Video: 2017 GMC Acadia Review

It's a big departure from its predecessor and it's more family friendly than ever. The new Acadia's driving experience, by comparison, is much more car-like. It offers an available V6 engine that's smooth and powerful, and it rides well and steers easily. Plus, now that it weighs 700 pounds less than before, it gets better EPA estimated gas mileage. The Acadia offers a number of increasingly common active safety features like forward collision warning with automatic braking, but it also offers a couple of features that are much more rare. And those are a rear seat reminder and GM's teen driver technology. The rear seat reminder will display a message and sound a warning chime at the end of your trip, if you opened one of the rear doors before starting your drive. The system helps you avoid forgetting a purse or bag in the back seat, or even worse, an infant in a child safety seat, which has a potential to end with tragic consequences. GMs teen driver technology, meanwhile, lets parents set limits in order to help teens be safer drivers. Parents can configure their teen's key fob to do things like mute the stereo when people in the front seat aren't wearing their seat belts, and sound a chime when a preset speed has been exceeded. The system can also generate a report card with information about your teen's trip, like the maximum speed they achieved, and whether the stability system was triggered. In-car entertainment has also evolved. More and more families are bringing their own devices into the car for the family road trip, and the Acadia's 4G LTE wifi hotspot is there to keep them connected. The subscription-based service lets passengers check email and watch videos on the go, and multiple front and rear USB ports ensure all those devices stay charged. The Acadia also offers Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, which shows select smartphone apps on the dashboard touchscreen. It took just a few seconds for the system to recognize my iPhone and show compatible apps, which makes it an easy way to play my music, or make a phone call, or more safely use my phone's navigation capability. It's extremely rare for a car to go through the redesign process and end up smaller, but that's what GMC has done with the new Acadia. It's more manageable on the road than before, and when you add in the cutting edge safety and tech features, it's not hard to see how crossover SUVs like this one are the new American staple.