Mercedes-Benz G-Class Professional returns – just not in the way you think
The eternal Mercedes-Benz G-Wagen sheds even more of its working class roots with a new Professional-Line styling package.
Forged over 40 years ago as a tough, capable, all-terrain working and touring vehicle, the Mercedes-Benz G-Class, or Geländewagen, may still serve global emergency services and military forces (including ours), but as a civilian vehicle it seems its blue collar is now very firmly white.
For 2022, Mercedes-Benz in Europe will offer a new Professional Line styling package to give your quarter-of-a-million-dollar G400d a more rugged and off-roady look, as you hard-park it outside a cafe in Sorrento. Think Moncler boots, not Blundstones.
The package includes stone grilles on the headlamps, smaller 18-inch wheels with all-terrain tyres, mud flaps, a roof rack, ladder and spare wheel carrier. The car can be optioned with matte-finish (Night Black Mango) contrast trim on the roof, wheel arches and bumpers to help your choice of ten paint colours (including Orange Mango pictured) stand out.
A roof-top tent can also be fitted.
The 'Professional' equipment may simply dress up the G-Wag, but the 243kW/700Nm 3.0-litre turbo-diesel six-cylinder and constant four-wheel-drive hardware with three differential locks ensure it has the ability to back up its flex.
For Australian buyers, the Professional Line equipment has not yet been confirmed, with a Mercedes-Benz Australia spokesperson telling Drive: "Our G-Class customers are enthusiastic when it comes to personalisation, and we’re in the process of evaluating the new PROFESSIONAL Line Exterior package for our market."
While this isn't, is a vinyl seat, hose-out, working G-Class like the 2017 G300d Professional, it is a fully equipped, highly luxurious, and relatively efficient tourer. It may have strayed from the original interpretation of the G-Wagen from 1979, but arguably, in this guise the 2022 G-Class Professional Line is the most perfect G-Wagen yet.