CHANGES are being made to Alfa Romeo's high performance Quadrifoglio pairing of Stelvio SUV and Giulia sports saloon with both models getting upgrades to their technology and styling.

From a performance and dynamic perspective little is altered and both remain feisty and capable of delivering breathtaking drives.

But Alfa's tweaks to the equipment and design on the two models brings them right up to date.

On the technology front there is now an 8.8-inch touchscreen central display complete with a drag-and-drop menu system which can be used in lieu of the rotary control which remains prominent in a new-look centre console.

The system sees the introduction of what Alfa calls Performance Pages to the software and those show an array of information including torque and turbo gauges, the temperature of important mechanical components such as the brakes and digital chronometers to give an indication of speed and acceleration.

The data can be used either on the road or on the track - and with the Giulia Quadrifoglio capable of 190mph the latter is the place where it is well at home.

There is also a new-look to the instrument panel which has a seven-inch TFT at its centre between the speedo and rev counter. It's a classy display and the graphics are neat and easy to read.

Other changes include a new design for the steering wheel and gear lever which now has the red, white and green Italian national colours included in its mounting and overall the entire cockpit has a more simplistic and contemporary approach to its design.

It works and the layout is much more in-keeping with cars costing from £67,195 for the Giulia and £73,195 for the Stelvio.

On the outside there are different LED rear light clusters with a darkened hue to the lens and while the Alfa badge is changed inside to a matt black finish it remains in colour on the grille and boot and both cars retain their green and white cloverleaf emblems first used on racing Alfas in 1923.

Both versions we sampled also came with carbon fibre grilles, mirror caps and rear spoilers which are options reserved for the Quadrifoglio cars as are carbon shell Sparco seats and red or green seatbelts in place of the more traditional black webbing.

The cars also come with Alfa's latest driver assistance systems which combine several features such as lane keeping, blind spot alerts and active cruise control to enable level two autonomous driving - the highest level of autonomous driving currently permitted.

As with earlier models the pair are powered by 2.9-litre twin turbo V6 petrol engines which have 510hp on tap.

The result is breath-taking performance with the Giulia having a 3.9 second 0 to 60 acceleration and a maximum of 190mph.

The Stelvio is a fraction faster through the gears - both models have eight-speed ZF auto boxes allied to paddle shifters - at 3.8 seconds and that is almost as rapid as a Lamborghini Urus costing almost twice as much.

On a fuel economy front the Stelvio is rated officially at 24.6mpg with emissions of 261g/km while the Giulia comes in at 27.2 to the gallon with a CO2 figure of 236g/km.

On our drives in the two we managed to see an average of 26.5mpg for the Giulia although the best we could get out of the all-wheel-drive set up in the Stelvio was 19.4.

Nevertheless, both deliver stunning drives with nimble handling under all circumstances and with the new-look to the interior, the feel of the cockpit is much improved.

Options fitted to the Stelvio we tried took the price up to £84,800 while the Giulia had some £6,000 worth of extras onboard taking its price to £73,460.

Both emit a delightful soundtrack from their standard fit dual mode quad exhausts while another option for the latest versions is an Akrapovic exhaust complete with carbon fibre tailpipes.