Jay Leno Reveals What He Actually Thinks About The 2023 Cadillac Lyriq

Jay Leno is a genuine car guy. The former "The Tonight Show" host and lead star of the popular YouTube channel "Jay Leno's Garage" has about 181 cars and 160 motorcycles in his Burbank hangar, and his interest goes beyond amassing an uber-expensive supercar collection. Leno likes old cars, too; he even has steam-powered vehicles dating back to the early 1900s (per Barrons). And like most older folks that love cars, Jay Leno is naturally fascinated with Cadillac, a brand once renowned as "The Standard of the World."

Jay Leno was among the first people outside Cadillac and General Motors to take the all-new Cadillac Lyriq for a spin. He didn't hold back his undying love for the Cadillac brand, and the fact that he has 1918, 1925, and 1957 Cadillacs is proof of his allegiance to the once-almighty American carmaker.

Coincidentally, Leno is also the proud owner of a 1909 Baker Electric, one of the first mass-produced EVs (per The New York Times). Given his reputation for loving anything with wheels (whether electric, gas-powered, or otherwise), it would be interesting to know what the man thinks of the 2023 Cadillac Lyric.

The all-new Cadillac Lyriq is initially available as a rear-driven, single-motor variant with a 100-kWh battery pack. It has 340 horsepower to play with and an EPA-estimated 312 miles of range. There's a 500-horsepower dual-motor version in the works, but Cadillac has yet to announce how the added oomph affects real-world driving range. According to Jay Leno, the single-motor Lyriq has more than enough gravitas for a luxury EV. He's also impressed that Cadillac took a different route with its first-ever electric car instead of battling it out with Tesla, Lucid, and others in the horsepower race.

In other words, the Lyriq feels like a proper Cadillac on the road: quiet and supple but has a space-age design that turns heads and the power to prove a point. Leno adds the Lyriq brings to mind the iconic 1949 Cadillac Series 62, a car that made the Germans stand up and take notice. It won MotorTrend's first-ever Car of the Year award with its innovative pushrod V8, automatic transmission, power windows, and many more hi-tech features to cement the brand's "The Standard of the World" reputation.

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Leno couldn't get past the fact that the Lyriq starts at under $65,000, a veritable bargain for what is possibly one of the finest luxury EVs you can buy today. Other merits are the posh cabin with top-notch materials, the groovy welcome lighting sequence, the station wagon-inspired crossover design, and the versatile charging capabilities. It would seem that a car guy like Jay Leno – with an almost encyclopedic knowledge of past, present, and future vehicles — would be hard to impress, but it takes a true-blue car nut to appreciate it when a brand stays true to its roots.