BMW 328i vs Infiniti G35

In my pursuit of perfect entry-level luxury vehicle, I visited a BMW dealership and an Infiniti dealership to take a first-hand look and feel of the vehicles. First up: Parkview BMW. They had 323i, 328i and 328xi side by side which allowed me to see the subtle differences between the 3 trims. 323i is, obviously, the most affordable 3-series clocks in at $35,600 but it lacks leather seat which isn’t even available as an option. When you think about luxury, leather seat is a given so I abandoned the 323i and focused on 328i with base price of $38,000.

As expected, 16″ wheels look too small: the model vehicle had 17″ double spoke alloy wheels which is what I would have chosen. Right now the tally was $47,000 since I put in leather seats, metallic paint and upgraded wheels (part of Sport Package). Dealer informed me that almost every vehicle they order comes with Premium Package since it includes sunroof as well as power seats with memory. Coupled with automatic transmission, the car’s final MSRP was $52,900, certainly a lot more than the base price.

Sitting in the cockpit, I’ve noticed several things: seats felt firm but comfortable, signal and cruise-control stalks were a bit hard to operate, and the engine start/stop feature felt gimmicky since you still need to insert the key. At least it’ll recharge the battery when it’s inserted… Without the infamous iDrive, center stack looked incredibly boring. Another thing: pop-up cupholder is neat but it didn’t look too sturdy and I would have preferred traditional cupholders.

When I told the dealer I was also considering G35, he immediately mentioned that BMW 3-series is more fun to drive and worth the extra money: of course I’ll figure that one out myself when I go for test-drive tomorrow, but I doubt city-driving will be dramatically different from G35.

Over at Infiniti, the dealer was very quick to point out that G35 is slightly cheaper, slightly bigger, a lot more powerful with extra bells and whistles. Certainly the Intelligent Key, color-screen and? Bluetooth connectivity were superior to 328i which lack most of these options. We’ll see how the extra power (230hp for 328i vs. 306hp for G35) translates to real-world performance tomorrow.