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Facelifted junior Rolls gains the sporting flavour of a Black Badge fettling

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With this week’s road test, we check in on the latest developments concerning two of Rolls-Royce’s more popular modern inventions. The Rolls-Royce Ghost limousine – now on sale as a facelifted Series II take on its second-generation form – is the first of them and the anti-traditional Black Badge derivative phenomenon is the other. 

The Ghost first arrived in 2009 as a slightly smaller, more usable and less formal foil for the traditional Phantom. It broadened Rolls-Royce’s customer base significantly and also attracted a significantly younger audience. 

That car became one of the first to receive a Black Badge design treatment, in 2016. Intended as an effective counterpoint to the more traditional luxury design idioms of the firm’s ‘mainstream’ models, Black Badge variants adopt subversive, alternative materials and features to appeal to buyers less enamoured of the ‘age of grandeur’ that Rolls-Royce has typically catered to, and more motivated by contemporary design trends. 

Which brings us to this car: the Rolls-Royce Ghost Series II Black Badge. The Black Badge 'thing' has proven a commercial success for Goodwood, and now accounts for 25% of the firm’s sales volume. With this Ghost Series II, it takes a subtle but significant development step in sporting character and engineering scope. The resulting car has been described by its maker as the most agile and driver-focused limousine the firm has created. Stand by to find out what, precisely, that means.

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DESIGN & STYLING

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Rolls Royce Ghost review 2025 002

Launched in 2020, the second-generation Ghost has become a key technological demonstrator for Rolls-Royce. The first-generation car was criticised for its adoption of a BMW Group model platform and V12 engine, but the second could hardly have been more different.

It uses Rolls-Royce’s own Architecture of Luxury (an all- aluminium spaceframe-style chassis) and a different version of the 6.75-litre V12 that powers the Phantom, but it also blooded an innovative Planar active air suspension system. This not only adapts its spring and damper calibration for the road surface ahead based on input from a camera (technology that, in inimitable fashion reminiscent of motoring’s earliest days, Rolls-Royce calls ‘Flagbearer’) but also has dedicated mass damper countermeasures on both axles intended to absorb lateral shocks that might otherwise disturb the car’s ride. 

The Ghost Black Badge gets its own front bumper styling with this enlarged air dam, which, at its lateral extremes, provides extra cooling to the front brakes. It looks like it means business too.

The Ghost uses active all-wheel drive and active four-wheel steering. The former feature, just like the active suspension system, isn’t offered on the more expensive Phantom.

Aside from introducing some new wheel designs, Rolls-Royce hasn’t changed the regular Ghost’s running chassis specification for the Series II version, but it has come up with a new and special Black Badge calibration of the Planar suspension. So the tuning of the steering, adaptive damping and ride height have been subtly reappraised for improved body control and greater driver engagement.

The Black Badge model continues to use the ‘high-power’ version of the Ghost’s 6.75-litre twin- turbocharged V12, producing 592bhp and 664lb ft here, just as it did in the pre-facelift Ghost Black Badge (up from 564bhp and 627lb ft in the standard model). The Black Badge’s eight-speed automatic gearbox can execute shift s 50% quicker than the regular car’s, when more than 90% throttle is being applied, and it has an active exhaust system for more audible drama. 

In terms of its appearance, this also becomes the first Black Badge Rolls with redesigned body features, rather than simply different body trim. The Ghost Series II has revised headlights and tail-lights to mark it out, as well as some subtle new chrome front bumper trim, but the Black Badge gets a wider, lower front air dam with specially designed outer air intakes that feed more cooling air through to the front brakes.

INTERIOR

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Rolls Royce Ghost review 2025 011 dash

The Ghost continues to tread a careful line between largeness and what many might consider excessive vastness. The car doesn’t stand as tall at the kerb as the more imposing Phantom so, although long, doesn’t have the kind of bulk that gives you pause for thought as you approach and then tug on the outsized handle of one of its ‘coach’ doors. It’s big – but not extraordinarily so.

From behind the wheel, you will find the cabin’s proportions conventional. Large, soft, broadly adjustable and suitably comfortable, the front seats offer abundant leg room and a hip point of fairly saloon-typical height.

‘Black Badge Technical Fibre’ is the default cabin trim choice: a mix of interlaced carbonfibre and metal thread, laid onto bolivar wood and then polished to the finest sheen, that really does catch the eye. Bespoke alternatives are, of course, possible.

Even in the Black Badge, the steering wheel remains large, with a slim, studiously round rim. Rolls-Royce’s preference for simple, traditional primary controls makes for an elegantly slender column shifter transmission control stalk, and an indicator wand matching in its lissom svelteness. Even here, there are no paddleshifters for manual gearbox control, however. On the digital instrument screen in front of you, Rolls’ famous ‘power reserve’ dial is in its familiar place; so there’s no rev-counter, either. These are your first clues that, while a dusting of extra driver appeal may be in the offing, some things remain sacrosanct.

That a regular-series Ghost would likely eschew a colour combination like our test car’s Phoenix Red on Black leather is hard to doubt, however. Added to this, the Black Badge comes with what Goodwood describes as ‘Technical Fibre’ cabin trim: a bolivar wood with layers of carbonfibre and metal leaf, and polished to a lusty sheen. It not only catches the eye, but very skilfully balances modern performance appeal and Rolls-Royce’s typical traditional craftsmanship.

In the back, our test car had occupant space typical of a large limousine, but was no bigger (an ‘Extended’ model some 170mm longer in the wheelbase can still be had if you desire more.) Even so, its motorised rear-hinged coach doors and set-back seats still conjured lots of grandness and sense of occasion. Visibility isn’t great because of the chunky roof pillars, but most passengers we drove said they appreciated the resultant sense of being cocooned.

The boot is big by saloon standards. It’s a little narrow but would be more than 1.2m long if you did without Rolls-Royce’s back-row drinks chiller and could swallow bulky luggage easily.

Multimedia - 4.5 stars

The Ghost’s infotainment system, called Spirit, has had an update for the Series II facelift but it retains a particularly old-school control regime. Rolls-Royce’s iDrive-style physical rotary input device continues on the transmission tunnel, surrounded by various menu shortcuts, and the same line of eight user-configurable chrome shortcut keys remains in place just under the screen.

So while the screen can be operated by touch, more often than not you find your way around it via other means and, with a little time to set up preferences, it’s really easy to use and not distracting at all. There are physical heating and ventilation controls, too, so the system doesn’t feel over-burdened. 

For those in the rear seats, our test car came with individual multimedia displays built in behind its motorised picnic tables and each can stream media from a different wired device and connect to a different set of wireless headphones, if necessary.

ENGINES & PERFORMANCE

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Rolls Royce Ghost review 2025 023 front tracking

The magic of a modern Rolls-Royce in motion is encapsulated perfectly by its first 20 yards or so – and that magic isn’t compromised one jot by this Black Badge execution.

The Ghost’s V12 engine catches with only the very faintest whine of starter motor and then settles into a faultlessly smooth and quiet idle. Squeeze the accelerator and the car’s super-progressive pedal tuning, combined with the most lusciously decadent engagement of the gearbox’s torque converter, makes you feel more like you’re easing an expensive powerboat away from its moorings than actually connecting a piston engine to two driven axles. It’s a bit like driving through treacle but in the most agreeable way imaginable.

Part of me wishes they had risked some closer gearbox control, and a rev counter, on this car but I also love the driving experience as it is. You can feel master of it without investing or expending any particular effort in enjoying it. It's simply lovely.

There is very little you can actually do to make a car like that feel like it’s hurrying off the mark. Select the car’s Low transmission setting and there’s just a little more urgency about the way the Ghost ushers in its drive forces – not to mention just a dash of extra V12 vocality from the engine, which takes on an audible tone distantly redolent of a pack of pedigree draught horses braying at the reins.

But even here, when you build torque up against the brake pedal and then launch it from stationary, the 4.5sec 0-60mph time you will record still fails to trouble the car’s traction at all. Clearly, Rolls-Royce could have shaved plenty from that but its decision not to reveals plenty about the subtlety with which it’s courting added dynamism and excitement here.

Keep your foot planted hard and the Ghost Black Badge certainly feels – and is – fast. Though it’s not a match in outright terms for the Bentley Flying Spur Speed we tested earlier this year, the way it squats on its hind quarters, allowing the front axle and steering to become slightly light as it forges beyond 100mph, makes for an abundant sense of speed. The lightness of that steering doesn’t develop enough to corrupt the car’s stability. But it’s enough to make you think about where and how often you would fully uncork what is, after all, a 2.5-tonne luxury saloon that’s quicker – from 70mph and beyond – than the last Volkswagen Golf R that we tested in 2021.

Would you enjoy yourself more if you could select gears ‘manually’? We would argue yes – mostly to control precisely when and how forcefully the automatic gearbox elects to shift down under plenty of power, but also to develop an even more meaningful connection to what is a really enticing V12 engine

As it is, Rolls-Royce’s perennial preoccupation with producing what feels like an infinitely torquey ‘one gear’ style of performance for this car costs it just a little potential driver appeal where more could otherwise be had.

RIDE & HANDLING

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Rolls Royce Ghost review 2025 024 front cornering

When we road tested the second-generation Ghost in 2021, it was its ever-predictable handling and enticing steering that impressed us most. Four years on, those dynamic strengths remain in place in this Black Badge version and are still intoxicatingly convincing in such a large and heavy car that’s lovely to stroke along at a just-so seven-and-a-half-tenths pace.

This Ghost certainly has a more level and uncannily settled country road ride in Black Badge form than it has as standard, however, and, when working at its best, also seems to put its active suspension to better use to dial out the lateral body movements that cause head toss.

Duality is key to this car’s dynamic appeal. Leave the Black Badge in its standard transmission mode and its ride comfort is pervading and convincing, its isolation from the road surface at times eerily good.

It doesn’t quite waft with the long, languid, vertical movements of a Phantom. But there is an ever-fluent sort of breathing to the way the Ghost hovers above most roads and a real sense of glide about how it absorbs most asymmetrical inputs as they hit one side of the axles or the other. You can hear these distantly but you just don’t feel them as you expect to and the rock-roll bodily reaction you expect of a softly sprung limousine simply never materialises. Except, that is, for rare but noticeable occasions when a mid-corner sharp edge hit with a loaded wheel appears to catch the Planar suspension out and make it seem to freeze slightly.

Hit Low transmission mode and you can feel a little of that breathing compliance dialled out of the ride and sense greater weight to the otherwise light but consistent steering. But that’s it. There’s no extra directness to the pace of the four-wheel steering and no more alertness to the car’s laid-back, long-wheelbase chassis response. Because a Rolls is a Rolls and must always be stately and serene, even when going quickly.

Hurry this car along faster still and you will soon find a pace it isn’t comfortable maintaining, as steady-state understeer builds and damping support at that soft rear axle wanes. But for a big, wide, heavy saloon with clear priorities, the Ghost Black Badge can be driven keenly and it is enjoyable when you respect its boundaries, but it is always an uncompromising luxury proposition.

Track notes - 3 stars

Driving a Rolls-Royce on a circuit feels like an offence that ought to be punishable by detention in the Tower. Even this Rolls-Royce, with its subtly lifted dynamic ambitions, ultimately reveals the sacrifices made in order to produce such an accomplished on-road ride.

The Black Badge has the power and mechanical grip to be driven quite quickly around a lap. But, at the limit of that grip, it’s subject to the kind of steady-state understeer that wouldn’t afflict an equivalent Bentley or Mercedes because such a softly set rear axle, necessary to make this car as comfortable as it is, simply gives the Ghost’s front axle less to push against.

The electronic stability and traction control systems work well, and with subtlety, to keep it in safe, untroubled dynamic waters. But if you turn them off (and you can), the car’s limits come quite early and aren’t to be bargained with.

MPG & RUNNING COSTS

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Rolls Royce Ghost review 2025 001 front tracking

Ghost prices rose quite sharply when Rolls-Royce replaced the old BMW-based model with the second-generation one in 2020. But then the car that replaced the old Ghost was rather a different beast technically, and since Rolls-Royce buyers tend not to quibble – or even take a passing interest – over pounds, shillings and pence, little notice was taken.

Now, list prices have increased only slightly with the Series II facelift: somewhere between £4000 and £8000, depending on model, on a car that’s unlikely to yield a final transaction price of less than £300,000 in any guise. So in the strictest sense, this remains Rolls’ ‘affordable’ model, but it would be pointless to describe it as such. A Black Badge comes at a premium of just under £50,000 compared with the regular model. (For an Extended Wheelbase, it’s £30,000.)

Our test car, meanwhile, returned a touring fuel economy test result of just under 26mpg and has a 90-litre fuel tank, so its real-world 500-mile cruising range ought to make it just as suited to continental touring as its roomy boot does.

VERDICT

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Rolls Royce Ghost review 2025 028 static

The very idea of a forgotten Rolls-Royce may be a little far-fetched but, in the era of the Rolls-Royce Spectre and Cullinan, it does feel as if that’s the role the Ghost is fated to play. And it does so superbly – because it’s usable, manageable and just a little bit understated, but also still grand, lavish, special and highly dynamically accomplished.

Perhaps that’s why the Black Badge version works so well. It elevates this car’s stature, develops its dynamic appeal, and both modernises and subverts its kerbside presence.

We wondered before this test if it might turn out to be a wannabe super-saloon, but no: a Rolls-Royce can’t pretend to be anything other than luxurious to its bones. Yet this one has just enough sporting seasoning to add to the overall appeal, without changing the guiding recipe – and we like it a lot.

Matt Saunders

Matt Saunders Autocar
Title: Road test editor

As Autocar’s chief car tester and reviewer, it’s Matt’s job to ensure the quality, objectivity, relevance and rigour of the entirety of Autocar’s reviews output, as well contributing a great many detailed road tests, group tests and drive reviews himself.

Matt has been an Autocar staffer since the autumn of 2003, and has been lucky enough to work alongside some of the magazine’s best-known writers and contributors over that time. He served as staff writer, features editor, assistant editor and digital editor, before joining the road test desk in 2011.

Since then he’s driven, measured, lap-timed, figured, and reported on cars as varied as the Bugatti Veyron, Rolls-Royce PhantomTesla RoadsterAriel Hipercar, Tata Nano, McLaren SennaRenault Twizy and Toyota Mirai. Among his wider personal highlights of the job have been covering Sebastien Loeb’s record-breaking run at Pikes Peak in 2013; doing 190mph on derestricted German autobahn in a Brabus Rocket; and driving McLaren’s legendary ‘XP5’ F1 prototype. His own car is a trusty Mazda CX-5.