2025 Lamborghini Urus SE Review: An automotive oxymoron

You could assume that Toyota is the face of the automotive fleet's transition to hybrid technology but they are far from the only one pitching them. In fact, In the third quarter of 2024, the share of new hybrid vehicle sales reached a record 10.6 percent market share.

Aiding and abetting this increase is none other than Lamborghini, which seems highly unlikely. Yet it’s true. The Aventador’s replacement is the 1,001-horsepower Revuelto hybrid and following in its wake is the Huracán’s successor, the 907-horsepower Temerario.

Related: We talk with Lamborghini's CEO about an electrified future

Now, we have the 2025 Lamborghini Urus SE, powered by the Temerario’s 611-horsepower twin-turbocharged DOHC 4.0-liter V-8, 189-horsepower electric motor, and an eight-speed transmission used by Porsche and Bentley siblings in the Volkswagen Group. Here, it generates 789 horsepower and 701 pound-feet of torque for its four wheels, while towing 7,000 pounds.

Urus SE’s hybrid system doesn’t dampen its behavior

The Urus SE uses an AC motor that provides 37 miles of electric driving at speeds up to 81 mph thanks to its 25.9-kWh lithium-ion battery, which resides under the rear cargo floor. Fully recharging it from 20 percent requires 4 hours and 20 minutes.

As you might expect from an SUV, there are Strada, Sport, and Corsa modes for on-road driving and Neva, Sabbia, and Terra modes for off-road driving. This is in addition to Hybrid, Recharge, Performance, and EV Drive hybrid driveline modes.

You can endow the Urus SE with a variety of personas, although the overarching qualities are the ones you’d expect: exhilaration and extreme capability.

This hybrid can hustle

We had the chance to drive the 2025 Lamborghini Urus SE at Volkswagen Group’s Nardò Technical Center in southern Italy, as well as the streets nearby. It revealed that the Urus SE’s practicality and fuel efficiency don’t come at the expense of its fun factor.

As if to prove it, we slung this 5,523-pound stud muffin around the skid-pad, which is not the first thing you’d consider doing once behind its wheel. But it wears the Lamborghini badge, which is all that you need to know. It also handles like one, adroitly dancing through a motocross course with an ease that belies its weight and ride height. Credit goes to its rear-wheel steering, adaptive dampers, anti-roll bars, and carbon-ceramic brakes that are easily controlled thanks to its accurate, if light, steering.

It set the stage for what proved to be a riotous ride: several laps around the Strada Bianca, an off-road dirt track course riddled with tight turns and acres of topsoil heaped upon a decidedly inhospitable road surface. This is where the Urus SE comes into its own, hanging its tail out as it easily and effortlessly drifts around corners and absorbs bumps and ridges with the alacrity this Italian stallion is known for.

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Yet on the winding roads around the track, it proved potent enough to shove your vital internal organs against your backbone upon initial acceleration, with G-forces that leave little doubt as to its performance ability.

It’s the perfect prescription for adrenaline junkies, as the added electrons ensure there’s even more of the full-throttle thrills expected from a Lamborghini. That said, you’re always aware that you’re riding in an SUV, with its weight always apparent. And while the exhaust was quieter to meet European noise restrictions, the ones heading for North American shores will possess the requisite exhaust symphony that snarls, pops, and growls with authority.

Lamborghini brought a refined wardrobe for the Urus SE Hybrid

Of course, a new trim level and powertrain calls for a freshened face. The Urus SE benefits from freshly designed grilles that augment cooling framed by redesigned lighting. Inside, you’ll sit upon quilted leather seats in a cabin trimmed in aluminum trim.

Once seated, you’ll find the instrument cluster, infotainment system, and climate control systems are designed with the excitable angularity that adeptly captures Lamborghini’s character. They’re each housed on their own 12.3-inch digital display.

And, should you care about such things, the Urus SE is the most practical of Lambos, able to haul 22 cubic feet of stuff, growing to 57 cubic feet with the seats stashed. That’s more than a Toyota Venza Hybrid, and this rig is far more ferociously fun.

If you’re more concerned about carrying family or friends, there’s plenty of room for four, or five if they’re really close friends.

Final thoughts

Few vehicles combine outrageous fun with prodigious function and fuel efficiency so expertly. Given its unrestrained excess, the fact that it returns 18 mpg is as amazing as a politician keeping a promise. For short trips or the daily commute a few blocks away, it will never use a lick of gas.

With an MSRP starting at $262,630, its combination of design artistry, extreme excess, fuel efficiency, and unexpected practicality make it tough to resist. Who would think such a reprobate should be such an upright citizen – at least sometimes? It’s an automotive oxymoron.