Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Cars
  3. News

Sporting tons of tech, the new Mercedes-Benz Sprinter isn’t your average van

By

Vans aren’t usually hotbeds of automotive technology, but Mercedes-Benz is trying to change that with its redesigned Sprinter. The new Sprinter has traditional van virtues, like generous cargo space and Lego-like configurability. But it also emphasizes connectivity like never before, and will be offered with an all-electric powertrain for the first time.

Mercedes loaded the Sprinter up with tech features aimed at both individual and fleet buyers. Multiple telematics services bundled under the Mercedes Pro label allow fleet managers to monitor the locations, fuel levels, and maintenance records of multiple vehicles, as well as give drivers assignments.

Recommended Videos

The Sprinter also boasts many of the tech features one would normally expect to find in a passenger car. The new MBUX infotainment system can be paired with 7-inch or 10.25-inch touchscreens, and features AppleCarPlay and Android Auto. A voice-recognition system understands casual speech. For example, saying “the fuel tank is empty” prompts the system to find nearby gas stations. Touchpads on the steering wheel control infotainment functions.

Driver-assist tech has also reached passenger-car levels. The Sprinter can be equipped with adaptive cruise control, autonomous emergency braking, lane keep assist, crosswind assist, a driver attention monitor, and 360-degree camera system. It also gets Mercedes’ “Wet Wiper” system, which sprays washer fluid directly onto the wiper blades, rather than the windshield, to improve visibility.

On the outside, the Sprinter looks similar to the outgoing-generation model, with a bit of the Mercedes Vision Van concept thrown in. Under the skin, Mercedes will offer an all-electric powertrain in the Sprinter for the first time. The electric model, called eSprinter, will arrive in 2019. In Europe, other versions will use a variety of gasoline and diesel engines. The U.S.-spec engine lineup hasn’t been finalized.

Like its predecessor, the new Sprinter will be offered in an array of configurations for carrying both cargo and passengers. Mercedes claims there are no less than 1,700 possible combinations of powertrain and body style. That includes a choice of front-wheel drive, rear-wheel drive, or all-wheel drive. The Sprinter is probably the only vehicle in production to offer all three. The packaging efficiency of the front-wheel drive option makes it ideal for camper-van conversions, Mercedes says.

The new Mercedes-Benz Sprinter goes on sale in Europe in June. A U.S. launch date and pricing will be announced at a later date. Sprinters sold in the U.S. will be built at a new factory in Charleston, South Carolina.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Stephen Edelstein
Stephen Edelstein
Contributing Editor
Stephen is a freelance automotive journalist covering all things cars. He likes anything with four wheels, from classic cars…
Mercedes is finally bringing an electric van to the U.S.
Front three quarter view of the 2024 Mercedes-Benz eSprinter electric van.

Mercedes-Benz might be known for luxury cars, but it also makes vans, and it's finally bringing an electric van to the United States.

Scheduled to start production this summer, the 2024 Mercedes-Benz eSprinter is an all-electric version of the Sprinter full-size cargo van that's already a favorite of delivery services like FedEx and Amazon, as well as camper van converters. While the automaker has been selling electric vans in Europe since 2010, the new eSprinter is the first one aimed at the U.S. market.

Read more
2023 Mercedes-Benz EQE SUV preview: The EV lineup grows again
Front three quarter view of the 2023 Mercedes-Benz EQE SUV.

As Mercedes-Benz has steadily expanded its EQ range of electric cars, the lineup has become a bit like the late stages of a Tetris game. It’s mostly complete, but with a few gaps still left. And the 2023 Mercedes-Benz EQE SUV is the piece that perfectly fits one of them.
Mercedes recently launched two other electric SUVs at opposite ends of the price spectrum. The EQS SUV is positioned as the lineup’s flagship, while the EQB is the entry-level model. The EQE SUV slots between those two in size and, presumably, price. The latter hasn’t been confirmed yet, and likely won’t be until the EQE SUV’s planned March 2023 on-sale date.

Design
As the name says, the EQE SUV is a utility-vehicle version of the EQE sedan, which will likely beat it to showrooms by a few months. Mercedes did the same thing with the EQS, which is available in both SUV and sedan body styles.
With its tall, upright profile, the EQE SUV definitely looks like a proper SUV compared to the low-slung EQE sedan. Park it next to an EQS SUV, though, and you’ll have to get out a measuring tape to spot the differences.
The EQE SUV is 0.6 inch narrower and 1.2 inches lower than the EQS SUV, but the most significant difference is in length. The EQE SUV is 10.3 inches shorter than the EQS SUV, with a 2.1-inch shorter wheelbase. And while the EQS SUV has three-row seating, the EQE SUV has two rows. Based on our experience with the EQS SUV’s third row, that’s not a big loss.
The interior design theme carries over from other Mercedes EQ models, with an expansive sloping dashboard designed to accommodate many screens, and multicolor ambient lighting that should look pretty dramatic at night. However, leatherette upholstery is standard, rather than real leather, which Mercedes is now spinning as a vegan option.

Read more
We tested the self-driving Mercedes tech so advanced, it’s not allowed in the U.S.
Mercedes-Benz S-Class sedan with Drive Pilot.

You can’t buy a fully self-driving car today -- and may never be able to -- but automakers are looking at ways to shift more of the workload from human drivers to machinery. Mercedes-Benz may have taken the biggest step in that direction yet.

Mercedes claims its Drive Pilot system, which was recently launched in Germany, is the first production system to achieve Level 3 on the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) autonomy scale, meaning the car can fully drive itself with the system active, but a human driver may still need to take over from time to time. It’s still a long way off from autonomous driving, but the Level 3 designation signifies a greater degree of capability than competitor systems.

Read more