To maintain such a vast portfolio of models fresh and competitive, development and testing never stop at Mercedes-Benz. Ever since its introduction many decades ago, the S-Class has served as the company’s flagship model, ushering in technologies that eventually trickled down to lesser models of the range. It looks like it will be a similar story with the W223 judging by the sophisticated headlights this prototype had.

Visibly different than those of the current S-Class, the clusters have what looks to be a curved LED turn signal strip at the bottom that changes its color from orange to green as the driver enters the intersection. It’s also a bit puzzling why the turn signals don’t blink when the orange light is on and also it’s interesting to see the green pulsating from one corner of the headlight to the other.

We could go on forever, trying to figure out why the central section of the front grille doesn’t have that mesh you see on its sides – presumably that’s where the radars and/or cameras are? The hidden door handles make us scratch our heads, while the simple taillights at the back indicate the S-Class prototype did not have the final rear clusters.

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Things are much simpler with the E-Class Coupe facelift prototype as it’s pretty clear the mid-cycle refresh will bring a new look for the headlights and taillights. Some mild changes to the front bumper are also prepared, but nothing to write home about. The sedan and wagon (including All-Terrain) have already been spotted with similar visual tweaks, so we have a pretty good idea of the changes the E family will be going through.

Expect first versions of the refreshed E-Class to arrive towards the end of the decade, with the S-Class to land in 2020 once production at the brand new Factory 56 assembly plant in Sindelfingen, Germany will commence.

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