Is the Polaris RZR Pro R Worth Buying in 2026?

UTV Driver

https://dirthammer.com/ is the best place online to buy and sell side-by-sides! No more Facebook Marketplace weirdos, no more “is this available,” no more sketchy parking lot meetups. Just buying and selling side-by-sides, simplified. Check out www.dirthammer.com for your next side-by-side purchase!  It's been four years since the Pro R debuted, and its class is more competitive than ever. With the Can-Am Maverick R and Kawasaki Teryx H2 making heaps more power, the Pro R got left in the dust. But in 2026, Polaris gave the Pro R a much-needed refresh. New tires, a giant screen, and attractive new styling makes the Pro R feel like an all-new rig. So does the Pro R hold up to the competition? To help you decide, we put together five things we love and five things we hate about the 2026 Polaris Pro R Ultimate.  Become a Channel Partner: https://octanemedia.co/home/become-an-advertiser/ Looking to buy? Get prequalifed https://octane.co/vehicle-selection/?partner=A8PrQQB&a=298&flow=long-prequal&appTheme=3a49337c5724d18079602a4ca5a91626 Favorite Gear:  Packtalk Edge ORV: Code 'octane' for 10% off https://cardosystems.rfrl.co/z8qy5  For more stories, reviews, and first-looks check out https://www.utvdriver.com/   Want to see even more shenanigans from the UTV Driver team? Give us a like and follow:  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/UTVdriver/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/utvdrivermagazine/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/utvdriver/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@utvdriver

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00:00The Polaris Razor Pro R made headlines in 2022 as the fastest production side-by-side in the world.

00:06The 2-liter naturally aspirated inline-four was the most powerful engine ever put in a production

00:11side-by-side at 225 horsepower. But since then, it's been outclassed by the Can-Am Maverick R

00:17and the Kawasaki Terex H2. So in 2026, after a year of updates, extra styling, how does it hold

00:23up to the two other rigs that claimed its title? And should you buy one for yourself?

00:28To help you find out, we put together a list of five things we love and five things we hate

00:32about the 2026 Polaris Pro R. The first thing we love, which should be no surprise,

00:37is this engine and transmission. Now the engine, like we said earlier, is a 2-liter inline-four

00:45naturally aspirated. That means no turbo, no supercharger like the Kawasaki H2. Like they

00:49always say, there's no replacement for displacement. And that rings true with the Pro R. Now yes,

00:54the Maverick R at 240 and the H2 at 250 have more horsepower than this thing. But what they don't

00:59have is throttle response. The throttle response that you get from a naturally aspirated inline-four

01:04is unmatched. I haven't seen this good a throttle response in anything I've driven. As soon as you

01:10put your foot on the throttle, you're getting gas. And that includes with the CVT. Everybody says you

01:15have to wait for a CVT to spin up. There's a little lag in the throttle response. And that's not

01:19the case

01:20with the Pro R. Usually I'm not a CVT guy. I love the dual clutch transmission in the Mav R.

01:25But with the Pro R, I don't really mind it. You don't notice it. And when you're going at high

01:28speeds, the CVT doesn't really matter. That's kind of what it was made for. To keep you in gear at

01:33any

01:33speed on any type of terrain. And above all, it just sounds good. You don't have a supercharger or a

01:39turbocharger in your ear constantly chirping. You have that excellent rumble of an inline-four. If an

01:45engine sounds good, then it's going to put a smile on your face. Period. And that's why the first thing

01:49that we love about the 2026 Polaris Razor Pro R is the engine and transmission. Now the second

01:55thing we love about the Pro R is this wheel and tire package. Now years prior, we've talked about

01:59the Pro R and one of the things we didn't like about it was the tires. Polaris used 32-inch

02:04Maxxis Rampage Furies on the Pro R and the Pro S. And while I'm sure those tires are fine on

02:09the West

02:10Coast, on the East Coast, we found ourselves with holes in our tires more often than not. Pinch flats and

02:14not a ton of grip in wet conditions made those tires less than ideal. Now for 2026, Polaris swapped to

02:20these Pro Armored Trekkers. They're still the same size. They're still 32-inches wrapped around a 15-inch

02:24wheel, but they are just so much better. This tread pattern is better. It's a lot more forgiving on open

02:30terrain, and it's kind of more of a jack-of-all-trades instead of just straight West Coast tires. Added

02:35on to

02:36that are these sick wheels. They look like the old three-piece wheels that you'd find on old BMWs,

02:41and I adore them. It's the right color, it's the right pattern, and they look amazing with these 32s.

02:47They're even color matched to the rig. So the third thing that we love about the Polaris Pro R is

02:51this

02:51suspension. Now this is equipped with Fox Live Valve 3.0 Internal Bypass X2 shocks. If you didn't know, Fox

02:58Live

02:59Valve constantly samples the terrain at over a thousand times per second, and then automatically adjusts the

03:04suspension according to those readings. That means that you just have to pick one of four suspension modes

03:09and pretty much forget it. Now there's Comfort, Track, Rock, and Baja mode. We could get into what each of

03:15those mean, but they're pretty self-explanatory. I personally like to keep it in Baja mode almost the

03:20entire time. It's a very good well-rounded suspension setup. It has 22.25 inches of travel in the front

03:26and 24.5 inches of travel in the rear. We could talk about how that compares to the Maverick R

03:32and the H2, but they're so close that it really doesn't matter. Once you get up there,

03:37a lot of suspension travel is a lot of suspension travel, period. We love this suspension setup and

03:42we've been loving it since 2022. Polaris hasn't changed it much and that's not really an issue.

03:47It's still great and it's going to continue to be great. Now the fourth thing we love about the

03:522026 Polaris Razor Pro R is this center screen. Now I know what you're going to say, center screens are

03:57almost always bad, but in this case it's really not. We've talked about how much we love Polaris

04:03Ride Command and this just kind of makes it better. One of the only issues of Ride Command

04:06is that you couldn't multitask in it. If you were looking at your map, you couldn't control your

04:11music while you were doing that. But with this new 10.5 inch screen, it fixes all of that. It

04:16has

04:16split screen capabilities, which means you can have your map up here and your menu down here or just

04:21about anything else you want. There's cameras, there's media, there's other controls. Pretty much

04:26anything that Ride Command can do, you can do it split screen with the map or anything else you want

04:31it

04:32to be. And a big reason we love it is because the user interface is so good. All the buttons

04:36are well

04:37mapped out and for 2026 with the new screen, you have these controls at the bottom. You have this

04:42volume knob right here, which you didn't get in prior years. If you want quick access, you can hit

04:47these giant buttons. There's your gauges, there's your settings, there's your music, there's your phone

04:51control. It's that simple and we adore it. And it's not just an infotainment system. It has some of

04:57your drivetrain and suspension settings up here. We talk about Ride Command on almost every Polaris

05:01machine we get in that has it and we're not going to stop anytime soon. It's great and it's still

05:06the

05:06best infotainment system in the industry. And the final thing we love about the 2026 Polaris Pro R

05:12is the styling. We kind of already talked about the wheel styling, how it resembles three-piece

05:17wheels that you see on older cars. Look at the rest of it. The red looks great, the silver looks

05:21great.

05:22It's an attractive machine and that's really what you want out of a side-by-side. You want to look

05:26good going down a trail. You can't say that about every rig, but we sure as hell can say

05:31it about the Polaris Pro R. That was five things we love about the 2026 Polaris Pro R.

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06:32for sponsoring our channel. Now, back to the video. All right, so the first thing we hate about the

06:362026 Polaris Pro-R is actually this bed. Now, it's nice and long. It's pretty deep, but the problem

06:42comes when you actually want to put stuff in it. As you see, it's got this, like, weird shape with

06:47these little, like, locking mechanisms in here. And that's because Polaris wants you to use their

06:51lock-and-ride system. And all that is is just a system that comes straight from the factory where

06:55it just nestles down in these little, in these little divots, and it gives you, uh, you know,

07:01protected storage or a cooler back there or whatever, and all of that's straight from Polaris.

07:05But if you want to put your own coolers back there, the only strap-down points you have are right

07:09here.

07:10I've tried to fit a ratchet around there. It's not going to work. There's no tie-downs on this point.

07:14It's literally just these. So every time I have to put something back here, I have to take my strap,

07:18hook it to there, loop it around whatever I'm putting down here, and then loop it back to that

07:22one. And that just doesn't create a very stable hold. I would love to see some straps on this side

07:27so that you actually have something to strap your stuff down and that you don't have to go directly

07:32through Polaris to get what you need. Now, another thing we don't like about it, as you can see,

07:36it's pretty dirty. And I spent, you know, about three hours washing this machine the other day.

07:41There's mud all around here for me trying to get all of this out. And that's because there is a

07:45single

07:45drain hole in this bed, right there. You don't get one on this side. You don't get one on this

07:49side. You don't get one on this side. It's literally right there. So if your rig is on an

07:53upward slope, all of the water is going to pull down here. If it's sideways, all the water is

07:58going to pull down here. It has to be facing downhill at a kind of angle like that, just to

08:02get any water out of this thing. See, there's even standing water in there. That's not great. We need

08:07more drain holes. We need more tie-down points, and it'd be a great bet. I mean, this thing can

08:11haul 300 pounds, and I don't know anything that's 300 pounds that'll fit back here. Now,

08:15the second thing we hate about the 2026 Polaris Pro-R is this shifter. Now, I know we sound like

08:20a broken record here. We've talked about the shifter in almost every Polaris Pro-R review we've

08:25done, but we're going to keep talking about it until Polaris fixes it. Right now, this shifter

08:30feels like mixing a bucket of wrenches. It's hard to move, and more often than not, you miss the gear

08:35you're trying to go into. When you're going from park to, say, low, most of the time, you go past

08:40it and hit

08:40high. And when you're going back up to correct, it skips and goes to neutral. And the worst part

08:44about it is, is that we know Polaris can do better. They have an excellent shifter in the Ranger XD

08:491500. Now, I get it. That's a utility side-by-side, and this is a sport rig, but that just

08:54proves that

08:54Polaris can do better, and they're choosing not to. So, the third thing we hate is the weight of this.

09:00Now, the 2026 Polaris Razor Pro-R Ultimate weighs 2,452 pounds. To put that into perspective,

09:07it's heavier than the 2026 Kawasaki Terex H2, which is a four-seater. I don't know if you can tell,

09:13but this is a two-seater. Now, it's pretty obvious that most of that comes from the engine. Its engine

09:17is double the size of the H2. And yeah, 100 or so pounds doesn't really matter, but when you're

09:22looking at the spec sheet, and you're a potential buyer, you're going to take that into account.

09:26You want a lighter rig for the trails. They're just better. They have an easier time going through the

09:30mud, they have an easier time staying on the rocks, and they're a little bit more fun to fling around.

09:34And that's why its weight is the third thing we hate about the 2026 Polaris Pro-R. Now,

09:39the fourth thing we hate about the Polaris Pro-R is that it got a lot of updates for 2026.

09:43Let me be

09:44clear. We do not hate the updates. The updates are amazing. The new tires are great. The center

09:48screen is awesome. What we hate is that the updates came a little bit too late. Now, if those would

09:52have shown up in 2024, it would have had a real chance of competing against the Maverick R in our

09:57head-to-head test. But it didn't do that. The tires were still the Maxxis tires, the center screen was

10:03still tiny, and the suspension tweaks weren't anywhere to be found. If the 2026 version of

10:08the Pro-R would have been available in 2024, it would have been a much different conversation.

10:12We still appreciate the updates, but they could have came a little bit earlier.

10:16Now, the last thing we hate is that this is a Polaris Pro-R Ultimate, and it's pretty much the

10:21only one you can buy. What I mean by that is that this is the only trim available. Unless you

10:25want to

10:25pay a lot of extra money and try to get yourself on the Razer Pro-R Ultra list, you're stuck

10:29with the

10:30Ultimate. They got rid of the Premium. They got rid of the Sport. So if you're wanting to get in

10:33the

10:34seat of a Pro-R, you're going to have to spend at least $43,999. And that is a stark

10:39contrast from

10:39Can-Am, which has four different trims for the Maverick R. And don't even get me started on the X3.

10:45There's 19, 20 different trims of the X3. Polaris, you're lacking a little bit in that front. We love

10:50you, but it's time for a few more trims. So finally, let's go over who this rig is for. Now,

10:55the

10:552026 Polaris Razer Pro-R Ultimate is for someone who likes to go fast on almost any terrain. Now,

11:01we love the Can-Am Maverick R, but it only likes to go fast. It doesn't really like to rock

11:05crawl,

11:06and it doesn't really like to mud, unless you buy its specific trim to do that, of course. But the

11:10Pro-R is the jack of all traits. It can rock climb. It can go fast through the desert. It

11:15can go through

11:15mud holes. It can do all of that, and you're still going to have a great time. Now, like we

11:20said,

11:21this is in the wide open category. It only has two other rigs to compete against. But if you want

11:25a

11:25rig for the everyman, something that'll do whatever you want in any situation, it's going to be the

11:30Pro-R. And of course, it's for the buyer who has a little bit more change in their pocket than

11:34anybody else. $44,000 is a lot of money. I don't care who you are, but keep in mind that's

11:39$6,000 less

11:40than the price of the average new car in America. Is it a value? I don't really know, but either

11:46way,

11:46you're going to have to write a fat check for this thing. Thank you so much for watching. That was

11:50five things we love and five things we hate about the 2026 Polaris Razor Pro-R Ultimate. Now, if you

11:56like this video, do us a favor, go down below, hit like, hit comment, hit subscribe. We love hearing

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12:06that, head over to utvdriver.com, where we have news, reviews, and buyer's guides five days a week.

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