View Photos of the 2020 Mercedes-Benz GLS

Since its debut as the 2007 GL-later renamed GLS-Mercedes-Benz's flagship SUV has been our favorite in the three-row large-SUV class, continuing to defeat all comers even in this year's 10Best Trucks and SUVs awards in its final year before this major redesign. That the GLS retained not just competitiveness but supremacy throughout its extended life cycle speaks to just how fundamentally excellent it was to start, and maybe a little bit that, until the recent arrival of the BMW X7, most of its competitors were based on underpinnings donated from pickup trucks. But its winning blend of luxurious and sophisticated comportment and three rows of generous passenger space caused it to nibble away at the stranglehold that the General Motors brutes-the Cadillac Escalade, Chevy Tahoe and Suburban, and GMC Yukon-had on the segment.