Bentley’s newest grand tourer — the Continental GT Speed — packs a lot of power, luxury and style, and for 2022, is equipped with new gear to make it far more agile. It is distinguished from the rest of the Continental lineup by a dark-finish grille, lower air intake, more sculpted side sills and exclusive 22-inch wheels. It’s available as a coupe and convertible.
Bentley’s 6.0-liter twin-turbo W12 engine, packing 650 hp and 664 pound-feet of torque, is what really sets the car apart. It is bolted to an eight-speed dual-clutch transmission and standard all-wheel drive. While it weighs just more than 5,000 pounds, the enormous power propels the GT Speed from 0 to 60 mph in a scant 3.5 seconds, with a top speed of 208 mph.
We’ve rounded up some early reviews of the third-generation Continental GT Speed.
“It all looks and feels graceful and elegant, but like a swan gliding across a pond, the result is the product of furious activity you can’t see: The rear-steer system, the e-diff, the torque-vectoring by brake, the 48V anti-roll system, and the active all-wheel-drive system all work together, adjusting everything from turning radius to roll rates to front and rear and cross-car torque splits in real time to give the GT Speed the agility and balance you want. But it all feels surprisingly analog, reassuringly natural; the 2022 Bentley Continental GT Speed does what you want it to do, when you want it to do it, without fuss.
“If we’re looking for more improvements, a tad more dialog between your fingertips and the front tires would be nice. And although the massively powerful, optional carbon-ceramic stoppers eliminate 66 pounds of unsprung weight, we’d probably save our money and stick with the standard steel brakes.
“The new 2022 Continental GT Speed is not just an above-average Bentley. It’s quite possibly the ultimate modern gran turismo. It is everything you expect of a Bentley coupe: big and fast and luxurious and lush (the ride characteristics in Comfort and Bentley modes are identical to those of the regular W12 coupe), a car that can effortlessly devour 1,000 miles in a day and leave you feeling calm and relaxed at the end of it. But, uniquely, it’s a Bentley that’s also ready, willing, and able to play when the mood takes you.”
— Angus MacKenzie, MotorTrend
“While the revised chassis did impress, the Speed’s modestly altered W-12 engine remains its starring feature. The Speed gets new turbochargers to improve responses. While the torque peak moves slightly higher in the rev range, the horsepower peak hits at 5000 rpm and remains flat to 6000 rpm, the engine’s previous peak point. But the overall experience is almost entirely as we remember it from earlier examples. This venerable engine might be nearing its retirement party — Bentley claims it will produce its last non-electrified powertrain as soon as 2025 — but even as the sand runs down, it still feels like a modern engineering achievement.
“On public roads, where full throttle only ever comes in small doses, we know that the effortlessness of the W-12’s muscle tends to be its defining characteristic. But on Silverstone’s fast GP circuit, the mighty engine forgot its soft voice and wielded a very big stick, turning snarling and savage as it enabled huge velocities on the circuit’s straights. While loud under full throttle (even when experienced through the padding of a helmet), the Speed has lost some of the pops and bangs we remember brawnier versions of this engine making in previous models.”
— Mike Duff, Car and Driver
“The newfound chassis talent adds another facet to the Continental GT’s already broad and appealing repertoire, giving those buyers who might have grown out of the Porsche 911 Turbo a hugely luxurious GT that cossets as well as excites. That’s a tricky balance to get right, and it’s one that Bentley has apparently achieved, the ‘Speed’ here not being the raw numbers possible — the GT has always been a fast car — but instead the ability to explore that power and thrust in corners.
“Whether the Bentley’s spider chart robs some of its on-road ride for that handling prowess is still in question — today, we could only fast-lap the smooth, flat tarmac of Silverstone — but the chassis engineers are adamant that there’s very little trade-off. If that proves the case, the Continental GT Speed might just be the best Bentley coupe yet, usurping our usual preference for the V-8 model (if we were ever lucky enough to be browsing the Bentley configurator with moneyed intent). Then again, we wonder how good the W12 Speed’s transformative chassis revisions would be, mixed with that lighter, nearly-as-powerful V-8 under the hood.”
— Kyle Fortune, motor1.com