The Lexus LS 500 is the Most Powerful Lexus Sedan You Can Drive

Written By Marco Carvajal

2023 Lexus LS 500 F SPORT AWD

If you are looking for a full size stylish fast and sporty sedan, with the perfect mix of elegance and style, then pay attention to the 2023 Lexus LS 500,

The LS is a full-size luxury sedan serving as the Lexus flagship model. The LS 500 is fast, precise, and solid. It offers amazing performance

The LS is a very advanced full sedan but the ticket to go on this ride is not cheap with pricing ranging from $78K to $114K. The model I am driving is the LS 500 F Sport AWD which is specially designed for performance and starts at $85K, you also can purchase the RWD version for $82K, but if you are going to invest more than $80 on this advance machine I suggest to go for the AWD to have maximum power and performance on all roads.

There are so many different characteristics that the Lexus LS 500 has that give this car its formal and satisfying driving experience. The car has features such as an F sport exterior, a panorama glass roof, and it is Lexus most powerful and fast sedan.

Competitors

Some of the competitor rivals of the Lexus 500 are the BMW 7-series, the Mercedes-Benz S-class, and the Audi A8. The LS 500 competes well in this expensive segment, especially when we talk about precise driving, power, and performance with a modest look for those humble drivers who don’t want to overimpress.

If we talk about the exterior, there is some room to improve the exterior and interior design of the LS 500 versus its competitors, but on the other hand, the conservative style of the Lexus LS 500, makes it a great car for those who want to drive a very advanced car without over impressing.

LS Lxuruy Sedan by Lexus

The Luxury and performance included in the Lexus LS make you understand this is a real masterpiece. Driving the LS on the highways and roads near the beach in Florida, with hundreds of different vehicles driving near you, make you feel how the LS excels versus most other sedans.

LS means Luxury Sedan. This full-size luxury sedan has been available for sale since 1989. Previous generation LS models used V8 engines, however, the new 5th generation comes with V6 engine standard. The first LS, the 400 was very successful and helped to establish Lexus as a luxury brand 30 years ago, and today the LS 500 continues to position Lexus’s image as a great performance and luxury automobile.

The LS is not a very flashy looking on the outside, and when you see it for the first time it is beautiful and bolt, but it doesn’t catch as much attention as other luxury cars at first sight, but once you start to drive it, you start to fall in love with its impressive performance and on how comfortable is to ride inside this full-size luxury sedan.

When driving an LS you feel total control of this fast machine. At the reach of your hands, you have control, speed, precision steering, the best breaking system, safety advance features, a great navigation system, and a very advanced and easy-to-use control panel to produce the best driving experience with luxury all around you while onboard the LS 500.

LS 500 Design

The LS comes with 20-inch wheels with a machined finish. These wheels have gloss black accents. Not only do they have a nice look but they also reassure noise reduction and great traction as you drive.

One important factor when choosing the car of your dreams is comfort. The interior of the LS is made of quality material which does include the seats. The leather seats offer a necessary amount of space, as well as a heating and cooling system. I love seating on the LS 500, driving for a long time is still very comfortable. The LS has some of the most comfortable seats I have tried, just feels so good.

There are tons of details that make up the car interior design so luxurious, such as auto-dimming inside and outside mirrors with puddle lamps on outside mirrors.

Power rear sunshade, 16-way power-adjustable heated and ventilated front seats.

The F SPORT perforated leather-trimmed shift knob and heated steering wheel, performance-inspired instrumentation with the sliding bezel.

Aluminum pedals, Heated rear seats. Dual-zone climate control, Four-zone Climate Concierge with climate-comfort front and outboard rear seats, infrared sensors, an air purifier, and semi-aniline leather-trimmed door armrests just among many other interior elements of the design make this car so impressive and fun to drive.

Lexus Advanced Park And Drive Features

The luxury LS comes with two additional features such as advanced parking and advanced drive.

Advanced Drive is designed to be used on limited access highways in order to detect driving conditions to plan and execute acceleration, braking, and steering commands to maintain the vehicle within the lane, follow other vehicles, change lanes, navigate certain interchanges and traffic jams and help to overtake slower vehicles. This was very useful as I was driving from Daytona to Orland as I reach the congested I-95 highway near Orlando downtown with many trucks and cars driving on narrow lanes.

It supports SAE Level 2 functionality that under certain conditions, can also offer hands-free capabilities while keeping your eyes on the road. This feature can benefit the driver by helping to reduce fatigue over long periods of driving and empowering the driver to pay better attention to the surroundings for safety.

The Advanced Park assists the operations necessary for hands-free parking by automatically controlling steering, acceleration, braking, and gear changes when parallel parking or backing into a parking space. Using 360-degree sensing, which integrates the functions of complete-circumference cameras and ultrasonic sensors, the system also provides a bird’s-eye view display to allow the driver to check the vehicle’s position relative to any obstacles during Advanced Park operation, which also can be very helpful sometimes.

Performance and Engine on the LS 500

Fans of the LS understand that performance is the edge of this car.  This is not just one more pretty sedan, this is Lexus Flagship full-size sedan and also the most powerful sedan in the brand.

The LS 500 is built on top of the dynamic Lexus GA-L platform, which makes it the most capable sedan flagship made by Lexus. Subtle tuning of its control surfaces, the steering, and the braking controls help give it more control.

The 3.4-liter, twin-turbo V6 engine on the LS 500 offers the output one would expect in a flagship sedan: 416 horsepower and 442 lb.-ft. of torque. In the pursuit of refinement goals, the engine features a piston with a lip shape on the piston top to help realize low emissions and quiet operation when the engine is cold. The wastegate control on the twin-turbo engine provides stable opening and closing of the valve to enhance performance efficiency. The 10-speed automatic transmission is re-calibrated to aid in keeping the engine in a more responsive area of its power band.

The LS 500 delivers a 0-60 time of 4.6 seconds.

The driver can tailor powertrain response and feel by choosing from Eco, Comfort, Normal, Custom, Sport S, or Sport S+ modes. The available AWD system features a Torsen limited-slip center differential to further enhance grip, traction, and cornering stability. The torque distribution can vary from 31% front, and 69% rear on dry roads to as much as 48% front, and 52% rear on slick surfaces.

The performance of the LS 500 F-sport is fantastic. The chassis cleverly controls body roll at moderate speeds. Even with the car loaded down with five passengers, acceleration is brisk. Unfortunately, the transmission is slow to downshift when you want more power. The twin-turbo V6 seems reluctant to harness the power, with a considerable delay between pressing the pedal and the car responding.

The LS 500 AWD model  I am test driving was great to drive on all types of roads and crowded highways. I love how smooth the gear changes are, with imperceptible upshifts, and you don’t feel any downshifts as you slow down, producing a wonderful ride. It’s easy to slow the car down thanks to the linear braking response at low to moderate speeds. Steering effort is light in most drive modes.

The suspension absorbs all the imperfections of the road. The latest LS has a decent ride and cornering composure, but it’s still primarily a luxury cruiser, not a sporty sedan.

The LS provides a suspension with balanced spring and damper rates for impeccable damping performance. To help control vehicle body roll in turns, the diameters of the front and rear anti-roll bars are optimized.

The Adaptive Variable Suspension (AVS) employs revised linear solenoids and control valves designed to provide low damping force via their enlarged internal flow path.

The LS’s available ride-height-adjustable air suspension function helps facilitate a very advanced option to control the car’s height as needed.

2023 LS 500 Trims And Pricing

The 2023 Lexus LS 500 F SPORT AWD is just one of the three trim options, there are other two models you can select when purchasing your LS 500. The LS 500, LS 500 F Sport, and LS 500h.

The price range starts at $78K for the base model LS 500, the model I am driving the LS 500 F Sport that is specially designed for performance and starts at $82K, and then the top-of-the-line LS 500 hybrid version has a higher ticket price at $114K.

The first two trim models LS 500 and LS 500 F Sport are available as RWD or AWD, if you want the All Wheel Drive version the price difference you have to pay is around $3,000 more.  Then the Hybrid version is only available as an all-wheel-drive.

2023 Lexus LS 500 Starting At $78,535

• 416-HORSEPOWER, TWIN-TURBO V6 ENGINE
• 4.6-SECOND 0–60 TIME
• CLASS-LEADING STANDARD LEXUS SAFETY SYSTEM
• AVAILABLE IN AWD OR RWD

2023 Lexus LS 500h Starting At $114,635

As much as I love hybrid technology in terms of pricing the LS 500 F Sport makes more sense budget-wise. The price increase difference to buy the LS 500 hybrid is around $25,000.

2023 Lexus LS 500 F SPORT AWD highlights

The LS 500 F Sport is one of the best sedans for performance within the Lexus family. These are some of the highlights that make this full sedan, one of the best in its class.

• Horsepower of 416 HP
• Powerful Twin-Turbo V6 Engine
• Reaches a speed of 60 MPH In 4.6 Seconds
• Starting at $85,385 for the AWD version.
• Available In AWD and RWD
• Adopts Lexus Interface With a 12.3-Inch Touchscreen Display
• Apple Carplay And Android Auto, Wireless Capability
• Adaptive Variable Air Suspension With Rapid Height Function
• Power Lift-Up Buckle
• Panoramic View Monitor
• Leather-Wrapped Heated Steering Wheel With Premium Wood Trim
• Art Wood Organic Gloss, Art Wood Herringbone, Or Laser Special Black Premium Wood Trims
• 20-In Split-10-Spoke Alloy Noise-Reduction Wheels With Vapor Chrome Finish
• Panorama Glass Roof
• 24-In Head-Up Display
• Recently added more USB ports throughout

The 2023 Lexus LS 500 F SPORT is one of the best fast full sedans in the luxury market. Starting with pricing around $82K for the RWD version, it has excellent performance characteristics like a V-6 engine with a powerful 416 horsepower and is available with a few options and trims according to your needs, also AWD is available.

The LS 500 is an extraordinary car to drive, especially if you’re interested in something that stands in the middle with a very nice young and elegant style that reflects the driving power you have inside the hood, not too sporty looking or not too elegant classic looking but a very attractive look in its own style.

The Lexus LS 500 is the Most Powerful Lexus Sedan You Can Drive