Thule Motion 3 L Review: The Roof Box That Replaced the Motion XT
If you went looking for the Thule Motion XT L, you will not find it new any more: The Roof Box Company marks it discontinued and points to the Motion 3 L as the upgrade. That is the box Thule’s UK shop and Halfords sell in October 2026, at £725–£730. A UK ski magazine’s year on the roof, two UK fitters and 38 buyer ratings say it is a very good box. Whether it is worth buying rather than hiring depends on how often it would actually be up there.
Where the reviews line up
The evidence comes from three places: a twelve-month family test by the UK ski magazine Fall-Line, the specification and fitting information published by two UK specialists, The Roof Box Company and GT Towing, and buyer ratings at REI and Halfords — 4.9/5 from 36 and 5.0/5 from 2. They agree on most of it.
Three points come up everywhere. It is easy to fit: the PowerClick clamps come pre-installed and click when they are tight, so no tools are involved, and Halfords quotes up to 30 minutes for a fitting it charges £30 for. It is easy to live with: the lid opens from either side, and the SlideLock locks itself as you shut it — Fall-Line points out that the key will not come out unless the box is locked. And it is quieter than people expect: Fall-Line found no booming on long motorway runs, and the Canadian off-road title OVR Magazine found it fairly quiet below 60 mph, with some wind noise above.
The footnotes. At 20 kg it is a two-person lift on to the roof. It is expensive — more than £100 above the Motion XT L’s last RRP. Nobody has published a fuel figure for this box, and the general roof-box tests we found put the penalty at roughly 10–24% depending on speed. And Thule’s own UK page says 440 litres while Halfords, The Roof Box Company and REI all say 450.
Buy or hire? If the box will go on for one summer holiday a year, hiring is hard to beat: GT Towing in Hertfordshire charges £79.99 for a 500-litre box for up to five days in summer, and lends the roof bars free. Buy the Motion 3 L if you will use it several times a year, or every ski season. At UK prices of £680–£730 it pays for itself somewhere around the sixth to ninth hire.
The three reviews this summary is built from
- Fall-LineA UK ski magazine’s “Tried and Tested”: the L size on a family estate for twelve months, published 27 March 2026.
- The Roof Box Company & GT TowingTwo UK specialists that sell, fit and (GT Towing) hire Thule boxes: bar fit, spacing, warranty, fitting and hire prices.
- REI & Halfords buyers4.9/5 from 36 at REI (US) and 5.0/5 from 2 at Halfords, checked 12 Oct 2026 — on pages that sell it.
Before the review: Motion XT L or Motion 3 L?
The Motion XT L (Thule no. 629701 in gloss black) is listed as discontinued by The Roof Box Company, whose page links to the Motion 3 L (no. 639700 in gloss black, 639701 in titan) with an “upgrade” badge. Rack Attack, a US rack retailer, also lists the XT as discontinued. The two are close on paper — the XT L was 450 litres, 20 kg, 75 kg load, PowerClick and dual-side opening — and the main change is a new wing-shaped profile that Thule says cuts drag. This page reviews the Motion 3 L. If you find a new Motion XT L, it is old stock; check the price against the 3.
Specification at a glance
| Spec | Figure | Confidence |
|---|---|---|
| Capacity | 440 litres (Thule UK) or 450 litres (everyone else) | Disagreement — see below |
| External size | 194 × 87 × 42 cm (L × W × H) | Thule UK and The Roof Box Company’s description. GT Towing lists 194 × 89 × 43 cm; The Roof Box Company’s own spec table says 1940 × 890 × 430 mm |
| Internal size | 182 × 72 × 38 cm | The Roof Box Company and GT Towing. Thule UK lists 184 × 72 × 38 cm |
| Height above the bars | 38 cm | Thule UK; The Roof Box Company |
| Weight | 20 kg | Thule UK, The Roof Box Company, GT Towing, Fall-Line all agree |
| Load limit | 75 kg (TÜV approved) — and never more than your car’s roof limit, which includes the bars and the box | Thule UK; The Roof Box Company |
| Skis | 5–7 pairs up to 180 cm; 3–5 snowboards | Thule UK. Fall-Line says four to six pairs in practice |
| Mounting | PowerClick clamps, pre-installed, with a torque indicator that clicks when tight | Thule UK; GT Towing |
| Roof bars it fits | Steel and aluminium bars up to 90 mm wide; T-track adapter 697-6 for Thule SlideBar and ProBar Evo; Caprock needs kit 611330 | The Roof Box Company (width); Thule UK (adapters) |
| Bar depth | 30 mm or 35 mm maximum | The Roof Box Company gives both on the same page |
| Bar spacing | 555–930 mm | The Roof Box Company’s spec table |
| Opening | Both sides, one-handed | Thule UK; every source agrees |
| Lock | SlideLock: locks the lid automatically and shows when it is shut; key cannot be removed until locked | Thule UK; key detail from Fall-Line |
| Fitting time | Up to 30 minutes (Halfords, box only); “under 15 minutes” (GT Towing, for hire boxes) | Retailers’ own claims |
| Warranty | 2 years, plus 3 more if you register with Thule — 5 in all | The Roof Box Company. Thule UK’s product page gives no figure |
| Fuel penalty | No figure for this box. General tests: 10–12% worse mpg (What Car?), 14% more fuel at 90 km/h and 24% at 130 km/h (University of Žilina) | See below — none of these tested a Motion 3 |
| UK price | £724.99 Halfords; £729.00 The Roof Box Company; £729.99 Thule; £679.95 GT Towing (collection only) | All checked 12 Oct 2026. Thule RRP £729.99 |
On the capacity: Thule’s own UK page lists 440 litres, and Fall-Line, which tested it, says “around 440”. Halfords, The Roof Box Company, GT Towing and REI all list 450 litres. The internal measurements both UK fitters give — 182 × 72 × 38 cm — would hold about 500 litres as a plain box, but a roof box tapers at both ends, so either figure is believable. We have printed both. Ten litres is not going to decide anything.
On fuel: Thule says the wing-shaped profile is “for reduced drag and fuel efficiency”, but it publishes no number, and no reviewer measured one. The best general figures we found: in a What Car? test reported by Green Flag, a roof box (make not named) cut a Dacia Logan from 54.2 to 48.5 mpg and a Nissan Qashqai from 37 to 32.5 mpg. A 2017 University of Žilina study with a 305-litre box on a Škoda Fabia measured 14% more fuel at 90 km/h and 24% more at 130 km/h. The Roof Box Company just says “usually a few MPG”. On our arithmetic, the Qashqai figures over a 500-mile holiday round trip come to about 8.5 extra litres of fuel. Every source agrees on what to do: take the box off — and steel bars too — when you get home.
Fall-Line
Who they are: Fall-Line’s own masthead lists Jim Duncombe as Digital Editor and a Nic Lang as Art Editor, not a gear specialist; we could not find a profile confirming that this is the same tester, so the test was chosen because it is the only UK review we found covering a full year and thousands of miles.
Fall-Line is a UK ski magazine, so it judges a roof box the way skiers use one: loaded with skis for long motorway drives to the Alps. Its verdict is that the Motion 3 “proves you don’t need a bigger car to carry more gear – just a better roof box”. It found wind noise lower than expected with no booming on long runs, the PowerClick mounting quick and tool-free with a clear click to confirm, and the lid easy to reach from either side. The most useful line is about durability: “Twelve months in, thousands of miles travelled and not one component has failed.”
The criticisms are the obvious ones. It is a premium price — £700 for the L when Fall-Line tested it — and at 20 kg the tester suggests two people to lift it on to the bars. The magazine counts four to six pairs of skis inside, slightly fewer than Thule’s five to seven. The only other hands-on review we could read, by the Canadian title OVR Magazine, carried the same L size on a Subaru Crosstrek with Thule WingBar Edge bars for 1,300 miles, 500 of them on rough gravel. It found the load “didn’t move one bit”, wind noise “not obnoxious” above 60 mph and the box about half the weight of its old fibreglass one — but the tie-down straps in the box did not hold the load well enough, and the gloss lid picked up light scratches.
Watch: Thule Motion 3 Review
A general review of the Motion 3 range — the closest video to the kind of hands-on judgement Fall-Line gives. The listing did not say which size is shown. Confirmed by search listing only; see the caveat box below.
Watch on YouTube ↗ Independent YouTube video — not made by or for Shopbam.The Roof Box Company and GT Towing
Who they are: The Roof Box Company is a Cumbrian specialist that has sold and fitted roof racks, boxes and bike carriers since 1997; GT Towing is a Hertfordshire towbar and trailer business dating from the 1960s that sells, fits and hires Thule kit — both publish manufacturer specifications and their own prices, not tests, and both earn from the sale or hire.
These two are not reviewers. They are what you would get if you rang a specialist before buying: the details that decide whether the box fits your car. The Roof Box Company gives the numbers Thule’s own page leaves out. The PowerClick clamps take bars up to 90 mm wide — steel or aluminium — and Thule aero bars with a T-slot can use an optional adapter instead. Its page gives the maximum bar depth as both 30 mm and 35 mm, so if your bars are deep, ask. The bars must sit 555–930 mm apart. It lists the warranty as two years, plus three more if you register the box with Thule. It also notes the £45 ski holder only works with the standard PowerClick clamps, not the aero-bar adapters.
GT Towing, a towbar and trailer firm in Hertfordshire that was Thule Dealer of the Year in 2009, sells the box for £679.95 for collection only, and runs a hire fleet of Thule boxes. In summer, a Large 500-litre box costs £79.99 for one to five days or £109.99 for six to twelve; from October to March those fall to £59.99 and £84.99. Roof bars come free with the hire, and the firm says fitting takes under 15 minutes. The page does not say which Thule model you get. If you are outside the M25 area, peer-to-peer site Hygglo listed Thule boxes around London at mostly £5–£10 a day — including a Motion XT L at £10–£15 — with an average of about £37 a week.
Watch: Thule Motion 3 roof box demonstration - www.roofracks.co.uk
A UK roof-rack retailer demonstrating the box — the same specialist-counter view as this section. The listing did not say which size is shown. Confirmed by search listing only.
Watch on YouTube ↗ Independent YouTube video — not made by or for Shopbam.REI and Halfords buyers
Who they are: REI is a US outdoor retailer whose ratings come from its shoppers and whose review policy we could not read, so treat them as unverified US owner experience; Halfords publishes a ratings policy we could not read, and two ratings from its shoppers are a signal, not evidence.
These are ratings on shop pages that sell the box, and the bigger sample is American. REI’s 36 ratings for the L size have nothing below four stars, and 25 of 25 reviewers who answered said they would recommend it. Neither page let us read the written reviews, so we cannot say what owners praise or complain about — only that nobody has given it a poor score. Two Halfords ratings is too few to mean anything on its own; we include it because Halfords is where most UK buyers will see the box.
Price, 12 October 2026: Thule’s UK shop £729.99, in stock; The Roof Box Company £729.00 against an RRP of £729.99, in stock with next-day delivery; Halfords £724.99, down from £754.99, with fitting £30 extra — the page names no other seller; GT Towing £679.95, collection only from Welham Green. The discontinued Motion XT L’s last RRP at The Roof Box Company was 615 (the page shows no currency sign). You will need roof bars as well, which none of these prices include.
Watch: Thule Motion 3: In-Depth Review of the New Cargo Box
A longer walk-round of the new box, useful for the details buyers rate it on — the lid, the lock and the inside. The listing did not say which size is shown. Confirmed by search listing only; we have not watched it.
Watch on YouTube ↗ Independent YouTube video — not made by or for Shopbam.Strengths and weak points
What holds up
- Tool-free PowerClick clamps that click when tight; Halfords quotes up to 30 minutes.
- Opens from either side, one-handed.
- SlideLock locks itself and will not release the key until the lid is shut.
- Quieter than expected on the motorway, by Fall-Line’s twelve-month test.
- No failures in a year and thousands of miles (Fall-Line).
- Takes bars up to 90 mm wide; five-year warranty if you register it.
What people complain about
- £680–£730 before you buy roof bars — over £100 more than the Motion XT L’s last RRP.
- 20 kg: a two-person lift.
- The supplied tie-down straps did not hold OVR Magazine’s load well.
- The gloss lid scratches lightly; the liner is extra.
- Any roof box costs fuel — 10–24% in the general tests we found.
- Thule and the retailers do not agree on capacity (440 or 450 litres).
Who it actually suits
Buy it if the box will be on the car several times a year — a ski trip every winter, camping weekends, or a family whose boot is full every holiday. If you are also taking bikes, a towbar rack such as the Thule EasyFold 3 keeps them off the roof and leaves the box room for luggage; if you are camping, an awning like the Vango Kela Pro Air is the next thing that has to fit somewhere.
Hire instead if it is one summer holiday a year. At £80–£110 a trip with bars thrown in, you would need six to nine hires to match the purchase price, and you will not have a 20 kg box to store in the garage. And whichever you choose, check your car’s maximum roof load in the handbook first: the 75 kg box limit is no use if your roof is rated lower once the box and bars are counted.
What we could not check
- The videos. We could not open YouTube from here. Each video on this page was confirmed by its exact watch address and title appearing in two differently worded searches, not by watching it. The listings did not name the channels or say which Motion 3 size each shows.
- Capacity. Thule UK says 440 litres; Halfords, The Roof Box Company, GT Towing and REI say 450. We could not resolve it.
- External size. 194 × 87 × 42 cm (Thule UK) against 194 × 89 × 43 cm (GT Towing and The Roof Box Company’s spec table).
- Maximum bar depth. The Roof Box Company gives both 30 mm and 35 mm on the same page; Thule UK gives no bar width or depth.
- Warranty. The five-year figure comes from The Roof Box Company; Thule UK’s product page states no length.
- Fuel consumption. No test of the Motion 3 exists that we could find. The figures quoted are from other boxes on other cars, and What Car?’s test is reported second-hand by Green Flag without speeds or the box model.
- Who tested it at Fall-Line. The byline says Nicola Lang; the masthead lists Nic Lang as Art Editor. We could not confirm they are the same person.
- Written buyer reviews. Neither REI nor Halfords showed review text to our tools, and Thule UK showed no rating. Amazon and Argos were not checked.
- Halfords stock and seller. Halfords’ booking system was unavailable when we checked, and the page did not name the seller.
- Which box GT Towing hires. Its hire page says Thule but names no model.
- Honest John’s review. A review of the Motion 3 at kit.honestjohn.co.uk now redirects elsewhere and could not be read.
Sources last checked 12 October 2026. Roof box prices move with the seasons, and hire prices go up from April — check the listing in front of you before ordering.