screens, one for digital instrument cluster and one for infotainment and they're highly customizable and very well laid out. We've got a lot of new features for example the Mercedes voice assistant and there's a lot of ways That you can intuitively interact with the system, everything from voice commands to touch controller here to steering wheel controls to just touching the touch screen, it's a touch screen now. [MUSIC] Now if you're really interested in the ins and outs of [UNKNOWN], be sure to check out our deep dive into the technology in the new Mercedes GLE which has this same infotainment system, albeit with a slightly larger screen. It's definitely worth checking out. One little tech nitpick is that all of the USB ports, there are about five of them in this car, are USB C. Which is good for me, I've switched all of my accessories to that. But a lot of you are gonna be living dongle life in your car if you choose to go with the A class On the safety front, Mercedes' driver aide suite is in full effect here with features like lane-keeping steering assist and adaptive cruise control that's smart enough to not just maintain a safe following distance behind the car ahead, but also adjusts your speed based on the curvature of the road. Chosen route or even if the posted speed limit changes. Of course, each of those functions is customizable and individually deactivatable so you can fit the cruise control up the way that you like best. One safety feature I'm having a couple of problems with are the blind spot monitoring system, which has a bad habit of warning me about cars two lanes over or three or four car lengths back. Which leads to false positives when I try to merge into a lane that's otherwise empty. And yeah, it's better to be too safe rather than too sorry. But what I really want is for it just to work consistently without me having to second guess it all the [MUSIC] Overall Mercedes-Benz's entry point into luxury has gone from being my least favorite car in the class to the car to beat at this price point. And all they had to do is give us a completely new vehicle. Easy peasy, right? [MUSIC] Making a price point the a class here starts at $33,500, which is competitive with what Audi and BMW are doing at this price point. You consider the destination [UNKNOWN]. Still, it's the German car and the starting point is never actually where you end up. You've got $15,000 worth of options on this bad boy which brings us to an adjusted price of just under $50,000. Still, the A class feels like it's worth every penny. [MUSIC] [MUSIC]