Guide

Rolls-Royce Cullinan vs Bentley Bentayga: which to lease?

Updated September 2026 6 min read Performance & Prestige

The Bentley Bentayga V8 S is ours; the Rolls-Royce Cullinan is arranged through a vetted partner. Both run on a three-month minimum term and both are quoted on request. The Cullinan buys coach doors, a V12 and a quieter cabin; the Bentayga is the better car to drive yourself and costs less to hold.

What separates them?

Less than the badges suggest on paper, and a great deal more in person. Both are five-seat, four-wheel-drive luxury SUVs with eight-speed automatics. The Rolls-Royce Cullinan Series II is the only V12 SUV Rolls-Royce has built, and its cabin is quieter than most sitting rooms — the company's engineering priority has always been the removal of sensation rather than the addition of it.

The Bentley Bentayga V8 S is quiet too, but it has not given up on the driver. The S is the firmer, darker, louder version of the Bentayga, and it still wants you to enjoy the road. That is the fault line: one car is engineered so the outside world stops reaching you, and the other is engineered so you can still feel it when you want to.

Coach doors: what they mean beyond the photographs

The Cullinan's rear doors are rear-hinged, which is the detail everybody knows and few people have thought through. Getting out of the back of one is genuinely more graceful — you step forward rather than swinging out sideways — and it is the reason the car photographs so well at an event.

The practical corollaries are worth planning for. A coach door needs room to swing, so a tight bay is a problem in a different way to an ordinary car. And the theatre is unavoidable: you cannot arrive discreetly in a Cullinan, because the doors themselves are an announcement. If the point of the car is the arrival, that is the single strongest argument for it over anything else in the category. If you would rather not be watched getting out of a car, it is an argument against.

Which is the better car to drive yourself?

The Bentayga, clearly, and it is not a close contest. The V8 S has a chassis with genuine interest in it, it changes direction like a smaller car, and it is a rewarding thing to cover a Welsh A road in. The Cullinan is magnificent to be in and slightly beside the point to attack a road in — it will do it, but you are working against the grain of what its engineers were trying to achieve.

If you are the one driving every morning for three months, that matters more than any specification comparison. The other way round, if you will mostly be in the back with somebody else at the wheel, the Cullinan wins by the same margin and for the same reason, and its long-wheelbase rival within Bentley is the Bentayga EWB Azure.

What does each one cost to hold?

The Bentayga V8 S is in our own fleet, so the monthly figure is ours to confirm: a three-month minimum term, one month up front, then one a month, with 1,000 miles a month included. It holds a refundable £5,000 deposit against a £5,000 insurance excess, and mileage above the allowance is £2.50 a mile.

The Cullinan is arranged through a vetted partner, so there is no firm availability claim on it until the specific car is confirmed, and the figure follows that step rather than preceding it. What is published on both is the rest of the stack. On the Cullinan that is a £7,500 deposit against a £7,500 excess, and £3 a mile above the allowance. The long-wheelbase Bentayga EWB sits at £7,500 as well, with mileage at £2.50 a mile. All of these are provisional while the insurance arrangement is finalised and confirmed with you before anything is agreed.

Do the driver criteria change at this level?

No, and that surprises people. The Cullinan, the Bentayga V8 S and the Bentayga EWB are all set at a minimum age of thirty, with a full licence held for at least five years and no more than six points. The most expensive SUV we can arrange asks no more of a driver than the Bentley does.

That is because criteria track the insurance profile of the vehicle rather than its value — the same reason a supercar with a modest list price can be harder to qualify for than something far more expensive. If you meet the Bentayga's criteria you meet the Cullinan's, and the deciding factors become money held, mileage rate and whether the car is ours or has to be confirmed by somebody else first.

Is the step up worth it for three months?

It depends entirely on what the three months is for. If the car is going to be photographed, if it is collecting people who will remember it, if the arrival is part of the job, the Cullinan does something no Bentley does and the extra money held and the higher mileage rate are the price of that.

If the term is ordinary life — the commute, the school run, the airport, an occasional good road — the Bentayga does ninety per cent of it better and all of it for less money held, and it is ours, so the answer comes out of one conversation rather than two. Choosing the Bentley for that reason is not settling for less, and it is worth saying so plainly.

Is the Rolls-Royce the right call?

Take the Cullinan if you want the top of the category and you know why. It is the only V12 SUV its maker has built, the coach doors are a genuine event, and there is no substitute for it lower down the range. Send your dates with the enquiry and we will confirm the car and the figure in writing before you plan anything around it.

Take the Bentayga V8 S if you want to drive rather than be driven, if you would rather the car be ours than arranged, or if you want the same category with less of your money held and a gentler mileage rate. And if the back seat is the real priority but you would rather stay with Bentley, ask about the EWB — it is the long-wheelbase answer, sourced and priced on request.

Common questions

Can I lease a Rolls-Royce Cullinan for three months?

Yes. Three months is the shortest agreement we write and it applies across the sourced catalogue. The Cullinan is arranged through a vetted partner, so the monthly figure is quoted on request and confirmed in writing before anything is committed.

How many seats does the Cullinan have?

Five. If the priority is rear-seat space specifically rather than the Rolls-Royce badge, the long-wheelbase Bentley Bentayga EWB is the alternative worth pricing, and the long-wheelbase Range Rover Autobiography is the less expensive one again.

Is the Cullinan difficult to park?

It is a very large SUV and the rear-hinged doors need clear space to open, so a tight multi-storey bay is not its natural habitat. It is no harder to manoeuvre than any car of that size, but the doors are worth thinking about before you plan where it will live.

Which is cheaper to run over three months?

The Bentayga V8 S, on every published measure. It holds £5,000 to the Cullinan’s £7,500 and charges £2.50 a mile above the allowance to the Cullinan’s £3. Both monthly figures are quoted on request, so ask for the pair if you want to weigh those too.

See the two agreements next to each other

What you put down, what you carry as insurance excess, what you pay over the allowance and the minimum driver age are set per car. This puts both sets in one table so you can see where they part company.

Compare the Rolls-Royce Cullinan Series II and the Bentley Bentayga V8 S