willw007

Had a loaner 2018 prestige with the dark brown interior (no tints), and we recently had an extreme heatwave (like 115 degrees F, though it's a dry heat here in LA). With the a/c set to auto and sync for all 4 zones, the a/c cooled the cabin surprisingly well. I left the car out in the sun without even a sunshade during this heatwave, and the a/c cooled it down fairly quickly. The ventilated seats seemed to help a bit but not much. My passengers and I were definitely comfortable with the a/c set to 74 degrees F.

I don't know if this is obvious, but one thing is to make sure that the auto start/stop is deactivated. I noticed that when on, this function is pretty aggressive in shutting off the engine even when the car is first started, and I believe the a/c shuts off if the engine does (even though the fan continues to run). So if you're in stop and go traffic when you first start out, I think the a/c would be shutting off fairly often.

mi_sat

Off topic, but you mentioned the ventilated seats. My ventilated seats are ineffective at doing much other than making noise. Yes, i know they.re not cooled seats and yes, I know how they are designed to work. I think the design is completely ineffective. Give me cooled seats any day.

gm4511

Guess I'll have to live with the poor a/c and ventilated seats, unless the service department can find something. What a disappointment for a high dollar vehicle.

smacky

I think it takes 30 seconds with the windows down and driving with the AC on Auto to get it to be comfortable inside the car. I find it does a great job and a lot better than my 08 535xi in recent years.

Now that takes 15 mins but it also has black exterior and interior. But I don't remember it being this bad until the past few years.

cltsig

SC outside Charlotte. '18 Prestige (4 zone). Black with brown interior. All windows tinted - sunroof, front, sides down to legal. Still gets hot and takes awhile to cool when sitting in the sun. Our 2015 Infiniti Q70L cools much faster. The temp difference at the vents is much cooler on the Infiniti than on the Q7. I notice when the Q7 has sufficiently cooled, with level 1 I sometimes get too warm around my face and upper body. Level 2 can be too cold, so I point the vents away. I need a level 1.5.

Something is off with the AC. Maybe it is a combination of the glass moonroof and somewhat weaker AC system but there seem to be warm spots and cool spots.

Forgot: we did have it set to blow both at our feet and upper vents. We switched to upper only and that improved things considerably. Also, in the MMI there is a setting for foot temp. Check that to be sure. Maybe too much foot ventilation takes away from cool air elsewhere.

jrtouareg

I live in coastal south carolina and have had both 2017 Q7 3.0 Premium Plus white exterior and black interior and now 2018 Q7 3.0 Prestige Samurai Grey exterior and black interior. AC works fine even in 95 degree weather w/over 70% humidity for at least 6 months of the year. AC works great in both cars. Its parked outside in a huge asphalt parking lot during the day. All of my vehicles since 2011 have had the panoramic sunroof. The 2017 Q7 had the black headliner and the 2018 has the light grey. What I've noticed is the light grey lets more sun through the roof sun shade but it doesn't seem to get as hot. My 2011 VW Touareg I had the suuroof glass tinted with ceramic tint and it helped a lot but it had a very light tint to begin with. Itseems all the newer one now come with the sunroof glass tinted a bit darker and this helps. You guys might want to consider installing ceramic tints on the glass. Even the light tint helps a lot. But I think the AC works real well. I keep it all synced and on auto. It takes maybe 5 minutes for the fan to slow down to get the car to a comfortable level. I keep the temerature at 72 degrees and on auto so I just let the ac do its thing.

A6Louie

I have a 2017 Q7 and I don't have any complaints about the A/C, and I run hot naturally, so A/C is a big deal to me.

I agree that it takes a while to REALLY cool off on a hot day, but with that said, I drove my wife's Highlander today and I had to crank it down to 68 to feel as comfortable as I do in my Q7 with it set to 73 or 74. Both of our cars are dark colors inside and out.

BTW, putting on the Max A/C for a few minutes when it's 90+ outside and very humid really does cool the car off much more quickly...Auto will not do this, so I do it manually when the temp spikes outside and then click it off once it starts to feel cool and Auto is fine after that.

hayde_bre

2018 MY here, A/C is better than my BMW but not as good as some of the other cars I owned. The fan is unnecessarily high in Auto, I constantly have to fiddle with fan to make it comfortable.
B panel vents are noisy, it's giving me headache, I have to shut the vents to make it nice and quiet, but if someone is in the back, they usually have to open them back.

Ventilated seats are life saver, they actually do a really good job assisting A/C with cooling. The perforated seats also help keep the seats cooler compared to solid leather seats. When the center consol can burn my elbow, the seats remain noticeably less hot.

Blake P

I have several complaints with this vehicle, but thankfully the A/C (4 zone, btw) is not one of them! I also keep the ventilated seats on 24/7 and can definitely feel a difference if they get switched off for some reason. Anyone know what's the purpose of the long vent directly above the glove box? I don't think I've ever felt any air coming from that, so I figured it was only for aesthetics...?

Leks