2024 Chevrolet Suburban Diesel Lives for Road Trips

• The 2024 Chevrolet Suburban High Country 4WD with seating for seven can be optioned with a 3.0-liter turbodiesel inline-six, delivering impressive fuel economy over the standard gasoline V8.

• In High Country trim, the Suburban can easily overlap in price with the base Cadillac Escalade from the same platform.

• With a few options checked, including Super Cruise, the diesel Suburban is for eating up hundreds of highway miles in one dash, while also towing something large weighing up to 7,800 pounds.

A diesel engine under the hood of one of the locomotive-shaped trucks that have become the standard family hauler over the past decade is a common-enough option these days. But a diesel under the hood of a roomy and reasonably luxurious family SUV is a little harder to find, especially as SUVs of this type and price are poised to go electric.

The Chevy Suburban has been part of our landscape long enough for it to require little introduction—at least the basic idea of it. But the latest iteration of Chevy's mobile living room exists in an era of much smaller commuter crossovers below it—and six-figure luxury yachts positioned just barely above it in price.

And the dimensions of the current Suburban are still surprising for something one will invariably see used as a daily driver, making it seem like an artifact from the late 1990s when ownership of a land yacht conferred status in suburbia.

This makes the diesel Suburban High Country seem like an anachronism in the age of rapidly electrifying SUV lineups. But as we've discovered after spending a week in one, there's still a place for it in the American landscape.

The current model, which entered the twelfth generation in 2020, did not seek to reinvent the formula of the Suburban that has been pretty static throughout oil crises, Watergates, more oil crises, a Star War or three, two-plus Gulf wars, more Star Wars, and several waves of the Pokemon craze.

Borrowing a platform from Chevy's truck lineup, the basic Suburban offers seating for up to nine passengers depending on which seating layouts you choose, as well as enough luggage room out back to serve as a hotel shuttle.

With a commanding road presence, the Suburban is pretty close to the most SUV you can buy from General Motors if you don't necessarily desire the visibility of driving an Escalade, with all of its chrome reflections blinding airline pilots up above.

It also makes you look like a Secret Service agent, especially if you option one in a Midnight Blue Metallic color.

While the base version of the Suburban that starts at $61,195 features a 5.3-liter V8 as standard, sending power solely to the rear wheels, the four-wheel-drive model in the top High Country trim is paired with a 6.2-liter gasoline V8, with 420 hp and 460 lb-ft of torque on tap.

But the Suburban can also be optioned with a 3.0-liter Duramax turbodiesel inline six-cylinder, offering a $1,500 discount over the 6.2-liter V8. With 277 hp and 460 lb-ft of torque, this is also the version that will offer 26 mpg on the highway and 20 mpg in town for a combined 22 mpg, at least according to EPA figures. These are far more favorable numbers than you're going to see in either V8.

But is this the version to get if you're shopping for a Suburban or, as rental car agencies put it, "Suburban or Similar?"

That's what we tried to find out by spending a week in the diesel-flavored Suburban High Country.

First things first: This engine is deliberate, rewarding gradual throttle inputs. The coarse hum of the throttle calls for a smoother, unhurried driving style, and with almost 19 feet of the Suburban's fuselage behind us this is one of those vehicles that requires some judicious maneuvers in traffic, and not just because there could be a comically small and obscure classic car in front of you at a stop light that you might not see. "Is that a DKW Junior Deluxe?"

The Duramax diesel doesn't feel short on power, so highway onramps can be taken without flooring the throttle, even though this engine is pulling quite a bit of car. On the highway is where the diesel Suburban feels at home, eating up miles without the fuel gauge moving even a millimeter.

With a long wheelbase and the beefy four-wheel-drive chassis, the 'burban settles down into the top gear of its 10-speed transmission and cruises along in relative quiet as the diesel hum is still easily heard. But it's not distracting, and the interior is insulated well enough for a quiet trip with just over 600 miles between fill-ups.

The 4WD system makes the steering feel light and a little numb, compared to the RWD model, so the suspension feels a little stiffer, but it's well within the comfort zone. Just like with large trucks, the Suburban feels more steady while hauling or towing something rather than traveling empty, so you will need passengers or a boat for the full experience. And realistically, if you're looking at one of these, you're probably going to be towing something with the Suburban.

So the ownership case for a diesel Suburban perhaps starts with the fact that you own something that needs towing hundreds of miles pretty regularly, and you also need to bring the crew of that vessel and all of their luggage on these trips.

The High Country is well suited for this task, offering two seats in the middle row that easily stow and tip forward to allow ingress and egress from the generous third row. The second-row passengers have 12.6-inch screens to keep them from kvetching on long journeys, and they're also separated by an aisle that's wide enough to allow access to the rear seats.

That's just how wide the Suburban is, but unfortunately it doesn't come with a flight attendant with a refreshment cart.

For the pilot and copilot up front, the Suburban offers a modern and convenient infotainment screen, along with plenty of physical buttons including the transmission that is controlled via switch-style buttons positioned up high, just to the right of the instrument cluster.

It's an unobtrusive system and it works with a satisfying click, making us thankful that GM hasn't gone down the path of various rotary knobs or monostable-type robotic systems.

Speaking of robots, GM's Super Cruise is perhaps the least fussy Level 2 system on the market today, permitting hands-free driving and automatic lane changes.

The Suburban High Country we drove was optioned up to a sobering $92,750 carrying about $10,000 in options that included Super Cruise as part of the Advanced Technology Package, as well as the $1,745 folding running boards and the Enhanced Automatic Parking Assist for $1,995. While this total price is no longer remarkable in the world of SUVs of this size, it is worth noting that the base Suburban still starts at a more palatable $61,195.

So we're certainly in Escalade territory while rolling in High Country. If you find yourself seriously looking at this particular trim, odds are you can afford the Escalade as well, though you might not necessarily want the level of bling.

And with an interior that is premium but not technically Cadillac-level in the GM SUV Cinematic Universe, the Suburban still manages to deliver most of the toys you're going to see in the Escalade anyway, along with incrementally more modest interior materials.

Will demand for diesel SUVs with high passenger counts still exist in a few years, or is this one of the last appearances of such a formula? Let us know what you think in the comments below.