Tested: 2023 Volvo V60 Cross Country B5 Goes against the Crowd
Volvo’s XC60 mid-size SUV may be its bestseller these days, but the brand long known for station wagons hasn’t yet given up on the segment. The V60 is the XC60’s wagon-bodied counterpart, and it shows there are still virtues in going against the crowd.
Wagons are all but extinct, yet paradoxically, they’ve never looked better. That’s certainly true of Volvo’s V60, which emerged from its 2019 redesign wearing a sharply tailored new suit of sheetmetal. It also boasts less nose-heavy, more athletic proportions. Four years on, tweaks to the grille, rear bumper, and wheel designs denote the ’23 model, but bigger changes are afoot on the inside and under the hood.
Volvo offers the V60 wagon in a choice of two powertrains, both with standard all-wheel drive. A turbocharged 2.0-liter four assisted by a 48-volt hybrid system powers the mainstay offering, the V60 Cross Country. A 2.0-liter plug-in hybrid, the Polestar Engineered, or V60 Recharge, makes 455 horsepower and also can drive up to 41 miles on battery power alone. Most buyers will choose the version tested here, the Cross Country.
The electrically assisted drivetrain is new to the V60 Cross Country but rolled out in other Volvos last year (the XC60 midsize SUV, the S60 midsize sedan, the S90 large sedan, and the V90 Cross Country wagon). While some of those models also offer a more powerful B6 version that makes 295 horsepower, the V60 Cross Country no longer offers a mid-level choice, only the standard B5 that musters 247 horsepower.
Volvo is eager to herald the news that all its cars are now electrified, meaning they either employ some form of hybrid assistance or are EVs. For the V60, though, the benefits beyond corporate bragging rights are modest at best.
Most notably, our instrumented testing showed that performance takes a hit. The V60 Cross Country needs 7.1 seconds to reach 60 mph, and it crosses the quarter-mile in 15.4 seconds at 92 mph. That’s significantly behind the last V60 we tested with the previous T5 engine, a front-driver that hit 60 in 6.4 seconds and busted through the quarter-mile in 14.9 seconds at 96 mph.
