Sector: Executive Price: £65,415 Fuel: 24.4mpg CO2: 268g/km

While the automotive industry becomes ever-more fixated on low-carbon vehicles, it’s great to know that at the top end of the power food chain there’s still fierce competition to produce thuggish super-saloons. A club to which the Jaguar XFR belongs.

Think of this as the offspring of a conventional XF and the XJR. A combination of luxurious executive car and the brute force of a 5.0-litre supercharged V8 engine with 500bhp, sprinkled with dusting of Jaguar’s sports car DNA. It’s wonderful.

Competition is fierce in this segment, though. As with the lower-powered models the BMW M5 is considered a bit of a benchmark, but the recently refreshed Mercedes-Benz E63 AMG and new Audi RS6 are biting at its heels. These three, and the XFR, each offers a slightly different take on what is ultimately a very similar product.

In the Jaguar, it’s pure muscle. Large fast cars can feel a little uninvolving with it, but the Jaguar has the attitude of a brawny sports coupe and just enough power to make the chassis feel lively with it. It’s a ferociously quick car, not only on paper but in the way it delivers twice the power of the most powerful diesel accompanied by the characteristic whine of the supercharger and bark of a V8.

The Jaguar also scores highly on style. The Germans offer all-out aggression but the XFR is jaw-droppingly beautiful with it. Those smooth curves, straight-off-an-E-Type mesh grille, embossed Supercharged badging on the wheels it shares with the XJ and the purposeful bonnet vents mean it looks as much like a coupe as a four-door executive saloon possibly can.

It feels special from the moment you press the engine start button with its heartbeat pulsing red glow, and where others can feel like a highly specced version of a very ordinary executive car, there’s something unique and characterful about the XF that just isn’t available elsewhere. The XFR also includes space for five in comfort, a herd of cowskin and a dashboard that transforms into the set from Tron after dark. Even crawling through traffic jams, there’s a real sense of occasion here.

That’s quite a privilege when you realise this is £8,000 cheaper than BMW or Mercedes-Benz’s equivalent products, and possibly even further adrift from the quattro and Avant-only RS6. The Jaguar is the least powerful of the three, but the ferocity of the power delivery means it’s not much of a sacrifice on the road, and it proved itself easily capable of exceeding the average fuel economy while cruising. With eight gears and a lot of power, the engine is barely ticking over at motorway speeds. Should you desperately need to out-sprint colleagues, there's always the track-focused 540bhp XFR-S.

Perhaps its biggest threat is that it shares showroom space with the XF S – a 3.0-litre diesel with a more-than-ample 271bhp, a good chunk of the XFR’s on-road presence and the option of a Sportbrake version. As much fun as the XFR is, its closest sibling would offer almost as much fun in the majority of situations without needing a full tank of fuel every 300 miles. In the UK, it’s the best compromise of the lot.

Verdict:

Characterful, beautiful and brutally quick, the XFR has really benefited from the 2011 facelift, offering arguably the most head-turning option of its competitors. If you can justify the fuel economy, you’ll love every minute behind the wheel.