All-New BMW X5 for Australia: Two Six-Cylinders From a Reported $143,900, Landing Late 2026

Image credit: BMW. Overseas model shown, local specification may vary.

The X5 has been BMW's most important car in Australia for the better part of two decades, and the one we have been selling since 2018 is finally being replaced. Not facelifted. Replaced. This is the fifth-generation car, and it brings the tall narrow kidney grille and X-shaped light signature from BMW's new design language with it.

Two variants launch here in the final quarter of this year, both 3.0-litre straight-sixes with 48-volt assistance, both with the M Sport package as standard. A plug-in hybrid and a fully electric iX5 arrive next year. The prices, though, come with a caveat we want to put near the top rather than bury.

The Prices Are Reported, Not Published

Two figures are circulating, and they are almost certainly right, but we could not stand them up against BMW Australia itself. BMW's Australian pressroom sits behind a login. The bmw.com.au X5 pages carry the entire technical data sheet and not one dollar figure. Even BMW's own online configurator cannot return a price for the new car yet, while it happily prices the outgoing one.

Prices before on-road costs, as reported. BMW Australia has not published pricing for the new X5. Variant names are BMW Australia's own, note "40 xDrive" rather than the old "xDrive40i" format.

The naming has changed too, and it trips people up. BMW Australia's own strings are X5 40 xDrive and X5 40d xDrive, with the drive type after the number rather than before it. Not xDrive40i, and not xDrive40d.

What Moved Against the X5 We Already Hold

We carry the outgoing car, so we can put the two side by side. Our G05 prices were last checked against bmw.com.au on 24 June 2026.

Outgoing figures from the CarSorted database, prices before on-road costs and last checked against bmw.com.au on 24 June 2026. New-car prices as reported.

The engineering step is modest and sensible: the diesel gains 11kW with torque unchanged, and the petrol gains 14kW and 60Nm. Nobody is going to feel robbed, and nobody is going to be stunned either.

The pricing is more interesting, and here is a wrinkle worth showing our working on. Against the figures we hold, the new diesel is $6,300 dearer and the new petrol $4,300 dearer. But the reported price walk describes the steps as roughly $4,000 and $2,000. Both of those gaps come out at exactly $2,300, which is too neat to be coincidence: it points to BMW having lifted the outgoing car's list price by $2,300 sometime after our June check, rather than to anyone's new-car figure being wrong.

We mention it because it is a useful reminder that a price in any database, ours included, is a snapshot with a date on it. Those rows are queued for a re-check.

Image credit: BMW. Overseas model shown, local specification may vary.

The Torque Number Half the Internet Is About to Get Wrong

You will see the petrol X5 quoted as 294kW and 540Nm. That 540Nm is the combustion engine measured on its own. BMW's published system output, the one that includes the 48-volt motor and the one BMW leads with, is 580Nm.

Both numbers are real and both come from BMW. They just answer different questions, and the engine-only figure has escaped into the wild as if it were the headline. We use the system figure, because that is what the car actually delivers.

What BMW Australia Has Published

The technical data is genuinely well documented, which makes the missing price all the odder. Everything below is from BMW Australia's own technical data pages.

From BMW Australia's published technical data. BMW notes these are determined under WLTP with German-market optional equipment, so they are not ADR 81/02 figures. BMW Australia does not publish a fuel consumption or CO2 figure for the diesel. BMW's global spec table lists 4,994mm for length.

Standard kit is generous at this money: adaptive M suspension, a panoramic glass roof, comfort front seats with heating, cooling and massage, soft-close doors, a heated wheel, a 17.9-inch touchscreen with a passenger display, and an 18-speaker Bowers and Wilkins system. Air suspension is a reported $7,000 option, which is the one line on the options list likely to matter most to anyone planning to use the 3,000kg tow rating.

The Electric One Is the Interesting Car

The iX5 60 xDrive lands in 2027 with 425kW and 805Nm, a 141kWh battery, a claimed 645 to 845km of range, 460kW DC charging and a 10 to 80 per cent stop quoted at 23 minutes. Those are enormous numbers, again measured to WLTP with European equipment rather than to our standards.

The 50e plug-in hybrid we currently sell has a 25.7kWh battery and 101km of electric range. The new one steps to 26.5kWh and a claimed 86 to 102km, so essentially a hold rather than a leap. If you are weighing a PHEV against a full EV on running costs, our lease calculator is the quickest way to see how the sums land, and the electric luxury SUV guide covers the rivals.

On Safety: Unrated, and That Applies to the Old One Too

There is no ANCAP rating for the new X5. More usefully, ANCAP's current listing says in plain words that BMW X5 vehicles built from 1 January 2025 are unrated, and the five-star result the X5 wore was awarded on 2018 testing and expired in December 2024.

So "the X5 is a five-star car" has not been true for a while, and it is not true of the new one. It shows no data with us until ANCAP publishes something, and we will not carry an expired rating forward to a brand-new vehicle on a different platform.

Our Take: a Confident Car With a Curiously Quiet Launch

The X5 has never really had to fight for attention here, and the new one does not appear to be trying to. Two six-cylinders, a modest power bump, a big screen, and a price that moves up by less than the spec would justify. The genuinely new thinking is parked in 2027 with the iX5.

The reported loss of the optional third row is the change most likely to annoy existing owners, and it pushes anyone who needs seven seats towards an X7 or out of the brand entirely. Worth confirming with a dealer before you order, since BMW has not addressed it directly.

What we would like, and what BMW Australia has not yet given anyone, is a published price. Until the configurator goes live or a public price list appears, $143,900 and $145,900 are well-sourced reporting rather than the manufacturer's recommended list price, and we have not written them into the database against a new X5 row. The moment BMW publishes, they will be. In the meantime the M60i and X5 M Competition carry on, and the rest of the BMW range is here.