2024 Acura TLX Type S Review: Speed Isn't The Selling Point

There's something to be said for usable performance, and while the 2024 Acura TLX Type S may not be the fiercest sports sedan, or the fastest, its competitive pricing and all-season swagger aren't bad qualities to possess. One of just a handful of Acura models to bear the automaker's most serious Type S branding, the TLX has been overshadowed more recently by the even cheaper, more playful Integra Type S. Ignoring this bigger sedan, though, seems like a shame.

Three years after the current-generation TLX Type S made its debut, Acura has given it the inevitable mid-cycle refresh. The changes are, compared to some automakers' far-reaching revamps, fairly minimal. 

For the Type S specifically, the important parts — like V6 power and standard all-wheel drive — are the same, with most of the differences being aesthetic massaging. Inside, there are more gadgets as standard, while the AcuraWatch active safety system promises to monitor more of the road around the sports sedan.

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Pricing for a simplified overall 2024 TLX range — which includes the disappearance of the old base-spec model — means the Type S clocks in at $57,000 (plus $1,195 destination). Entry to the 2024 TLX club starts at $45,000 (plus destination) for the front-wheel drive model, now with niceties like the ELS Studio audio system and leather seats.

The latest-generation TLX was already a handsome car, with arguably one of the best implementations of Acura's family fascia in the current lineup. Wide, low, and sleek, it's a sports sedan aesthetic of the old-school — in today's age of outlandish grilles, for-the-sake-of-it bodywork slashes, and haphazard proportions, that counts as high praise. Falling into an unplanned convoy behind an A-Spec version, it was clear that Acura's design language holds up nicely.

The Type S only builds on that strong start. Fettled for the 2024 model year since we first drove the car in 2021, it gains diamond pentagon grill mesh, a new front splitter, new rear diffuser and decklid spoiler, and outsized quad exhausts. 20-inch split-spoke wheels with a black finish are standard, too, and look just grand against this Urban Gray Pearl paintwork (exclusive to the TLX A-Spec and Type S trims). 

If you're feeling a bit more showy, Acura offers blue and "Tiger Eye" orange colors, as well as gold-painted wheels, but a metallic red on the paint list wouldn't go amiss.

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The result is purposeful but not polarizing, and I suspect the TLX Type S will age more gracefully than, say, some of its competitors from BMW.

Acura's interior is a little more challenging. On the plus side, the seats — with a mixture of leather and grippy faux-suede, along with red contrast piping — are comfortable and supportive, and the bright red helps lift what might otherwise be a fairly dark cabin thanks to a moonroof that's on the smaller side. 

The perforated leather-wrapped steering wheel has just the right degree of thickness and heft, Acura provides dedicated switchgear for climate control and the multimedia basics, and there's a huge, easily-grabbed dial to switch between the various Dynamic Modes.

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A 12.3-inch driver display shows great restraint with graphics, and there's a sizable 10.5-inch head-up display on the Type S, too. A second 12.3-inch screen — bigger, now, than the 10.2-inch panel in the TLX previously — sits atop the dashboard for infotainment duties. It's here that things start to get tricky.

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Placed high up on the dashboard, the good news is that the display doesn't drag your eyes far from the road. Acura's touchpad navigation, though, feels at odds with the rest of the industry's embrace of touchscreens. Points on the touchpad are mapped, 1:1, with points on the UI: If you want to select something in the upper-right corner of the screen, you tap the upper-right corner of the touchpad.

Acura's argument is that this "True Touchpad Interface" is safer than a touchscreen, and means drivers can keep their attention on the road, rather than where their fingers are hitting a display. That may well be true, but the reality of vehicle infotainment — and, more broadly, consumer tech in general — is that we're so familiar with touchscreens at this point, Acura's alternative just ends up feeling clunky. I definitely spent more time trying to navigate through the UI with the TLX's system than I would've had I simply reached out to the screen.

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Wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are now standard (and Acura has added more USB-C charging ports to the cabin, along with the wireless charging pad that also comes standard), but are still controlled via the touchpad. That, too, feels awkward and time consuming.

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It's not a deal breaker, by any means, and neither is Acura's occasionally haphazard choice of materials. Take, for example, the stop/start button, which is a tactile circular lozenge of delightfully textured metal. If only the designers of that had also been responsible for the drive mode dial, which you touch even more frequently, but is made of more mundane plastic.

Acura's aggressive pricing for the TLX Type S can undoubtedly be cited as justification for some of those design choices, and I'd definitely prefer that the money went on the drivetrain rather than an uptick in cabin materials. In Type S form, that means a 3.0-liter turbocharged V6 good for 355 horsepower and 354 pound-feet of torque, paired with a 10-speed transmission and all-wheel drive.

These aren't the biggest power numbers among sports sedans. A BMW M340i xDrive or 540i xDrive bring more horses and torque to the party, as does Genesis' G70 3.3T AWD. Yet the Acura is a timely reminder that numbers on paper aren't everything.

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The key, I suspect, is Acura's AWD. Or, to give it its official title, Super Handling All-Wheel Drive — branding which might sound like hyperbole until you feel how well it works. In addition to being able to shift up to 70% of total power from the front to the rear axle according to traction needs, SH-AWD can mechanically push up to 100% of the rear axle power to the left or right wheel. Acura combines it with adaptive dampers — an option on the rest of the TLX range — and a Sport+ drive mode (with swifter throttle response in this 2024 revamp) exclusive to the Type S.

SH-AWD was fit for the Acura NSX, and it's what helps make the TLX Type S fun, too. While torque vectoring isn't uncommon on performance cars these days, often it's a brake-based system, intentionally slowing one wheel. Acura's tech, in contrast, actively pushes power left and right, and it does so incredibly rapidly.

The result is both impressive sure-footedness and a nimbleness in turns that leaves the feistiest TLX feeling tractable and planted. Sure, other sports sedans are faster, and provide more feel through the wheel — the Acura's steering is somewhat detached, even in Sport and Sport+ modes — but the TLX Type S' combination of reassuring grip and straight line pace make it an excellent all-seasons plaything.

That's not to say it's without foibles. At over 4,200 pounds, it's definitely not a light sedan, and there's a significant weight bias to the nose. SH-AWD does a decent job of masking that, but it's hard not to think even more fondly of the mid-engined NSX as a result. The Brembo brakes at all four corners are standard, and effective, but the brake-by-wire system can feel remote in all but Sport+ mode.

So, not quite the all-conquering sports sedan that Acura might've billed it as, but dial the 2024 TLX Type S into Comfort mode and you'll start to appreciate it more as an all-rounder. At that point it was soft enough to make Michigan's unkempt asphalt less of a chiropractor emergency, and the same 10-speed transmission that was swift to downshift in Sport+ mode suddenly slurs along nicely instead. Even the soundtrack, a pleasing burble and bark in the more fiery modes, is tamed for something more everyday.

Those in the front seats will be happier in those circumstances, but the TLX's rear cabin definitely feels tight. Legroom in the rear is snug compared to the 3 Series, despite the BMW being a shorter car. Even more bizarrely, the TLX has less rear legroom than Acura's own, smaller Integra. It's fairly dark back there, too, and that swooping shoulder line doesn't help matters. 13.5 cubic-feet of trunk space is, at least, decent.

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With slippery, snowy road surfaces for at least some of my time with the Acura, the idea of a performance-minded vehicle that wouldn't be a liability in the winter had a lot more appeal, too. All-season tires are fitted as standard, but high-performance summer tires are a dealer-fit option.

While you'd be forgiven for thinking the rise of the crossover and SUV has sealed the fate of the sports sedan, there's actually a surprising amount of choice — at a broad range of price points — these days. That's good news for keen drivers, though not so much for Acura. The 2024 TLX Type S finds itself in a pinch point when it comes to value and performance.

Genesis' 2024 G70 with the 3.3T twin-turbo V6 starts at around $50,000 — thousands of dollars less than the Acura but with more horsepower. It's no track car, but then I suspect neither Acura nor Genesis drivers were headed there anyway. Outfitting a BMW to similar spec levels to the TLX Type S' makes for an expensive prospect, but an M340i xDrive is more rewarding from behind the wheel, not to mention winning the battle for badge cachet.

Viewed in isolation, the TLX Type S has plenty to endear it, particularly when you're juggling dire weather and periodic opportunities to go have some fun. I can even look past the frustrating infotainment system and its fiddly touchpad interface. The biggest problem, however, is that this is a beefy car that would definitely benefit from more power, even if Acura can't do much about its curb weight. SH-AWD is the star, here, but the 2024 TLX Type S isn't the best showcase for Acura's clever engineering.