The LS6 Corvette Reviews Are In, and the Testers Agree on the One to Buy

Chevrolet cast the number 409 into the side of the new Corvette block, right next to the flywheel, where nobody will ever see it unless they pull the transmission. Hagerty's Aaron Robinson got that detail out of small-block assistant chief engineer Mike Kociba, who wanted the displacement in cubic inches instead of liters. It is a small thing, but it tells you who built the 2027 Corvette: people who still think a bigger naturally aspirated V8 is the answer.

The first wave of reviews landed on Sept. 3, after Chevrolet turned journalists loose at Atlanta Motorsports Park and on the roads around it. The Drive, Autoblog, Hagerty and Top Gear all filed. TORQFOLIO did not drive the car. This is a read of what those four found, where they line up, and where they don't.

What changed

The headline is the LS6, a 6.7-liter V8 that replaces the 6.2-liter LT2 and now powers every non-Z06 Corvette, including the base Stingray. Chevy rates it at 535 hp and 520 lb-ft. The Drive's Jerry Perez lists a 13.0:1 compression ratio, a 95-mm throttle body and forged pistons and rods, and Hagerty adds that it runs both port and direct injection. Autoblog's Chase Bierenkoven puts the redline at 6,500 rpm. The only transmission is the eight-speed dual-clutch.

Around that engine sit three cars. The Stingray is the entry point. The Grand Sport brings back the wide-body look from the Z06 with magnetic ride control standard, and it can be optioned with a Z52 package or a much more serious Track Performance package. The Grand Sport X adds the front electric motor from the ZR1X, good for 186 hp and 145 lb-ft by Autoblog's numbers, for 721 hp combined and all-wheel drive. Autoblog notes it takes the place of the E-Ray.

Where the testers agree: buy the plain Grand Sport

This is the rare lineup review where everybody picked the same car. Perez scored the Grand Sport a 9 out of 10 and the other two an 8, and wrote that he would buy the rear-drive Grand Sport with the $3,500 Z52 package, which adds summer performance tires, steel performance brakes and active dampers. "The GS is a precision instrument," Perez wrote in The Drive.

Bierenkoven reached the same place by a different road. He called the Grand Sport "the sweet spot in the Corvette lineup" in his Autoblog review and said the $20,695 Track Performance package was the best way to track one, because its brakes and Michelin Cup 2R tires let the rear-drive car run with the more powerful X. He also put the dual-clutch in the same conversation as Porsche's PDK, which is about as high as praise for a paddle-shift transmission gets.

Hagerty's Robinson was the most specific about why. Swapping between the two at Atlanta, he found the rear-drive car the most fun: lighter, less filtered steering, more overall grip, and a quicker response on the optional Cup 2R tires, which Chevrolet does not offer from the factory on the X. The X, he wrote, is 280 pounds heavier, rides on Michelin Pilot Sport 4S rubber, and feels every inch the big car the modern Corvette has become. Top Gear's Alex Kalogiannis gave the Grand Sport an 8 and summed it up with a line worth stealing: it "complements ability yet suffers no fools."

Where they split: the Grand Sport X

Nobody called the Grand Sport X slow. Chevrolet's estimate is 2.4 seconds to 62 mph in The Drive's table, and Perez called it a phenomenal track machine. The arguments are about price and personality. Perez thought it overpriced, said the front end feels heavy at first, and called its synthetic full-throttle sound effect cheesy. Bierenkoven found its launch violent and its fake electric whine distracting. Robinson described the speaker sound as a Star Trek phaser. Kalogiannis was more measured: the driven front axle adds a safety net, he wrote, at the cost of more understeer, and the push-to-pass boost only works in the track modes.

Where they also differ is how much the Grand Sport really adds over a Stingray on the street. Kalogiannis wrote that you have to push hard to find the gap on public roads, and that the real difference shows up with the track packages. Perez went further and said a Stingray can practically be a Grand Sport without the badge. Both of those are arguments for saving money if you never plan to see a track.

The complaints

The gripes are short. Perez found the Stingray very loud in Sport and Track modes, did not love how much Track mode adds to steering effort, and said the Competition Sport seats lack real track bolstering. Kalogiannis found the opposite problem with the seats he sat in, calling the ride rigid in a form-fitting, heavily bolstered seat. On the plus side, Top Gear and Hagerty both called out the new optional center-exit quad exhaust, and Robinson noted it is the first time a pushrod C8 has offered one.

One pricing note for shoppers: Hagerty lists $73,495 for the Stingray, $88,495 for the Grand Sport and $112,195 for the X. The Drive's spec table shows higher numbers, $75,990, $90,990 and $114,195. Compare quotes on the same basis before you get excited about either set.

What nobody measured yet

These were manufacturer launch drives, so the performance numbers above are Chevrolet's. None of the four first drives published an instrumented acceleration run or a lap time, and Autoblog mentioned a fastest lap in the X without giving the number. Independent test data will come later, and it will be worth watching how close the LS6 cars get to the claims.

TORQFOLIO's read

Read together, these reviews make the Grand Sport with the Z52 package the Corvette to buy for most people who drive on the street and do the occasional track day, and the Grand Sport with the Track Performance package the pick for anyone who lives at HPDE weekends. The Stingray is the value play if you mostly cruise, since the testers struggled to separate it from a Grand Sport on public roads. The Grand Sport X is for the buyer who wants all-weather traction and the quickest launch and does not care about the price or the sound effect.

For the pro-touring and muscle crowd, the bigger story is the engine. Chevrolet built a 409-cubic-inch, naturally aspirated small-block with 13.0:1 compression for its volume sports car in 2026. As Kociba told The Drive, "there's no replacement for displacement." The testers seem to agree.