For years now, the Mercedes-Benz brass and brains have been trickling out details about the future VAN.EA commercial and passenger van platform. They're now giving the world its first look at Auto Shanghai 2025. The all-new Vision V shows a particularly extreme form of e-MPV that plays with avant-garde styling and wild luxury features in a preview of a new class of van living and limousining. It's essentially a premium Mercedes VIP shuttle van without so much as an aftermarket upfitter. Is this what van travelers are looking for? TBD.
Mercedes provided some juicy details about the dawn of a VAN.EA era in 2023. In case it's a head scratcher, that stands for "Van Electric Architecture" – wonder how much the guy who came up with that gets paid.
Back then, automakers and major governing bodies the world over were loaded and hitched on the EV wagon, and the VAN.EA was going to underpin every Mercedes van moving forward. Then, 2024 happened. EV sales showed some signs of easing; automakers got a case of the jitters; and the auto world started talking more about "powertrain options" and "multiple avenues to net zero." So now there's the VAN.EA and the VAN.CA, or Van Combustion Architecture – somebody's really working overtime to carve out a place as the first Mercedes "VP of Architectural Name Designation."
On track for launch in 2026, the "modular, flexible, and scalable" VAN.EA platform will still underpin an entire series of electric vans; it just won't represent the entirety of Mercedes' future van footprint. It's unclear how the 2023 roadmap of full- and midsize VAN.EA camper vans has evolved under the new split-platform path, but if any van model could benefit from the renewal of combustion engine power, it'd be a camper van.
Those VAN.EA-vs-CA specifics can wait for now, though, as today we're only concerned with the EA, and the first glimpse of it Mercedes has provided through the lens of the Vision V. The new concept represents the highest possible trim of electric van Mercedes might introduce under the VAN.EA umbrella, a premium limousine clearly developed to sate the Chinese market's hunger for chauffeur-ready luxury minivans. Whether or not Mercedes ultimately takes the EA lineup that far upmarket, it does intend for the new van series to push further into the premium segment, focusing around a "private lounge" concept.
It doesn't get any loungier or more private than the Vision V, which separates the cockpit and rear cabin (i.e. the "private lounge") with a retractable glass partition. Users can adjust that glass from clear to opaque at the push of a chair-side button, depending upon just how objectionable they find seeing their driver.
And if one single layer of darkened wall still seems insufficient separation from the utilitarian human in front, the much more important rear occupants can also deploy the 65-inch flexible cinema display stored away below the floor. That screen rises in front of the partition wall, and a few transparent floor slats allow passengers to watch it deploy from below.
Once deployed, the 4K screen provides the visual half of a high-end mobile theater that also stuffs a total of 42 speakers in an immersive Dolby Atmos configuration that includes haptic actuators in the seats. We presume the widescreen matches that audio capability with the latest in Dolby Vision because no very important rear passenger (we'll go with 'VIRP' from here on) should suffer through a commute marred by suboptimal video quality.
Beyond the screen itself, the greater entertainment setup includes not one but seven projectors integrated into the headliner to deliver full-blown 360-degree visuals as immersive as the audio. They work in conjunction with switchable-tint side windows that serve as blank screens. We're not sure how compatible that widescreen + projector format will be with the latest episode of Andor, but at the very least, it promises to bring music to life with rhythm-matching lighting effects. There's even a karaoke option.
Presumably, the rear windows tint to opaque automatically when all that equipment kicks into high gear, concealing the boisterous rolling karaoke bar from seriously distracting surrounding traffic. Nothing seems less 'VIRP' than getting T-boned in your own four-wheeled nightclub.
For those who prefer something a little quieter and more analog, or want to avoid any risk of seizure from visual overstimulation, the spacious V cabin also comes stocked with a fold-out table that doubles as a chessboard. The chess pieces are stored conveniently in the glass display bubbling out of the wall panel, filling out the space left by the artistically showcased door speakers and minibar.
And here we thought the Rolls-Royce chess set (price on request) was going to be the only ridiculous billionaire's game board reveal of April 2025.
Of course, should all that mobile entertainment prove exhausting, the skeletal tube seats can recline right down to horizontal, encouraging a mid-ride nap. So even without a camper package, the Vision V is a sort of road yacht-grade sleeper van.
You wouldn't want a feature set as abominably overindulgent as that to go to waste inside just any MPV box, so Mercedes ensures that the exterior is every bit as ostentation as its inner sanctum. For instance, that toothy gape up front is corralled by a goatee of nearly 200 digital light whiskers. Another 190 of those light strands create the slim fissure of lighting that connects and engulfs the headlamps.
And, of course, you simply must emphasize the "VIRP on board" nature of the ride, in this case via 450 red louvres of light etching a massive illuminated surround around the abruptly chopped rear-end. In between the front and rear lighting tattoos, Mercedes explores volumetric styling with inverted sides connecting the wheels and two hood-top "power domes" slipping clean under the windshield to blur the distinction between outside and in.
Good news: If anything close to this particular MPV trim ever does make it beyond Mercedes' spring fever dream, it seems unlikely to stray from the Chinese market, where high-end VIRP luxury remains an established cornerstone.
As far as we know, Mercedes still plans to launch VAN.EA models in the US, including the premium passenger MPV it did not offer during its last run at the American midsize van market. We anticipate those will look far simpler than the Vision V, particularly inside but hopefully outside as well.
Source: Mercedes-Benz