‘Drivers Only’ Finds Lots to Love in the 2020 Acura RDX
Acura’s best-selling vehicle for 2019, the next-gen RDX outsells all of the company’s sedans put together.
Midway through 2018, Honda’s luxury Acura brand debuted a brand-new version of its Acura RDX crossover to pretty much universal acclaim, garnering great reviews from the likes of Car and Driver, Edmunds, JD Power, and MotorTrend. Although the RDX is almost entirely unchanged for 2020 — the only small tweak is the addition of a new Platinum White body color — new reviews are still rolling in, and the latest of these comes from *George Tung*, automotive vlogger and founder of both the Drivers Only YouTube channel and rankings website.
First launched in late 2006, the RDX is now far and away Acura’s most successful vehicle in the US market, outselling even the MDX by a healthy 21%. In fact, for every two sedans of *any* model which roll of the lot at Acura dealerships nationwide, the company sells three RDXs — and that makes it a hugely important model for brand-owner Honda.
In his video, Tung is at the wheel of a gorgeous 2020 Acura RDX SH-AWD A-Spec in Performance Red Pearl with Ebony interior, rolling on 20-inch A-Spec Shark Gray wheels. It’s a higher-end model that lists for US$47,425 with destination fees. (That puts it about US$8,600 above the front-wheel-drive base model, which lists at just a little under the $40k mark.)
Although it’s unchanged inside and out, that’s no bad thing in Tung’s mind, as he clearly likes this car a lot. The outside, he says, “looks sleek; it looks good, especially with the A-Spec package. [And] even without the A-Spec package, it just stands out from the segment.” And things are clearly just as satisfying from the driver’s seat, aesthetically-speaking. “Man,” says Tung, “This cabin blows away the competition. Acura did a really good job redesigning everything in here, from the seats to the dash.” And unless driving hard, it’s also “very, very quiet” inside the cabin.
Visibility is good in most respects, too, although at 5’10” tall Tung reveals that he still has to “sit a little bit higher to see well over the hood.” And there’s plenty of room for passengers and cargo. It’s “roughly where a compact SUV should be,” Tung confirms, with “a lot of hidden storage, especially [in] the A-Spec.” There’s a reason for that which he finds difficult to justify, though: The second-from-top package which he’s driving lacks the spare tire found in other trim levels, with its space taken up by more storage instead.
Other than that shortcoming, Tung’s biggest complaint is the choice of a touch-pad with which to control the infotainment system, rather than a more intuitive touch-screen interface instead. It’s not a showstopper, though. “Once you get used to it, it’s not bad,” he reveals. “It’s not nearly as cumbersome as the ones you find in Lexus [vehicles]. It’s still okay.” On the plus side, the screen chosen is “relatively large, very high-res, [and] bright.”
But how does it drive? Pretty well, for the most part. Tung calls the 272-horsepower, 280lb-ft, turbocharged 2.0-liter inline-four engine “very lively”, and the steering “pretty precise; it has a good weight to it.” The suspension setup of his A-Spec model is on the firm side, but “on normal roads, it’s very comfortable,” says Tung. “I don’t feel that much body roll. It feels controlled during tight cornering, [but] I do feel a little bit more bumpiness.”
The biggest driveability question mark hangs over the 10-speed automatic transmission to which the engine is mated. It is, complains Tung, “a little bit jerky. That’s unfortunate. When you’re at low speeds, stop-and-go, this transmission kind of falters a little bit.” And braking takes more effort than he’d like, too. “The pedal is a little stiff, and also you do need to press down a little bit harder to get the RDX to stop,” Tung continues.
But switching the car into Sport or Sport Plus puts a smile back on his face, even knowing that Acura is piping in fake exhaust noise in these modes. “You can definitely hear more,” he says, “and you really can’t tell it’s simulated sound. The transmission definitely holds its gear much, much longer, and the revs are much higher. Sport [mode] is a good trade-off between Comfort and Sport Plus.”
His only remaining concerns are in Acura’s choice of available option packages, as well as their pricing. Forgoing trim levels altogether, the RDX is offered in a choice of rear-wheel drive or “super-handling all-wheel drive”, with just three available packages: Technology ($3,200), A-Spec ($3,000) and Advance ($4,900). And as Tung notes with some sadness in his voice, the latter two present an either/or choice, meaning that you can’t have the best of both worlds in a single vehicle.
For example, his A-Spec tester lacks the adaptive damper system, noise-dampening front side windows, 10.5-inch head-up display, hands-free remote tailgate and more from the Advance package. And at the same time, that package lacks the leather-wrapped A-Spec steering wheel and exterior styling tweaks he enjoys in his test car.
He also gently bemoans the fact that both A-Spec and Advance packages require that you also purchase the Technology package, even though both replace its seat, wheel and audio system upgrades with their own. “It does add up in price pretty quickly,” he says with some understatement, given that effectively the A-Spec package becomes a $6,200 option, and the Advance package being a breathtaking $8,100 on top of base pricing.
We’ll leave it to Tung to run down these highs and lows in more detail, and also to offer up his final score. Given that his scoring system isn’t the easiest to understand — it’s based on points out of 10 in 13 different categories, for a possible total of 130 — we’ll convert his final score into a percentage, though. With a final total of 94/130 points, Tung effectively gives the 2020 Acura RDX an overall score of 72%.
Watch the video above for more!