First look: Citroën C5 Aircross

The C5 Aircross is Citroën’s new flagship. So confirmed CEO Thierry Koskas to CDN during its reveal at Palais de Tokyo in Paris, the brand moving away from the traditional D-segment at the cost of its quirky C5-X.

A big task for the new Aircross but it arrives on a wave of confidence – the firm has stayed true to its 2024 Paris Motor Show promise that the concept would make it to production almost unscathed.

Indeed, only showroom realities like protruding door handles, realistic wheel rims and correctly proportioned mirrors are easily identified in a brisk spot-the-difference.

This is the first roadgoing Citroën which allows 20-inch alloys to sit within its arches, while the ‘Incredible Green’ paint of the show car also makes it to the configurator.

More notable yet are its exposed rear ‘Light Wings’, a standout design feature partially led by aerodynamics and which we’ll see on future Citroën models as a brand signature. Another fine result for the CDN-award winning Citroën OLI concept from which they originate.

“We had a great project leader and a team of engineers that were open-minded to try new things,” Citroën head of design Pierre Leclercq tells CDN. “The cool thing about the three taillight elements is that you don’t see where the cut line is. It sounds minor, but we always fight for the minimum number of millimetres in cut lines for continuity.

“But that’s always difficult because you have a big black band in the middle. Here you don’t care, as you don’t read any cut lines.

“Another thing we’ve done with those taillights is simplify the construction. For the first time, we don’t have any shell or casing. Instead, the lights are injected into the pieces.

“You could say, ‘Oh that’s expensive to make’ but imagine the components we’ve saved. It is a cheap solution that we want to continue [on future models] because I think it looks super modern.”

The airflow carved by the Light Wings also helps mitigate the aerodynamicists’ request for Leclercq’s team to further narrow the cabin, which would have been tricky in a family-led SUV.

The aero performance of the C5 Aircross has not been led by a specific drag coefficient target, rather Leclercq and his colleagues have eked out as many miles of range as possible from its plug-in iterations.

Nonetheless, its efficiency slightly lags behind its Vauxhall and Opel Grandland cousin with which it shares its key dimensions, not least a stocky 2,784mm wheelbase – up 60mm on the outgoing C5 Aircross and channelled mostly into second-row legroom.

The concept car didn’t display an interior, but the production reality is a pleasing yet functional mix from the familiar Stellantis part shelves, with the group’s most expansive touchscreen yet nestled centrally in a ‘waterfall’ format.

A little flashy by Citroën standards, you might say; more befitting of the firm’s heritage is the pragmatic approach of the storage solutions tucked behind the large HD display.

Materials contributing to their structure include vine shoots from organic Burgundy vineyards which would have been burnt after harvesting otherwise. We can all raise a glass to that. They help contribute to 47kg of recycled or bio-sourced plastics and 160kg of recycled materials overall in the new C5 Aircross.

Moving further back, the concept-carryover roofline only starts to drop beyond rear passenger headroom – also improved by 68mm on its predecessor – but will remain a five-seat-only option. This is despite the smaller C3 Aircross offering an optional (albeit cramped) third row.

Citroën’s patented Advanced Comfort seats might soak up any disappointment, however, with the second-row seats reclining between 21 and 33 degrees to switch priority between passenger posture or luggage capacity.

More prosaic stalks and switches are familiar from the wider Stellantis group to hint at the increasingly common STLA-Medium platform perched beneath the new design work.

That also means common powertrain choices including numerous hybrids and several fully electric ë-C5 Aircross models, the largest 97kWh battery option offering up to 422 miles of autonomy (compared to 435 in the Grandland).

Perhaps such familiarity from its platform pals won’t please the Citroën purists, who have previously had the DS, XM and soon-departing C5-X to worship as proudly individual flagships.

The pure concept-to-reality journey of this latest SUV may just appease them – likewise Leclercq’s proudly unsporting philosophy.

“We don’t want to be sporty,” he confides in CDN, despite the C5 Aircross name being applied to a car much less curvy than its forebear. “We don’t want to be dynamic. All of our lines are vertical. I’m being a pain in the ass with our designers because I want so many lines perfectly vertical.

“I don’t want a little bit of an angle, I don’t want a curve. It’s extreme but you cannot imagine how much it contributes to the attitude of the car.”