The Mercedes‑AMG GLA 45 S is a £65,000 hot SUV

The GLA may indeed be the runt of Merc’s sprawling SUV family but there’s nothing little about the version as described, and certainly not its price. This new top GLA – the Mercedes-AMG GLA 45 S 4Matic+ Plus to give it its full gobbledygook name – costs a mighty £64,775.

That’s the version we’re busting to drive, with its promise of compact SUV practicality in a car that can blast from 0-62mph in 4.3 seconds and hit 168mph all out. But then again its sister sporty model, the AMG GLA 35 with 306PS (302bhp) and 400Nm, looks almost as good and is less than a second slower – and that costs a rather bewildering £21,000 less, at £43,565. Mercedes confirmed prices and specs for the AMG GLA duo for the first time this week, promising the first cars would be with UK buyers by late summer.

Quite an exalted pair then, for cars the size of a Ford Focus and based on humble (if good) A-class hatchback architecture, though in these forms suffused with a lot of bespoke AMG engineering including, in the GLA 45’s case, a hand-built engine. It’s the familiar  turbocharged four-cylinder but AMG’s fettling to 421PS makes it the world’s most powerful 2.0-litre in series production, as already shown to great effect by other über sporty A-Class models.

What do you get in your £64k A-Class crossover? Quite a lot of speed, plenty of visual presence and, as mentioned, no shortage of features. AMG Night package, high performance brakes, twin 10.25-inch cockpit displays, ambient lighting, augmented reality for navigation, AMG performance steering wheel and AMG performance seats are all part of the package.

The + Plus model also comes with 21-inch wheels, adaptive damping, adaptive multibeam headlights, aero body package, panoramic sunroof, electrically adjustable front seats, blind spot assist and Burmester surround sound system. But if you can do without that lot you can save yourself £6,000, the GLA 45 S 4Matic+ coming in at £58,755.

Go AMG 35 rather than 45 and you can trim the bill by rather more, down to £43,565 for the GLA 35 4Matic. Like its big brother, there’s a better equipped Plus version for £6k more. There’ no shortage of tasty features across these models but a spec anomaly to us is that a raft of safety features – including active assist systems for emergency braking, lane-keeping and steering – costs  £1,495 extra… but is only available on the top £50k Plus model. Surely it should be standard at these prices?

Whatever the model, this second generation of the GLA, and last of eight derivatives of the A-Class, is a substantially different car from the GLA Mk1: taller, roomier and more practical.

Like its predecessor though, it seems just as determined to show that compact SUVs come no more powerful – and no more expensive – than the AMG versions.