We spent a year driving a Nissan Murano. Here's what we thought of it.
Transcript[MUSIC PLAYING]
GREG MIGLIORE: So the thing that really stood out for me at both the Murano was its design. I thought this looked like a concept car. It just, it really stood out on the road. When I see the Murano, I was like whoa. That's cool. And that alone made me at least interested in driving it.
CHRISTOPHER MCGRAW: Design, for me, it just was a little maybe too bulbous. The headlights kind of stuck out. And the wheels, I didn't really like the wheels at all.
DAVID GLUCKMAN: So we chose the white leather on our car knowing that the dye from blue jeans was going to transfer to the seats. That happened. It was pretty easy to clean up with some leather cleaner. But, again, I wouldn't choose that in my own personal car.
ADAM MORATH: They really tried to bring some interesting textures and surfaces into the interior. This almost, kind of, like marble look to some of the plastic. I think it gave them a high end feel.
ERIK MAIER: The Nissan Murano-- a good way to express my grievances with this vehicle is that it was precisely OK. You need to do something more than heated seats and a touchscreen infotainment system. That's not going to win me over. That, coupled with the very milk-toast interior, the bad visibility-- in my opinion-- it really just brought the entire experience down for me.
EDDIE SABATINI: I really liked a lot of the interior features of the Murano. There were a lot of creature comforts that worked well and that we used often, specifically the four heated seats. Two in the front and two in the back. Those really came in handy, as did the heated steering wheel.
MICHAEL AUSTIN: I love the wood trim. Other people hated it. I thought it was really neat. I think someone described it as a Chinese bowling ball. I thought it was fancier. More like Macau Casino.
DAVID GLUCKMAN: The Murano really felt big to me when I was driving it. Bigger than it actually is.
MICHAEL AUSTIN: Typical [INAUDIBLE] points that were really good in the Murano-- super comfortable seats, for sure. The around view monitor for parking, you get that bird's eye view. And you can steer and make sure you're not hitting anything all the way around you.
I don't know if anyone else tried it, but there's this NissanConnect app, and that lets you do things like put Pandora on the infotainment screen. I never got it to work.
EDDIE SABATINI: It was very comfortable for four adults, and allowed us to fit all our gear in the back. But it also had plenty of pickup power. It had a decent engine in it.
CHRISTOPHER MCGRAW: I really thought the Murano, it was very comfortable for long trips. I drove it up North, which is about four or five hours away, a dozen times. And it was always very comfortable on those long drives.
MICHAEL AUSTIN: Although the adaptive cruise was really good, it was really smooth [INAUDIBLE] the integration, I only wish it had lane keeping. Because if you're not working the gas and brake, you shouldn't have to work the steering, either. It's ridiculous that you would have to drive a car.
DAVID GLUCKMAN: I was a little disappointed by the adaptive cruise control in the Murano. Because it was really lazy when it came to closing up a gap after you went up the hill or somebody cut you off and opened up a gap in front of you. I think that was partly due to the way that transmission is tuned for fuel efficiency, instead of giving you lots of power all the time.
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