2024 Land Rover Defender 130 Outbound First Test: Two-Row SUV In a Three-Row Package
The Defender 130 Outbound deletes third-row seating to accommodate more adventure gear.
Pros
- Quality interior that's made to get dirty
- Massive cargo space
- Excellent ride and handling
Cons
- Unreliable phone projection
- Usability issues not expected in this price range
- Multi-purpose physical controls aren't for everyone
The 2024 Land Rover Defender 130 Outbound is a mouthful to say, but it might be our favorite variant of theSUV yet, with the 13.4-inch increase in length over the 110 but without the additional seating capacity of the normal 130. For anyone looking for bigger adventures with more gear instead of more people, that's a huge plus. And as a daily driver it's just plain more room. Without the third row, it has a flat cargo area similar in size to those of compact pickup trucks like the Ford Maverick and Hyundai Santa Cruz, but in a nicely finished and enclosed package. To top it off, the Outbound remedies some aesthetic complaints we had about the 2023 Defender 130 when we first got our hands on one.
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Intel On the Outbound
If the added cargo space gets you excited, the Outbound is a no-compromise approach to a more capable Defender: same great off-road skills, same great road feel, but volume behind the second seat jumps from 35.8 cubic feet to 43.7. Not much else changes inside after dropping the extra seating and adding extra tie-down points, but the Outbound's set of Goodyear Wrangler Duratrac all-terrains bump the dynamic roof carrying capacity to 370 pounds. That's a 150-pound increase from Defenders equipped with all-seasons. After installing the optional Expedition Roof Rack, 291 pounds of gear can be safely secured up top.
The Goodyears had no adverse effect on ride quality, but wheel and tire size being equal, we'll give a nod to the standard adaptive air suspension for taming the three-ton SUV on the road. Stopping from 60 mph happened in 121 feet, which is perfectly in the middle of the two all-season options we tested on a 2024 Defender 130 X-Dynamic SE and a 2023 Defender 130 First Edition. The 20-inch double five-spoke wheels in gloss black are an upgrade from the blah single five-spoke offering, and the tire and wheel combo adds some aggression that the Defender wears well.
Outbound gets the potent 3.0-liter turbocharged I-6 mild hybrid P400, cranking out 395 horsepower and distributing 406 lb-ft of torque to all four wheels to take it to 60 mph in 6.4 seconds. A quarter mile disappears after 14.8 seconds at 94.6 mph. These numbers support the 7,450-pound gross vehicle weight capacity and 8,201-pound max towing capacity.
Rugged But Conservative
The result around our racetrack in a bottle didn't impress us like the straight-line performance did, but the Outbound performed better than other P400-powered Defender 130s we've run. The $1,250 Off-Road package with upgraded rear differential and torque vectoring improved handling over the others. Completing a lap in 28.7 seconds at a 0.59 g average made it a full second quicker, with a 0.71 g average around the skid pad. After nixing the stability and traction controls, we still experienced an aggressive speed cut to 35 mph during the turns and until the wheel was dead straight again. We noticed this on every Defender we tested so far, and it was time to find out why.
As it turns out, there is a third, always-on system lending a watchful eye: Roll Stability Control (RSC). The RSC monitors vehicle speed, lateral acceleration, steering input, and throttle input to keep the tires from reaching for the sky. It's a blanket calibration that doesn't account for current gross vehicle weight, passenger count, roof load, or every other possible permutation of vehicle loading conditions.
Now, remember that 370 pounds of rack and gear you can carry way up high, on the roof? It isn't going to be the first thing on your mind during sudden or evasive maneuvers, so the controls work to rein the vehicle inbeforeit becomes a problem. The RSC made this part of our job slightly less exciting but adds a great deal of confidence in loading up the Outbound—or any Defender—and taking it on an adventure. Even if that adventure is just filling the cargo area at your favorite members-only warehouse shopping center between expeditions.
Options and Accessories
Most marketing materials show the Outbound as a ready-to-go overlanding rig with a roof rack, side-mounted storage bin, and side-mounted ladder. Unsurprisingly, these aren't included in the Outbound's $85,975 base price. You can order the optional Explorer pack, which includes the storage bin and roof rack, or the Adventure pack with the bin on any Defender. The ladder is only a stand-alone accessory. This was the prime opportunity to offer all three as an inclusive package for the Outbound to simplify the process. Navigating the accessories online isn't straightforward, taking you from the configurator to a separate online catalog.
The Outbound we tested came in at $96,140, including the ladder and storage bin, though that total does not include any potential charge for their installation. The 330-pound rating of the ladder encompasses a wide range of people and whatever gear they can carry up. Deployment is simple, and it feels stable. Even when it's raining, the steps have enough grip to avoid a total hazard. The storage bin fits roadside gear like jumper cables or smaller jump packs and air compressors with ease.
The mounted accessories are useful for the target crowd, but they also break up the awkwardness of the extension and huge rear overhang of the 130. There now exists something in a place that always looked like something belonged. Neither object is intrusive in daily driving, staying out of the view of the side-view mirrors.
High Praise, Minor Complaints
There isn't much to dislike about the Outbound, and judges voted the 2021 Defender 110 P400 SEMotorTrend2021 SUV of The Year when it debuted for a reason, but it still has some small bugs we'd like to see worked out. Last year, we found Apple CarPlay to be unreliable, and Bluetooth connections were spotty, too. Spending time with Android Auto instead, it was equally unreliable but at least defaulted back to a Bluetooth device and kept our music going. But the Bluetooth workedtoowell. After shutting the Outbound down, exiting, and walking 100 feet away, our phone remained connected and kept connecting through multiple phone calls. The hardware seems to work well, but the software needs to be fixed.
The next one is admittedly tiny, but luxury vehicles at this price point open themselves to such complaints. The gas cap has a nice secure spot to sit in the fuel door so it doesn't dangle against, say, the $600 Carpathian Grey paint as on our vehicle. But the tether is too short. Like, half of an inch. Just extend it, OK? Easily remedied items like this go a long way toward the perception of quality—which is great otherwise.
Our editors are split regarding the physical controls inside, so many of you will be, too. Once you figure them out, they are simple, don't require a lot of extra steps, and work well. But the temperature control, fan speed, seat heating, and drive mode selection are all controlled with the same rotary dials. It's intuitive enough and keeps the center console from being overly cluttered, but they aren't for everyone. We still recommend giving them a fair shot, because we like just about everything else about the interior.
Final Thoughts
The only thing that separates the Outbound from any other Defender 130 is the lack of a third row. There aren't any other options exclusive to the model, and they all have the same well-executed interior that feels surprisingly luxurious even with plastic floors and durable materials. That's hard to pull off. But yanking the seats out of any other Defender with a third row isn't simple, so if you don't need the space for people, the Outbound far and away has the most storage space, putting it at the top of our list for trekking into the wild. This one feels like peak Defender—and it looks like it, too.
Cars should look cool and go fast. At least, that was Matthew’s general view of the world growing up in Metro Detroit in the early ’90s, and there was no exception. Raised in the household of a Ford engineer and car enthusiast, NASCAR races monopolized the television every Sunday and asking, “what car is this?” at every car show his dad took him too before he could read taught him that his favorite car was specifically, the 1971 Chevelle SS. (1970 can keep its double headlights, it’s a better look for the rear!) He learned the name of every part of a car by means of a seemingly endless supply of model car kits from his dad’s collection and could never figure out why his parents would drive a Ford Taurus Wagon and F-150 to work every day when a perfectly good 1967 Chevy Impala sat in the garage. Somewhere between professional hockey player, guitar player, journalist, mechanic, and automotive designer, he settled on the University of Northwestern Ohio (UNOH) with the hopes of joining a NASCAR pit crew after high school. While there, learning about electronics and the near-forgotten art of carburetor tuning (give him a call before you ditch your “over complicated” Rochester Qudarajet) were equally appealing, and the thrill of racing stock cars and modifieds weekly on the school’s dirt oval team was second to none at the time. And then sometime late in 2009, Matthew caught wind of the Tesla Roadster on YouTube and everything changed. Before it, electric cars we not cool, and they were not fast. A budding and borderline unhealthy obsession with technology would underpin a 12-year career at Roush Industries that would take him from a powertrain technician for the Roush Mustang, to building rollercoasters, NVH engineering, and finally to a state-of-the-art simulated durability lab working with nearly every EV startup you’ve ever heard of, and some you never will. And then it was time to go, and by a stroke of luck Nikola Tesla himself couldn’t have predicted, MotorTrend’s test team was looking for the exact kind of vehicle testing background he had to offer. And with it, his love of cars, art, engineering, and writing all suddenly had a home together. At this point in life, Matthew has developed a love and appreciation for all cars and methods of propulsion. He loves reviewing minivans as much as luxury cars and everything in-between, because the cars people need to haul their kids around are just as important as the ones we hang on our bedroom walls.
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