The best-dressed gentleman in the arena, Aston’s latest sports car underwent a comprehensive front-end redesign this year, featuring more humanoid headlights and a more pronounced grill with horizontal strakes. Distilling elements of the DB12 and Valhalla into a compact silhouette, the sculpted lines appear cohesive and well-balanced, and while the rear styling is mainly carried over with the quad exhausts and plateau spoiler, we have to admit that this generation of Aston Martin design has been absolutely ravishing. The Vantage is one of the few cars that we park, step out of, and can’t resist looking back at. 

Credit to California Sage, a timeless pale green that first appeared in the 1950s on the DB4. It looks tremendous on the Vantage as the sunlight fades and softens into a gentle overcast, and the shadows begin to creep into the paint flakes. But this isn’t just any Vantage. This is the Roadster that exposes you to the elements and delivers enough sensory amusement to match its chic silhouette.

Traditionally, convertibles add an ungodly amount of weight due to the structural requirements for rigidity, but Aston Martin developed both the coupe and roadster simultaneously from the start. As a result, many of the structural elements and fixing points were already in place. While the Roadster doesn’t come close to the stiffness of a dedicated carbon tub like in the McLaren Artura, it’s more solid and composed than many sports coupes we’ve driven. There wasn’t any scuttle shake or nervous unsettling after hitting bumps, and it’s also one of the fastest operating roofs on the market. The eight-layer fabric roof stows flush with the rear deck in just 6.8 seconds with just a simple fold and flick, reminding us of the mechanism in the BMW Z4. It operates at speeds under 50 km/h and doesn’t eat into trunk space either, which is wide enough for a golf bag and weekend getaway duties.

Natural light flooding into the Centenary Saddle Tan interior is one of the world’s many unnatural wonders, as the meticulously-stitched semi-aniline leather glimmers like the inside of a Hermès handbag, and the dark chrome accents hide in its shadows. The design may appear superfluous next to the stark confines of a 911 cabin, but it’s fairly restrained compared to the Bentley bling or the Roma’s haven of touchscreens. Aston has fashionably invested in proper switchgear, and the start button and gear lever feel particularly high-quality in looks and operation, as do the speaker grill covers shaped like fish scales. It’s more of a leather shop in here than a jewelry one, but green on tan is a spec we could never argue against. It also helps that Aston Martin has one of the most comprehensive online configurators, offering detailed descriptions of every paint colour, the ability to picture your car next to the AMR25 Formula 1 car, and an assortment of realistic backdrops to view your spec in different lighting conditions. 

Aston Martin has addressed one of our biggest criticisms with the DB12: the small, nearly illegible fonts on their driver’s gauges. As small an issue as it seems, no pun intended, not being able to see the gear indicator doesn’t exactly instill us with driving confidence. With the latest system that the Vantage is rocking, the graphics have been updated, and the gear indicator and speeds are now a suitable font size. 

The most exciting addition is Apple CarPlay Ultra, an upgraded variant of the now ubiquitous CarPlay that integrates many of the car’s inherent features into the Apple interface. That means you can control the climate, ambient lighting, drive mode settings, and even adjust the Bowers and Wilkins sound system right from the same interface. The system worked flawlessly during our time with it, and although there is more screen latency than the latest iPhone 17, it felt like a cohesive and fully baked Apple product experience. If you miss the old format, you can revert to regular Apple CarPlay at any time, and the same applies to Aston’s in-house interface. However, it’s clear that Ultra offers a superior, cleaner, and easier way to interact with the vehicle’s suite of functions.

Like the DB12, the Vantage utilizes a hand-built 4.0-litre twin-turbocharged V8 sourced from their partners at AMG but with an Aston Martin-specific tune that generates 656 hp and 590 lb-ft of torque through its rear-mounted 8-speed automatic gearbox. That’s enough to sprint from 0-100 km/h in 3.6 seconds, just one-tenth slower than the coupe, the same speed as a Mercedes-AMG SL 63 Roadster, and quicker than the Porsche 911 Carrera 4S Cabriolet and Bentley Continental GTC. 

Somehow, it feels swifter than the spec sheet suggests. The Vantage makes fast, flowing progress with its tidal abundance of torque and exploring the last 20% of the throttle pedal feels like manually lighting the frenetic afterburner. The Roadster carries a 60 kg weight penalty over the coupe, but you would be hard-pressed to tell from the driver’s seat. Fervent bursts of speed are met with the solid bite of the carbon ceramic brakes, with most of the stopping power right at the top of the pedal, so you’re not bothered with long, inconsistent pedal travel. 

A suitable eight-cylinder soundtrack follows suit, but to say it sounds entirely different from an AMG GT 63 exhaust would be a stretch. The two symphonies aren’t terribly distinctive from each other, but the Vantage still delivers deep, sonically impactful crescendos that are further punctuated by artillery fire on downshifts and throttle overrun. While it’s difficult to tire from hearing British rolling thunder, the peak exhaust range lives between 3,000 – 5,000 rpm, and it lacks the high-end fizz of a Temerario V8 and the wailing screams of a 911 GT3 flat-six, but the notes fit the Vantage’s ethos of a brute in a suit.

Build up the speed, and the Vantage handles beautifully, quickly settling into a joyous, neutral rhythm. The front end is sharp and eager to scythe in another direction, though it’s not easy to break traction in the rear. That’s both a good and bad thing, depending on what you’re seeking. The Vantage is wickedly stable in slippery conditions, even though it’s only rear-wheel drive but with all the safety nannies on, the Vantage is a pitbull on a restraint. Holding down the swirvy logo button engages a richer sensory experience. It disables stability control and allows you to choose from eight levels of traction control, each with less intervention. 

While not as expertly tuned as a Huracan STO’s system for gradual powerslides, or as intuitive (for some reason TC1 means more intervention while TC8 means more wheel slip), the Vantage’s clever e-diff and TC software lets you dictate slip angles with millimetric accuracy. It takes practice to induce a slide, and you need at least TC7 to prevent the Vantage from pendulously slapping you back straight, but the chassis relays clear signals of weight transfer to the driver, and the chunky 325-section width rears ensures most of those horses are translated into forward momentum.

The Vantage flourishes on twisty back roads, but it nails the GT brief quite nicely, too. Dial back the settings, and there’s enough wheel travel and suspension slack to even call it comfortable. The chassis breathes gently with the road underneath, and the adaptive damping works well at isolating harsh impacts and keeping unwanted undulations from disturbing the ride. Crossing a nearby railroad track that we always use to test the road compliance of a vehicle, the Vantage casually skips over it like a rock skipping the surface of a pond with no rattles or creaks from the chassis or cabin panels.

The Vantage is not only the baby roadster in the range, but also the most effervescent and rewarding to drive. It doesn’t require the CV of Fernando Alonso to extract its potential fully; instead, the Vantage allows you to build your skills as a driver with its protective powerslides and thunderous exhaust notes. The DB12 Volante fits the bill as the ultimate grand tourer, carefully blending sport with comfort, but leave it to the Vantage Roadster to elevate and intensify the thrills of high-octane, al fresco motoring.

Specifications:

Model: 2026 Aston Martin Vantage Roadster
Paint Type: California Sage
Base Price: $259,700
Price as Tested: $374,700
Wheelbase(mm): 2,705
Length/Width/Height (mm): 4,495 / 1,980 / 1,275
Curb weight: 1,805 kg (EU)
Engine: 4.0-litre twin-turbocharged V8
Horsepower: 671 hp @ 6,000 rpm
Torque: 590 lb-ft @ 2,750 – 6,000 rpm
Transmission: 8-speed automatic
Engine & Drive Configuration: Front engine, RWD
Observed Fuel Consumption (L/100km): 15.7
Tires: Michelin Pilot Sport 5 S AML; Front 275/35/ZR21; Rear 325/30/ZR21