Category: Reviews

Chris Baguley wanted to go out again. He didn’t insist on it, per se, but the rain had tapered off a while ago and the tarmac at the Millbrook Proving Ground was finally drying off. I was impressed enough with the Polestar 5 in the wet, but now the car’s chief engineer wanted me to experience it in the dry. 

Who was I to say no? When a top engineer, who’s also a superb wheelman in his own right, wants to show you what his 884-horsepower electric grand tourer could do on a proper track, you shut up and get in the passenger’s seat.

We had another go, and once again, I got tunnel vision from the acceleration the Polestar 5 could put down. And when Baguely completed our lap, he flashed a big grin, as if to say: “Not bad, right?”

He didn’t have to say anything. Lots of EVs are fast, especially in a straight line. But the point Baguely was trying to make came loud and clear: few fast EVs handle quite like the Polestar 5 does. And this thing has what it takes to challenge—I’m not saying beat, but challenge—the almighty Porsche Taycan. And even the likes of the Lucid Air, while it’s at it. 

If it comes to the United States, it’ll make for a fascinating match-up. But that remains a fairly ambiguous if.

(Full Disclosure: Polestar flew me to the United Kingdom last month for a preview drive of the Polestar 5. The brand covered my travel expenses.)

Polestar 5: What Is It?

The Polestar 5 makes its world premiere today at IAA Munich, Europe’s largest auto show. It’s being hailed as a big deal for the sometimes-troubled but aspirational electric luxury brand, which was spun out of Volvo and has deep ties to the rest of China’s Geely Group.

To understand why, it helps to go back to the beginning. 

The Polestar 1 was a limited-run plug-in hybrid luxury coupe that packed a lot of power but looked like a two-door Volvo S90, because under the skin, it basically was one. Then came the Polestar 2, a much-beloved electric sport sedan and early Tesla Model 3-fighter, but based on the Geely Group CMA platform that underpinned the Volvo XC40 and other cars.

Next was the Polestar 3, which offers excellent performance and style, but is again a twin to another Volvo. And finally, there’s the Polestar 4: Korean-made but also on another shared Geely Group platform used by various Zeekr and Lynk & Co. models, albeit with its own spin on things.

You get the idea. Polestar may be a newer brand, but under the skin, its cars have borrowed heavily from the rest of the family.

The Polestar 5 is where that starts to change. It’s built on an entirely new architecture exclusive to Polestar, including an all-aluminum platform and body, an 800-volt electrical architecture, an internally developed rear motor and plenty of other touches to make it something truly unique. 

“The most Polestar Polestar yet,” is how it was described to me. And that sort of thing is going to be key to making Polestar finally stand out from Volvo and the rest. 

Polestar 5: Design And Tech

And it does stand out. It’s a low, sleek sedan, angular in the right ways and perhaps echoing designs like the original Audi A7—hardly a bad thing to my eyes. You may remember the Polestar Precept Concept; this is that, taken to production with almost everything except the rear-hinged doors, which present crash-test challenges.

On the inside, it’s roomier than a Taycan, which admittedly isn’t hard to do because that car can feel more like an electric 911 than Porsche will admit. But the amount of rear headroom inside surprised me. My 5 foot, 11-inch frame never felt cramped in it, which can happen in some EV sedans like the Mercedes-Benz EQs, and I’m not even really that tall. 

How much you’ll like the interior depends on how much you like Polestar’s signature Scandinavian minimalism. (The same goes for the fact that, like most Polestar models, this one comes in Gray, Silver, The Other, Second Gray, White, Black, and who knows, down the line—Possibly Another Gray.)

Now, let’s get to the obvious: there’s no rear window. But the whole design and process is more artfully done than the Polestar 4 (and as much as I like the Polestar 4, this feels like the car it’s trying to be) and in my limited drive on the track, I can’t say I minded the camera-based rearview mirror much. It all works functionally just fine, though it’s still an acquired taste. 

In terms of software, you get Polestar’s standard Android Automotive operating system with Google built-in. While I didn’t get to play with it much on this drive, I’ve largely been impressed with that system’s speed, flexibility and voice recognition before, but more testing will be needed to render a final verdict.

Polestar 5: EV And Platform Specs

The Polestar 5 Performance—the top version and the one I tested—has a 112-kilowatt-hour battery (106 kWh usable) that powers dual motors and puts down the aforementioned 884 hp and 749 lb-ft of torque. You also get MagneRide adaptive dampers, bespoke Michelin performance tires and higher torsional rigidity from the platform than many gas-powered sports cars, Polestar says. 

But people don’t buy EVs for track days, or for performance alone. On the electric front, the Polestar 5 seems very competitive. Range for the base Dual Motor car is rated at 670 kilometers (416 miles) on Europe’s WLTP cycle, while the more powerful Performance version can go 565 km, or 351 miles. In EPA estimates for America, that equates to 330 miles for the base car, and 300 for the Performance. The max charging speed is a very healthy 350 kilowatts, and it can charge from 10% to 80% in 22 minutes. 

All in all, it’s an impressive package. And making something that wasn’t just another chip off the Geely block was the whole point. 

“There’s no group platform on which you can deliver this car,” Pete Allen, the head of Polestar UK’s R&D arm, told me. Nothing the Geely Group offered could make a car this low, or this stiff, or this light, so Polestar went out and made it alone. And the company won’t be watering it down later. “This is a no-compromise platform,” Allen said. “It’s only there to do sports, GT cars. There’s no plan to make an SUV off this platform.” 

Allen is British. So is Baguley, the lead dynamics engineer. So were a bunch of other folks who worked on the Polestar 5. The car drives like it was made by a bunch of people who’ve worked at places like Lotus and McLaren, because it was.

I suppose this makes sense. If you want AI in a car that opens your trunk when you ask it to, call up a Chinese automaker. If you want to make a car that is God’s gift to handling, call some Brits.

Polestar 5: Track Tested

For all those aluminum weight savings, the Polestar 5 still comes in at a beefy 5,518 pounds; a battery that size is heavy, and there’s no way around that. Beefier than a Taycan, for sure. But this platform affords an agility that belies its weight. Out on the Millbrook Proving Ground track—where prototype McLarens and Morgans can be seen alongside British military vehicles, hence why only Polestar was allowed to take photos—the Polestar 5 proved itself to be one of the best-handling EVs I’ve ever driven. Maybe even the best, although it’ll take more data to determine that for real.

The sedan’s steering is tight and direct. Porsche has it beaten on feel, but the 5 feels nimbler and smaller than it is. The ride quality still errs on the side of harsh, which could change if it comes to the U.S., but it’s tight and direct and handles a two-mile high-speed bank with as much confidence as it does a set of winding, off-camber blind curves. Baguley made better work of it than I could, but even a semi-skilled track driver like myself could get a lot out of it, and then some.

It’s not just a handler, either. It’s fast. Crushingly so. I did two hard launches on a straight and managed a zero to 60 mph run in 2.7 seconds, in the wet, which is considerably better than Polestar’s quoted 3.1-second time. And every launch kind of sucked the blood back in my eyes, warping my sense of reality a bit. Even by EV standards, it’s a beast. I managed to get it up to 155 mph on Millbrook’s back straight, tying it with a Cadillac CTS-V at Circuit of the Americas for the fastest I’ve driven any car on any road.

Above all, the Polestar 5’s notable for the analog vibe it has. There are surprisingly few hold-my-hand gizmos for a high-tech EV grand tourer. It doesn’t have active anti-roll-bars, or torque vectoring or an air suspension—all conscious choices, the engineers said, to make something that felt approachable and rewarding to driving enthusiasts. 

Polestar 5: Early Verdict

But as much as I liked this thing, even I’ll admit it’s a tricky sell. Polestar could use some wins lately, and what the Polestar 5 is—an expensive halo car—can’t make that happen alone. It’s targeting Porsche with a lot of the performance capability, but almost none of the brand cachet. 

The prices reflect its ambition. The base Dual Motor Polestar 5 will start at 119,900 Euro, or about $140,000, while the Polestar 5 Performance I tested is 142,900 Euro, or $167,000 at current exchange rates. That’s not what it would cost stateside—exchange rates, tax differences and tariffs mean you can’t simply convert one price to another—but it won’t be cheap.

Then there’s the fact that I’m left wondering if it can come here at all: It’s made in China, at a new sustainability-focused plant in Chongqing. Engineers said it’s borderline impossible to move the tooling for such a bespoke platform to another location, so if it’s to come to America, it would face an additional 100% tariff. 

“As with previous vehicles, we are taking a staggered approach to the launch,” a Polestar official told me. “The initial launch locations for Polestar 5 will include 24 of our 28 active markets and availability for customers in the U.S. will be announced at a later date.” 

I’ll take that as a maybe. But I hope it does. The Polestar 5 won’t be for everybody, but it’s as genuine an enthusiast car as EVs get—the kind of car where one gearhead sees it and nods to the other gearhead behind the wheel. If you know, you know. And if it previews more interesting adventures yet to come from Polestar, I’m here for it. 

Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com

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The Toyota Prius is the best hybrid on sale. It’s far more efficient than other hybrids, while offering plenty of room for four adults, ample cargo space and a responsive, refined driving experience. The real question, though, is whether you should get the plug-in hybrid version.

I spent a week with one to find out. And while I truly believe the Prius Plug-In Hybrid (PHEV) is one of the best plug-in hybrids ever, I still think the regular Prius is the right choice for most shoppers.

Read below to see why.

What Is It?

The Toyota Prius popularized hybrid vehicles in the United States, and has been a fixture of our roads since 2012. The Prius Plug-In launched in 2012 as the first plug-in version. While the Prius already offered industry-leading efficiency, the plug-in version allowed drivers to go for up to 11 miles on electric power alone. But with such limited electric-only driving range, it remained a rare option. It offered poor driving range and the same ugly design as other Prii at the time, but for more money.  

The original Prius PHEV was ugly, slow and boring to drive, with only 11 miles of range. The new one has solved all of those issues.

Photo by: Toyota

Yet Toyota never gave up. The second generation plug-in Prius became the Prius Prime, with the new name signaling Toyota’s renewed interest in the formula. But it wasn’t until this third attempt launched that people really took notice.

The new Prius offers a far more striking design and a much sharper driving experience than previous generations. Now, in PHEV guise, it gets 220 horsepower and up to 44 miles of electric driving range. Zero to 60 mph happens in 6.4 seconds (per Motortrend), and the Environmental Protection Agency says the Prius PHEV will do 52 miles per gallon combined when the battery is dead. 

For $34,445 for the base model, that’s a hell of a deal. 

What’s Good?

The value is hard to argue with. For $35,000, you get a modern, attractive car with seating for five, a generous cargo area and better fuel efficiency than nearly anything else on the market (the regular Prius is the only car that beats it). The Prius PHEV also comes standard with a ton of equipment, including all of the active safety tech you need. Luxuries like cooled seats, a JBL stereo, synthetic leather and a surround-view camera system are all available as extras.

In my real-world driving, I found the Prius to be whisper-quiet and engaging to drive. The steering is far improved over previous generations, and while I’d still prefer driving a Honda Civic Hybrid or Accord Hybrid on a twisty road, the Prius is among the most responsive and sporty mainstream hybrids ever built.

I also observed great efficiency during my test, though my sporadic level 1 charging stopped me from doing a full electric range test. Still, mid-50 mpgs and around 40 miles of EV range seems more than achievable. Since it’s a PHEV, too, you won’t have to do any special planning for road trips.

The bigger, 161-hp electric motor in the PHEV version is also great. It gives the Prius the instantaneous shove of a pure EV at low speeds. At highway pace, you’ll have to wait for the gas engine to spin up for any passing power, but I never struggled for speed. Between the seamlessness of the powertrain and the perfect blending of the brake pedal, any hybrid weirdness has been ironed out. The Prius PHEV feels like a normal, but fast, daily driver. 

It’s also plenty practical. The PHEV version sacrifices some cargo space—20.3 cubic feet of cargo with all seats in place, as compared to 23.8 cubes for the standard model—but with the hatch-back design and folding rear seats, this thing can easily swallow bikes, coolers, surf boards or other long and wide cargo. Just don’t get your hopes up about hauling tall objects: The pinched roof makes this a bit tighter than a crossover. 

What Isn’t?

There’s little wrong with the Prius. I happen to hate the clutter of buttons on the steering wheel, and in general I think the ergonomics are weird. Make sure you sit in one and play around with the controls before committing. Similarly, the awkward shape of the dash and the bizarre angles of the thing make it hard to find a driving position that offers the right mix of reachability, visibility and comfort.  

Speaking of visibility, the Prius follows Toyota’s infuriating trend of fitting driver-monitoring systems that are engaged even when you aren’t using driver-assistance features like lane-centering. If the steering wheel-mounted sensor can’t see your face—even while cruising around your neighborhood—it’s going to constantly tell you that the sensor is blocked.

I also found most of the driver-assistance tech in the Prius to be a step behind the industry leaders. The Prius also comes with Toyota’s “proactive driving assist,” which will use the car’s sensors to automatically adapt the car’s behavior to the driving situation. If you see a curve coming up or you’re bearing down on another car and let off the gas, for instance, the car will slow down more aggressively than if there’s no one ahead of you.

This is the personal opinion of Mack Hogan, who is not a lawyer: This feature should be illegal. 

Cramming 10 largely flat buttons onto the right half of the steering wheel is an ergonomic disaster.

Photo by: Mack Hogan/InsideEVs

In general, while what the car does when you lift off can be adjustable, it absolutely must be predictable. I can switch my car between one-pedal and normal driving modes, but it’s a choice I make knowing how the car will behave in all situations. With PDA enabled, however, when I let off the throttle, the car decides based on what I’m seeing. That means a bit of uncertainty at the best, and a safety concern at worst if the car behaves in a way you can’t predict. It’s doubly bad because, anecdotally, many consumers are not aware of the active safety features fitted to their cars. Because PDA is so esoteric, I could see an oblivious driver having it on for years and just not knowing why the car occasionally slows aggressively on lift-off.

Luckily this system—and most of them—can be disabled. So it’s absolutely not a dealbreaker, but something I think Toyota needs to work on.

Why I’d Still Buy The Regular Prius

The Prius may not have many flaws, but I still didn’t like it as much as I expected to. That’s for a simple reason: The last Prius I drove was a standard model. I expected the bigger battery and extra oomph to make everything better. But in reality, I think it spoils my favorite thing about the Prius: It’s seamless. 

The uphill battle of this gig is that I’m always speaking to buyers who frankly don’t want to hear it. The average American consumer probably couldn’t tell you what kind of engine is in their car—”a vee-four” doesn’t count. Almost nobody has a route-planning app on their phone, or wants to learn how to use one. Trying to coach them through living with an EV can be exhausting; most people just want to get in and drive to their destination without a second thought. They’ve never done it in an EV, and that scares them.

The Prius is the antidote. You buy one at the dealership, you use it like a regular car, your running costs are half what they used to be, and it lasts even longer. That’s the mission. The standard Prius fulfills it without further work from you.

The PHEV promises more, meanwhile, but also asks for more. It costs $5,000 more to start and, when the tax credit disappears at the end of the month, even lessees will be paying more. It gives up 3 cubic feet of cargo and hauls an extra 364 pounds around. It is not available with all-wheel drive, either, while the standard Prius is. It gets “just” 52 mpg combined, rather than 57 mpg on the regular one. 

Most importantly, the PHEV gives you more to manage. There are buttons that allow you to use up all of the electrons immediately, or to hold the charge for later. There’s a gas cap and a charging port. There’s another battery indicator to keep an eye on, another charger to carry, another gadget to plug in at the end of the day.

For what? More efficiency, of course. That is a noble goal. But the Prius is already getting nearly 60 mpg. It’s so good it’s silly. Commuting on electric power alone would be cheaper, but you’d have to do quite a complicated calculation to find out how quickly you’d make up the $5,000 difference. Remember to factor in that you’re getting worse MPG when the battery is dead.

You may come out ahead. But even if you do, you’ll run smack into the classic PHEV issue. If you have a cheap place to charge at home, and you’re willing to plug in every night, why wouldn’t you get an EV? You’d have to charge less often with the bigger battery, and you won’t have all of the compromises and maintenance that come with an internal-combustion vehicle. I just don’t think PHEVs are the right solution for most people. 

Conclusion

I know, I know, I can hear you shouting “road trips” at your screen. PHEV proponents argue they are the best of both worlds, giving you emissions-free commuting and planning-free road trips.

This idea is based on two misconceptions: One, that EVs cannot handle road trips, and two, that road trips are an integral part of all of our daily lives. Let’s tackle the second first: If you are seriously debating the merits of a PHEV vs an EV, ask yourself honestly how many times in the last 24 months you have driven over 500 miles. If you’re not doing it more than four or five times a year, you have nothing to worry about. An EV may cost you an hour of time once a year, but it will save you a hundred visits to the gas station in day-to-day life.

That puts the Prius PHEV in a weird place for me. I think it is the best PHEV you can buy, and it’s the only one I’d seriously consider. Yet fundamentally, it has the same problem: Those with home or work charging are better served by EVs, and those without charging at home or work should probably stick with a conventional hybrid.

PHEVs are for the awkward folks in the middle, those who have home or work charging, but who still road trip so frequently that they can’t make an EV work right now. To those people, I say go right ahead, snag yourself a Prius PHEV. It’ll be the best and probably last gas car you’ll ever buy.

Contact the author: Mack.Hogan@insideevs.com. 

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With a name like the Charger Daytona, you’d think that Dodge’s first-ever electric muscle car would be a champ at the charging station. That was not our experience. 

When we tested Dodge’s inaugural electric vehicle this spring, we fast-charged it twice at two different Electrify America stations in the Northeast. Both sessions went sideways in peculiar ways, and we never saw even close to the Charger Daytona’s claimed 20%-80% charge time of 24 minutes. 

That’s part of why, in his Charger Daytona review, InsideEVs Editor-in-Chief Patrick George called it a “great muscle car” and “a weird EV.” Let’s dig into exactly what happened. And to see the Charger in action, check out our charging test above. 

Our first test, at a 350-kilowatt station with plenty of power to meet the Charger Daytona’s 210-kW rating, started off fine. Video chief Mike Roselli arrived with a 15% state of charge. At 40%, the session was cruising along at around 150 kW. Suddenly, the charge rate plummeted to 2 kW, before rising back up to 150. At around 50% battery, the power output fell to a measly 73 kW, trending downward as it reached 80%. The whole session took 47 minutes. 

The final result was so far off of Dodge’s claimed charging time that we had to run the test back on a different day at a different location. 

Once again, the power rate started off strong, exceeding 200 kW at times, but whipsawed to 2 kW multiple times early on. This made for one of the strangest charging curves we’ve ever seen. The charging session cut out entirely at 36% (which may very well have been the charger’s fault). Once we resumed, the power rocketed up to a healthy 180 kW, but soon dropped to 40 kW, where it remained for the rest of the session.

This time, predictably, 20%-80% took well over an hour. 

When we asked Dodge about this, a spokesperson said the charger itself is usually to blame for the slow speeds, and that “the charge speed experience is not due to limitations on the vehicle side.”

He can’t speak to how widespread this issue is. However, according to YouTube videos, other Charger Daytona drivers have experienced similar issues across EVgo and Tesla Supercharger stations as well. Hopefully this can be solved with a software update. 

Do you own a Dodge Charger Daytona? What’s your experience been like overall, and with charging in particular? Let us know in the comments below or shoot me an email.

Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com

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This phenomenon has kind of tapered off in recent months, but for a while there, I couldn’t go a single week without getting about a bunch of emails from Tesla owners seeking advice on how to dump their vehicles.

The issue wasn’t even with the cars themselves. Most Tesla owners I spoke to really love their electric vehicles. The problem, you see, was the man up top: CEO Elon Musk. His various antics had Tesla owners everywhere scrambling to move to something electric from a different, and less controversial, brand. And most of those people were driving a Tesla Model Y, which makes sense, since it is the best-selling EV of all time.  

The good news for those people was that their choices for Tesla alternatives are now better than ever. There’s the Ford Mustang Mach-E, the Hyundai Ioniq 5, the Kia EV6, and the value-packed Chevrolet Equinox EV, just to name a few of the top of my head. 

Much to their consternation, however, there are still ways the Model Y runs circles around everything else. Yes, even now. And that’s especially true with the Model Y’s Juniper update—the car you see tested here in this video. 

Since Tesla does not do press loaners like other automakers do, I rented this Model Y off Turo for a week. It’s a Long Range, Dual-Motor All-Wheel-Drive model, the one packing a 75-kilowatt-hour battery and good for an EPA-rated 329 miles of range. And thanks to a raft of improvements inside and out, the Model Y is now a significantly better car than it’s ever been—one with a nicer interior, better technology, more overall comfort, more range, more striking looks, and packing the best adaptive high beams I have ever tested in my career. All that and a bag of chips for around $45,000, before any incentives or tax breaks, as long as those last.

As you’ll see in the video above, the Model Y remains the total package EV. Maybe it’s not the fastest-charging EV these days. Nor is it the fastest, period. And there are many areas where rivals are beginning to outpace it, if they have not already. But can you find all of those things rolled into one car that’s as good as this one, at this price point? The answer is not really.

You can say what you want about the guy up top, or the Tesla brand in general, or how it’s settled into a kind of Apple-like groove and doesn’t really seem to be innovating in terms of the EVs themselves, the way that it used to. But none of that changes the fact that the Tesla Model Y is an outstanding buy, and still quite possibly the best EV for most people. 

Check out our video review up top and let us know what you think in the comments. 

Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com

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• InsideEVs Editor-in-Chief Patrick George drives the electric Porsche Macan 4.
• The electric Macan is not mechanically related to the gas-burning car and is quite a bit more expensive.
• It’s not perfect, but it’s a great overall package that shows Porsche has learned a lot from building the Taycan.

You see a lot of Porsche Macans around the world, driven by people with expensive sunglasses and designer handbags. It is the cheapest way to enter the Porsche universe, and it blends excellent road manners with style and practicality, making it a global favorite.

But now that the combustion engine Macan is being phased out and replaced by a considerably more expensive pure electric model, does it have what it takes to maintain its popularity? Both flavors of Macan are still on sale today, and so far this year, and it’s the electric model that has proven more popular, even despite going electric (and potentially alienating part of its buyer pool) and hiking the price.

Even though the electric Macan is proving successful, Porsche isn’t taking any chances and has confirmed that it’s working on a new midsize combustion crossover. It will arrive in 2028, and it won’t be called Macan. 

While the Macan EV is more expensive than the ICE model, it’s also a better, more grown-up vehicle. The two are not mechanically related and the electric model rides on the VW Group’s Premium Platform Electric (PPE), which also underpins a couple of Audis. Thanks to this platform, it has a big 100-kilowatt-hour battery pack and offers big luxury car features such as rear-wheel steering.

This isn’t the first time we’ve tried the Macan, but now InsideEVs Editor-in-Chief Patrick George has spent more time with the car and had mostly positive things to say about it. His tester was a Macan 4 with a dual-motor powertrain providing 402 horsepower and 479 lb-ft of torque. That’s enough to send the Macan EV to 60 mph in 4.9 seconds and up to a top speed of 137 mph.

The Macan 4 has an EPA range rating of 308 miles, but that goes down to around if you get the larger RS spider-design 22-inch wheels like the ones on Patrick’s tester. Interestingly, when Out of Spec Reviews drove a Macan Turbo at 70 mph, it actually exceeded its 288-mile EPA claim by 2 miles on 22-inch wheels. Tom Moloughney got 343 miles in the base rear-wheel-drive Macan on 20-inch aero wheels, surpassing its 315-mile EPA range prediction by almost 10%.

With a starting price of $81,600, the all-wheel-drive Macan 4 is definitely expensive. Patrick’s tester had some options, so it cost $94,855, which is a lot for a Macan, no matter what powers it. Patrick missed one-pedal driving, which the Macan doesn’t really offer, and it could also do with a bit more drama when you’re going fast in one. But overall it works really well, it’s practical, it’s well built and it’s just a cohesive package. It really shows Porsche has gained experience making EVs, and in many areas, it feels like an improvement over the Taycan.

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Carmakers are now stuffing big batteries into their loudest and proudest performance flagships—the cars in their lineup that typically have the highest emissions—and it has created a crop of cars that are quite odd. They are absurdly quick in a straight line and can take you dozens of miles on electricity, but the heavy hybrids start to fall apart when you try to throw them into a corner like their non-electrified predecessors.

This became apparent after driving the new G99 BMW M5 Touring and then jumping into a Mercedes-AMG C63s E-Performance. One has a big V-8 complemented by a big battery that gives it dozens of miles of electric range, while the other has a small four-cylinder, with a smaller battery whose purpose is mainly to increase performance. Two very different approaches that at launch drew a lot of critcism from fans and keen drivers, but for different reasons.

The new BMW M5 feels even more gutsy than its claimed 717 horsepower output would suggest. It’s not surprising that one dyno test revealed that it was pushing almost 700 hp to the wheels, meaning the real output is probably closer to 800 hp. It pins you to your seat with its alarming pace, whether from a standing or a rolling start. There’s nothing quite like feeling the shove of a 4.4-liter twin-turbocharged V-8 engine with 737 pound-feet (1,000 Nm) of torque.

The M5’s powertrain is unequivocally brilliant. Part of that comes down to the fact that it’s also pretty great to drive without firing up the V-8. With 197 hp and 206 lb-ft (280 Nm) of torque, the electric motor, which lives inside the eight-speed automatic gearbox, is more than capable of moving the M5 on its own. Even in my hefty, 5,456-pound (2,475 kg) Touring Model, the M5 felt brisk in EV mode. 

I found myself enjoying driving the M5 most in EV mode, surprisingly. It pipes in a subtle, fun acceleration sound through the speakers. It also shifts up through the gears when the V-8 is off and you feel the shifts, although you can’t control them yourself in EV mode. The electric motor sends its power to all four wheels, meaning that even driving in EV mode in winter or low-grip conditions, you know you can rely on the all-wheel drive system’s reassuring extra traction. It’s a great around-town electric experience no matter the weather.

After driving the M5 Touring and putting a few hundred miles on it, I kind of wished I was driving the pure electric i5 Touring M60 instead, a thought I never expected. The new M5 is the first BMW M that I didn’t instantly covet after driving. Because it’s so heavy (heavier than the i5), BMW has had to tune the suspension to cope with the mass, and it results in a weirdly inconsistent ride quality. It can’t decide if it’s a Maybach or a pogo stick and you never know which of those extremes you’ll get.

Mid-corner bumps also unsettle the car, often alarmingly, and you feel the transfer of forces from one side to the other as you thread the car around a twisty road. All this mass makes the M5 feel like an athlete trying to run with ankle weights on. There’s an uncomfortable amount of inertia trying to pull the car straight into understeer when you drive it spiritedly.

Then I jumped into the still heavy but far more agile Mercedes-AMG C63 PHEV, and it really put the M5’s mass into perspective..

I know it’s one size class below the M5, so it’s not a direct and totally fair comparison, but I would honestly pick the C63. Yes, it only has four cylinders, which is half of what the BMW has, and a few dozen fewer horsepower. But it feels more special to drive. And while its engine may only be a 2.0-liter, it’s an actual AMG engine hand-assembled by someone who puts their name and signature on it.

The signed plaque is proudly displayed when you pop the hood, and you also get to see the big turbo and electric supercharger setup sitting to the side of the engine. This was a more impressive sight than what I saw when lifting the hood on the M5, whose clever hot-V twin-turbo setup is hidden by an underwhelming plastic engine cover.

The M139 engine is borrowed from the hottest versions of Mercedes-AMG’s compact offerings, like the CLA 45. It makes well over 400 horsepower on its own, and together with the electric motor, puts out 670 hp and 752 lb-ft (1,020 Nm) in the C63. That’s more torque than the BMW in a car that’s about 880 pounds (400 kg) lighter, and you can really feel it.

The force that acts on your body when you do a Race Start in the C63 is unlike anything I’ve ever felt in a combustion car. It definitely feels faster than the BMW, even though on paper, they are fairly evenly matched. Just like the BMW, the Mercedes feels quicker than the numbers suggest, but by an even greater margin. It’s shockingly quick off the line, thanks to all that torque and its all-wheel drive that does a fantastic job of putting the power to the ground.

There’s also an electric supercharger working to build boost quickly and minimize lag. The powertrain is really responsive, and the surge you feel from the combined torque of the electric motor and gas mill is really something. It doesn’t sound as bad as some have said, even if you disable the piped-in enhanced engine sound. You still hear the exhaust, which is characterful, and you get to hear the turbo build pressure and release it, which, for me, added to the fun.

It’s also much more enjoyable through the corners than the M5. It doesn’t feel like the C63s of old, which were always all too eager to turn their rear tires into shreds and smoke. The new model feels like a track car, focused on delivering the best possible corner exit with minimal drama.

Sure, the C-Class on which the C63 is based is smaller and lighter than the G61 5 Series Touring that serves as the basis for the M5. However, there isn’t an E63 that we can compare it to (yet), and the E53 plug-in hybrid that I have driven is not in the same performance league as the M5 and C63, even though its widebody treatment suggests it would be.

Mercedes could have ended up with a PHEV that was nearly as heavy as the Bimmer, but it intentionally designed a lighter system. Unlike the M5 and E53, which have a similar battery and motor configuration as lesser PHEV versions of each model, the C63 gets a smaller, bespoke setup. Its electric motor isn’t located in the gearbox but integrated into the rear axle, and its main purpose isn’t to drive the car around in EV mode (even though it can do that for around 5 miles). It’s there simply to boost performance, which it does in spades.

Mercedes’ real genius move with the C63 was giving it a smaller battery. While the M5 has a 22.1-kilowatt-hour battery, which is largely to blame for its heft, the C63’s battery only has a capacity of 6.1 kWh. That’s small by PHEV standards, but it does the job, and that job is mostly regulatory—it needs to do well in lab testing to please the European Union’s increasingly stringent emissions standards.

The heavier, more powerful of the two, the BMW, gets a WLTP efficiency rating of between 1.6 and 1.7 liters/100 km, or almost 150 mpg. However, that’s only if you keep the battery topped up, which many PHEV drivers don’t, which is why the M5’s EPA combined rating of 13 mpg (18 l/100 km) is much closer to what it actually returns in normal driving.

The C63 doesn’t get a comparable efficiency rating in Europe, with a claimed average of 6.9 l/100 km or 34 mpg. You will have to be extremely gentle with the throttle to come anywhere near that, but it is achievable, even with a drained battery. Driving it like I did the BMW to enjoy the car rather than save fuel, it ended up returning around 15 mpg, which is still excellent given the ludicrous acceleration that it can provide. The EPA rates the C63 at 20 mpg with a depleted battery, which is definitely achievable without trying to drive especially efficiently.

Look, we’re InsideEVs—we love electrons. But in performance cars, more battery isn’t always the way to go. The people who buy these cars can afford to fuel them up, and the advertised and often unrealistic efficiency numbers are not a key selling point for someone looking for a C63 or an M5. Plus, performance cars are a tiny subset of overall vehicle sales, accounting for a tiny fraction of overall emissions. We can electrify mass-market cars today, which would pay far greater dividends. But as the M5 proves, if you want the best possible driving experience, a giant battery can get in the way.

Even though Mercedes is accused of doing it wrong, I think it has the right approach to making a performance PHEV. The C63 is a better driver’s car than the M5, which is just too heavy to be fun. The C63 is still heavier than it would have been had Mercedes stuck to a V-8 without electrification, but for a PHEV, it’s still an excellent and exciting driving experience. It feels more special than the M5, even with half the cylinders.

There should be a clear distinction between electrified cars designed for efficiency and those where electrification is meant to enhance performance. Some great performance PHEVs include the second-generation Acura NSX, the Corvette E-Ray, the Ferrari 296 GTB or the new Lamborghini Temerario. Sure, electrification does enhance efficiency to a degree in any application, but making a PHEV too heavy by giving it too big a battery can make it less efficient than the same car powered solely by combustion.

What Mercedes-AMG did with the C63 PHEV is closer to Ferrari’s plug-in hybrids, where efficiency is never the key point of focus. The battery doesn’t have to be huge, and in cars like the Ferrari SF90 and 296 GTB, it’s under 8 kWh, which doesn’t overburden the chassis and keeps these cars’ handling pure. Getting a few miles of electric driving is a bonus, but the main point of the electrification remains performance.

The only catch is that if the battery runs low, the engine turns into a hamster wheel, sapping power to make electricity to replenish the pack. Unless you’re doing several laps of the Nurburgring, that likely won’t matter. I drove the C63 quite hard around a twisty road for over half an hour, and it still showed around 33% battery remaining. Maybe if you take it on a track where you keep the throttle pinned for longer, you will feel the performance loss, but in my experience, there was none.

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The way it looks is reason enough to buy the Renault 5 E-Tech. It looks like the result of tossing several classic Renault hatchbacks into a blender with some sci-fi gravy. It somehow ends up being a really tasty combo, but what clinched it for me was that it drives with enough poise and gusto to challenge a Mini Cooper E.

It strikes a better balance between sporty handling and comfort than the new Chinese-built Mini J01, which feels too stiff in comparison. Like the Mini, the R5 has a multilink independent rear suspension setup, which you rarely see in this segment of the market, making it feel surprisingly sophisticated as it glides over road imperfections. Oh, how very French of it.

This is one of the few electric cars that should come close to matching its WLTP range thanks to its consistently impressive efficiency, even when you’re not trying to save electrons. It’s nice to look at, pleasant to travel in, and the user experience is especially impressive.

It’s not perfect, though, since the version you want, with the more powerful motor and bigger battery, is not cheap, and there’s no room for a rear passenger sitting behind taller drivers. But if you accept that it’s pitched as a somewhat premium product (hence the price) and keep the hauling of big groups to a minimum, it all starts to make sense.

Tron Meets Baguette

Few cars blend retro design cues into a fresh, cohesive and modern look quite like the Renault 5. It’s like something you would see in a sci-fi movie with its holographic-looking, squared-off daytime running lights and matching squares in the headlight glass.

One of my favorite details is the 5 on the left side of the hood, which mimics the placement of an actual vent in the classic Renault 5, which was sold as the LeCar in the United States. The 5 even lights up in higher-spec versions like my tester, where it also acts as a battery meter to tell you the state of charge from a distance.

It also plays a cool animation when the car unlocks, and it makes you feel pretty special. It may seem trivial, but the light-up 5 is a must-have option for this car. I also really like the design of the rear lights, which, just like in the classic 5, run up the C-pillar. They have a cool 3D effect and built-in fake vents, which are meant to resemble the ones on the mid-engined Renault 5 Turbo rally homologation special. The Turbo is coming back with electric power, featuring in-wheel electric motors.

There are plenty of cool details all around the vehicle, and they all blend really well with the overall design. Nothing feels forced or like an afterthought on this.

Wheel design isn’t something I normally feel the need to mention in a review, but I have to because all the available options for the Renault 5 are fantastic. Even the base model’s hubcaps have aesthetic appeal, likely also helped by the fact that all wheel choices are quite big for a car this size at 18 inches—even the steelies.

An ‘80s Arcade Machine That You Can Sit In

The interior perfectly matches the exterior for style, with the same kind of retro-futuristic approach. This is the first car I’ve been in recently where thick bezels around the displays look like a smart design choice and not the result of the manufacturer installing screens smaller than they should be and trying to make them look big.

The top of the gear selector is translucent and has the Renault logo inside, which looks really fancy. Putting it in gear and using any of the stalks, I was impressed by how solid, damped and expensive they felt. The steering wheel looks great and is fantastic to hold on to. It’s probably one of my favorite helms in a modern car.

The seats also deserve a mention. They’re trimmed in something that feels like denim with a mustard yellow color that seems ripped out of a 1970s design magazine. The chairs themselves are soft, supportive and utterly French in the best possible way. They look fantastic and appear modeled after the Turbo 2 seats.

This is also the first modern car where thick bezels around the screens didn’t make it look cheap. Quite the opposite, actually. The driver gets a 10.1-inch display behind the steering wheel, while there’s another 10-inch screen in the middle handling infotainment. It’s among the best I’ve ever used in a car. We’ll get to that shortly.

The user experience inside the R5 is also really good, thanks to a brand-new infotainment operating system built around Android Automotive. I’ve met actual people less responsive than its artificial intelligence-powered digital assistants. Chatting to the bot is surprisingly natural, making asking it questions a lot less awkward than in other cars.

As much as I loved the R5’s interior, it’s not quite perfect. While I praised the overall build quality, there were a couple of spots where the plastic panels didn’t join together perfectly, and the ergonomics are a bit odd, too. To the right of the steering wheel, you have three stalks. One handles the transmission, another the wipers and that’s just too much to remember the position of on one side of the wheel.

There’s also no ‘Park’ position for the transmission, so when you want to stop, you put the car in neutral and then extend your arm all the way to the nether reaches of the dashboard to pull the parking brake button. Then again, a French car without a little weirdness would be an incomplete product.

But another issue I have with the R5 is the shameful lack of rear legroom. With the driver’s seat set for a six-footer like myself, there is no room for a full-size adult to sit behind the driver. There’s just no space for their feet, which makes the car more of a 3+1 rather than a true four-seater. This doesn’t make me like it less, since it’s about the same as a Mini J01, but it could have been a bit better. Maybe Renault could have sacrificed some trunk space for a bit of extra rear leg and foot room.

Corners Like It Means It, But Softly

Photo by: Andrei Nedelea

What really won me over is how it drives. The steering is sharp without being twitchy, and when you tip it into a corner, it weights up nicely and gives you a lot of confidence. That may seem secondary for a car that will spend most of its time sitting bumper-to-bumper in a crowded city. But it is this responsiveness that made me (and many others) like old Renault Clios, so I was very happy to see this character transferred to the new EV.

The well-judged suspension also deserves a mention. It’s a bit softer than in the Mini J01, but it’s all the better for it, since it has a smoother ride over uneven roads. The multilink rear suspension really helps when going over big imperfections or over the wildly inconsistent tram tracks that we have here in Bucharest. Almost no subcompact cars these days have independent rear suspension—it’s kind of a premium feature—making it clear what Renault is aiming for with the R5.

Taking it out on some more windy country roads, the R5 never felt flustered. Carry a bit too much speed into a corner, lift off just before hitting the apex and you feel it rotating around you, like a proper hot hatch should. This isn’t just competent. It’s fun, and I can’t say that about too many EVs in its price, power and size bracket.

My tester had the beefier motor. It delivers 148 horsepower and 180 pound-feet (245 Nm) of torque to the front wheels, allowing for a respectable time to 62 mph (100 km/h) of 8 seconds. It’s not as punchy as the Mini Cooper SE that I keep comparing it to, but it’s zippy enough, and flooring it out of a roundabout chirps the tires before the nannies rein in the excess power.

There is no acceleration sound coming through the speakers in the R5. Just silent thrust. In this regard, it’s like a Tesla and not like other electric (hot) hatchbacks. The Abarth 500e comes to mind, which tries to imitate a turbocharged four-cylinder both inside and out. After experiencing the Mercedes-AMG C590 prototype with its expertly done pretend V-8, I’m a bit partial to having an acceleration sound in an EV, but I also don’t mind its absence.

Plug In, Make Tea

With the larger 52-kilowatt-hour “Comfort Range” battery, my tester is officially rated at up to 256 miles (412 kilometers) on one charge. When I picked the car up from Renault Romania, it was fully charged and had a maximum range estimate of 246 miles (396 km) with an average electricity consumption of 4.28 miles/kWh (14.5 kWh/100 km), which almost matched its WLTP efficiency claim.

This was over several hundred miles from the journalist who drove the car before me, with a lighter right foot and more restraint than I could practice. I drove the car mostly in Sport mode for the first few days and really enjoyed what acceleration it had to offer, and my average consumption was 3.86 miles/kWh (16.1 kWh/100 km).

My theory about the best way to test electric cars is not to try to hypermile the thing to get it to come close to its manufacturer-claimed numbers. I drive these cars like I would any car, not treating EVs differently because they are electric, and in some cases, this produces some alarmingly high consumption figures and drastically reduced range. But in the R5, the average was still reasonable, even in spite of my carefree driving style.

Over the last couple of days with the car, I stopped treating it like a hot hatch, and the efficiency immediately started improving. By the time I returned the car, it had gone down to 4.09 miles/kWh (15.2 kWh/100 km), and this included the first two days of more brisk driving; I didn’t reset it specifically because I wanted to see how it all evened out.

I only charged the R5 briefly, with around 68% in the battery, preconditioning on the way to the charger. Juicing up to 80% from a 150 kW charger, I never saw more than 65 kW going into the car, even though it can take up to 100 kW. Its peak charging power isn’t great, with a claimed 15 to 80% in 30 minutes, but its battery is just about small enough that it’s not bothersome. Using its 7 kW onboard charger takes over six hours to fully replenish the battery from flat.

Thanks to its vehicle-to-load (V2L) function, the R5 can supply any device with up to 3.7 kW of power through a special adapter that snaps into the charging port and allows you to connect anything via a household-type socket. The adapter costs an extra $231 (€200), but it’s well worth getting.

I’d Buy One. Seriously

With its blend of tasteful retro style masterfully executed by Renault, impressive driving dynamics and great range from its relatively small battery, the R5 E-Tech is easily one of the best subcompact EVs you can buy today in Europe. With a starting price of $29,100 (€24,900), which goes up to just over $40,900 (€35,000) for a fully specced Iconiq Cinq example with the big battery.

It’s not perfect. It’s small, a bit pricey and its charging power is only so-so. The fact that you can’t carry an adult behind a tall driver is a big downside. But you know what? It looks fantastic and drives great, and it’s close to the top of the shortlist of EVs I’d seriously consider buying today.

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The BMW iX may be one of the ugliest cars on sale, but underneath that ugly wrapper lies quite a lovely electric car. The beaver-toothed front end and tragic proportions are hiding an interior that’s almost architectural in its ambiance, paired with a driving experience that’s sharper than some sports-oriented models from other brands. It’s a range king, too—a treat in the electric car space. 

Similarly, the Mini Countryman SE has taken a lot of flak for what some people say represents everything wrong with the Mini brand. To some folks, this car is too big, too ugly, and its circular infotainment screen is way too complicated compared to the simplistic aura that classic Mini cars had. Or heck, even the early BMW-era Minis. Are they right?

I don’t know. I’m not going to pretend to be the ambassador for Mini enthusiasts and purists. But I do know that a week with the Countryman SE revealed a charming electric vehicle, even if it’s not exactly pitch-perfect in its execution.

Believe it or not, the Mini Countryman is now in its third generation. Initially started back in 2011, this biggie-mini crossover was designed to court the number of buyers who liked the Mini Cooper hatchback, but wanted a little more space and a second set of doors. I suppose the ill-fated Clubman was also designed to satiate that desire, but its hearse-style rear doors and crew-cab door on the passenger side meant it was a five-door in the most maliciously compliant way. Mini drivers wanted a “five door” in the traditional sense, with four normal, forward-hinged doors, and a hatchback. 

Some point after that, and possibly even in response, the slightly-bigger-than-Mini Countryman was born. It was an immediate sales success. Several generations later, and a healthy amount of middle-aged model bloat, the Honda Fit-sized Countryman has turned into a small crossover that’s a stone’s throw from a Toyota RAV4. Victory, it seems, has defeated the Countryman.

But while the third-generation Countryman is bigger than ever, its platform feels designed to right some of those wrongs. Underneath, the Countryman is an electrified version of its gas-powered sibling and closely related to the BMW X1. The Countryman SE’s direct electric analog is the BMW iX1, an electric version of the X1 that we don’t get here. 

In Mini’s modern lineup, it’s the only four-door EV available with the Mini badge. The smaller Aceman five-door is missing in action for the U.S. market. 

Power for the Countryman SE comes from two electric motors that have a combined output of 308 horsepower and 364 ft-lbs of torque. This is fed by a 64.6 kWh battery good for 212 miles of range, mounted underneath the car’s roughly 4,400-pound body. Oh, and dual-motor is the only way to fly; no front-wheel-drive-only models here. 

A lot of people don’t like the way the Mini Countryman SE looks inside or out.

I am not one of those people. I think it’s a swell-looking car, but I will admit that it’s a design that looks far better in person. This is the biggest Countryman yet, but I think the Mini designers were good at both making the familiar Mini silhouette feel fresh, while disguising the car’s physical girth. 

Like other modern BMW Group cars, photos don’t really do it justice; the Mini’s sides look kind of blank and understyled, with not much brightwork or surfacing aside from the chunky, squared-off wheel arches. Yet, in person, the Countryman SE’s side surfacing is deceptively complex, with interesting surface interactions. I fell in love with the Countryman’s dead-on rear view, the beefy trunklid, and Union Jack taillights feel like such a techno-futurist elevation of what we’ve already seen on modern Minis. Add in the bronze roof and wheels, and it’s such a good way to make an old theme feel new and modern. I like it a lot more than other second-gen retro designs, like the Fiat 500e. 

The interior is arguably the best part of the Countryman SE.

Similar to the exterior, the interior is deceptively fresh. At first glance, the Mini’s interior looks like little more than a makeup compact-shaped screen mounted on a plastic panel. In reality, the car’s interior is so much more complicated. The shapes are simple – this feels like a more earnest reinterpretation of the very basic dashboards of the original Morris Mini Cooper. 

Yet, all of the surfaces look so much more interesting in person. All of the bright work in my tester was bronze, matched to the bronze roof and wheels. The blue fabric on the dashboard and upper levels of the doors turns orange/bronze as it moves toward the rear of the car. Add in the really nice leather seats, and the interior is so charming that you’ll forget that there aren’t very many soft-touch plastics at all. The only soft part of the interior is the seats and armrests.

Oh, and I liked the circular-shaped screen and its software, but we’ll get into that in a more focused review of the software. 

Fundamentally, the Countryman SE is a converted gas car with some batteries shoved under the floorboard. 

On its face, the Countryman SE’s numbers are very average. It’s heavy, kind of tall, and its power numbers aren’t as staggering as cars like the Volvo EX30 twin motor, which has more than 100 more horsepower than this Mini. Yet, this still manages to be a fun-to-drive crossover. Especially when you don’t have a Mini purist all up in your ear, complaining about how the Countryman SE is the antithesis of any Mini product.

I guess to be fair to those folks, they are a little right. I’ve driven plenty of Mini Coopers in my day, and the low-to-the-ground, slightly raw feeling is part of their appeal. The Countryman SE instead feels tall and very refined behind the wheel, not at all like the old Mini hatchbacks of yore. Dare I say it, the Countryman SE’s suspension tuning is sophisticated and feels expensive, the ride is the opposite of rough, and it feels a premium car, not a toy. For some, they’d hate it.

I am not one of those folks. Yes, the Countryman SE feels a little tall and bulkier than I’d like, and yes, I wish the suspension were a tad firmer, but the car makes up for it by being relatively engaging to drive. The steering ratio is fairly quick, and there’s a bit of feel for the type of vehicle that it is. The car corners flat and grips hard, whereas other cars with similar characteristics would not feel anywhere near as engaging. I mean, drive an Equinox EV, then hop behind the wheel of this thing.

The Countryman SE is also a quick car. Stick it in Go-Kart mode, depress the throttle to the floor, and the Mini will do its best impression of a rocket ship – it’s one of the first EVs I’ve ever driven that genuinely felt as if Mini had underrated its specifications. Mini says it’ll hit 60 in 5.4 seconds, but Car and Driver said its Countryman SE scooted to 60 mph in a mere 4.8 seconds. That’s pretty damn quick.

The Mini Countryman SE’s range and charging abilities seem to be, on paper, kind of mediocre. The car is only rated for 212 miles of range, but it’ll zip from 10-80% on a DC fast charger in 29 minutes, with a maximum speed of 130 kW. 

These numbers would have been cutting-edge in 2018. But, to be fair to Mini, the Countryman SE actually did all of those things. Our DC fast charging test hit the 29-minute mark right on the money, while a mixed-use road trip had me on track to achieve about 190 miles of range. For some, this may not be enough miles, but for my use case, the Mini was just fine. Over the week, I averaged 3.2 miles per kWh, which is merely okay. 

Frustratingly, the Mini has DC fast charging preconditioning, but it’s not intuitive to use. It can activate automatically when navigating to a DC fast charger, but I often don’t use navigation in everyday driving. There is a button to turn on the preconditioning manually, but more often than not, it was greyed out with no explanation. 

The Mini fans may have a point. On some level, the Countryman’s oversized dimensions and weird styling may not be everyone’s cup of tea. I get it, I remember being somewhat disappointed driving the new Fiat 500e compared to my old Fiat 500 Abarth.

However, I don’t think every car needs to be a direct 1-to-1 version of something old. Perhaps it’s time to reinterpret the past into something new—and take that something new, for what it is. With that in mind, the Mini Countryman SE has a lot of things to like about it. It’s sharp to drive without losing its premium edge, it is spacious for being a compact crossover, and in the grand scheme of things, it’s not even that expensive. True, the range and charging specifications are mediocre, but I think it’ll still work for most people.

I don’t even mind the price—my example stickered for $51,145. All Countryman SEs effectively come in one trim, with only a handful of option packs that can be optioned. My example came with the Iconic package ($3,200) and the Comfort Max package ($900), which added goodies like a Harmon & Kardon sound system, power front seats, and Mini’s Active Driving Assistant Pro. For comparison’s sake, this is cheaper than an AWD Cadillac Optiq. Although the Optiq qualifies for the federal $7,500 tax credit on full purchases. For now.

I just liked driving the Mini. Sometimes when I’m behind the wheel of these press cars, it can feel like a slog, like I am forcing myself to drive a car I don’t really like. Whereas with the Mini, I found myself making up reasons to drive the thing. I didn’t want to give it back. Because I liked it.

I think the world would be a better place if we drove cars we liked.

Contact the author: kevin.williams@insideevs.com

America’s love affair with big three-row SUVs is nothing new. What’s less appreciated is how well electrification fits that formula. Ditch the traditional engine, transmission tunnel, or driveshaft, and space can be used for what you really want—for your family, your pet and every piece of luggage they might insist on bringing.

The Hyundai Ioniq 9 leans hard into that advantage. Built on Hyundai’s Electric-Global Modular Platform (E-GMP), its flat floor and six- or seven-seat layouts make it a proper lounge on wheels. The numbers back it up, too: Its 123.2-inch wheelbase is longer than the current-gen gas Palisade (114.2 inches) and even longer than the Cadillac Escalade (121.0 inches).

Roadtripping in it is absurdly easy. It gets access to the Tesla Supercharger network, the country’s largest and most reliable charging system. Add in a smooth, quiet ride, Bose surround audio and a cavernous interior festooned with tech and you’ve got an EV that feels purposely built to keep you happy and comfortable on most roads.

So, if anyone is still telling you that gas SUVs are better roadtrippers for your family, you’re being lied to. The Ioniq 9 is here and it makes that case better than few other cars out there. We’ve already done a full review—which you can read here—but to learn more about its long-distance strengths, continue reading.

[Full Disclosure: Hyundai loaned me an Ioniq 9 for one week in Brooklyn. It arrived fully charged, and I returned it likewise.]

As a bachelor living in New York City, I didn’t exactly put the Ioniq 9 through a family or soccer mom test. But I did the next best thing: I took three of my friends and drove upstate New York. I’ve never seen them as relaxed or as excited in any other press car I’ve brought home.

These are powertrain-agnostic, non-car people who care about one thing: getting from point A to point B. Yet a few things had them grinning the entire trip: the buttery ride quality, the plush second-row captain’s chairs, the smooth electric powertrain and the Bose speakers turning the cabin into a concert hall on wheels.

The creature comforts are truly great, but they don’t mean much if the EV underneath isn’t sorted. Luckily, the Ioniq 9 nails the basics. So, let’s start with those first.

Range And Charging

The Ioniq 9 gets two things very right: range and charging speeds.

About 200 miles into my drive to upstate New York, I wasn’t even worried about plugging in. Interstate 87 has a decent frequency of Tesla Superchargers and the Ioniq 9 is equipped with a factory-fitted North American Charging Standard (NACS) port, opening up access to 20,000+ Superchargers nationwide. 

Under the skin, the Ioniq 9 shares its platform with its corporate cousin, the Kia EV9. But Hyundai has given it a bigger 110-kilowatt-hour battery, compared to Kia’s 99.8 kWh pack. That extra capacity translates into 300 miles of EPA-rated range on every trim—the base S stretches to 335 miles, the SE and SEL hit 320 miles, while the Limited (my test car) and Calligraphy are rated at 311 miles.

Its 800-volt architecture helps it charge from 10% to 80% in about 24 minutes on a 350-kilowatt DC fast charger—that’s plenty quick given the SUV’s large 110 kWh battery pack. Most new public fast-charging stations can deliver that much power, including Electrify America, EVGo, ChargePoint Express Plus and even Ionna.

During my week-long testing, I stuck to Tesla Superchargers simply because they were easier to find and use with the Tesla app.

While the majority of Superchargers are still capped at 250 kW, the new V4 units can hit 325 kW. The Ioniq 9 went from 30% to 80% in 25 minutes using one of these stalls. The charging speed was slower than what I expected, topping out at 126 kW, but it held that speed even past 70% percent before tapering near 80%—which is a pretty flat charging curve that helps you save time.

Utility Mode Rocks

Hyundai’s newer EVs come with Utility Mode that taps the main high-voltage battery to run the infotainment, climate control, cabin lights, or even external appliances. The feature isn’t unique to Hyundai—Tesla and Rivian have been offering it for years, but it’s a great thing that more cars are coming with it as standard.

Turning it on from the infotainment screen shuts the drive unit down while everything else keeps humming—which is useful if you’re parked for hours or camping. In gas cars, if you kill the engine, you’re stuck with the small 12-volt battery, which will drain fast and might even die.

Dropping the second and third rows opens up 86.9 cubic feet of space, more than enough to toss in an air mattress or a surfboard (or both). Drive it to a campsite and you’ve got a panoramic roof for stargazing.

I used it for something far less romantic: I used it as my office for half a day during a 98-degree Fahrenheit heatwave (felt like 104°F with humidity). It sipped just 2% of the battery during that time—the Ioniq 9’s 110 kWh battery is larger than average packs.

It also gets vehicle-to-load (V2L) capability, with a built-in 15 amp, 125 volt outlet in the trunk plus a 12 volt socket. That means you can power a coffee machine, induction stove, or whatever gear you throw in the back—all using battery power.

About Those Seats

The seats give the Ioniq 9 a lot of personality. The S, SE, and SEL trims come with a second-row bench, giving the Ioniq 9 a seven-seat layout. Step up to the Limited or Calligraphy trims and you get captain’s chairs. If you’re not regularly hauling more than six people, they’re absolutely worth it.

The sweet spot is the right-side captain’s chair behind the front passenger seat. With a set of buttons on the front seat backrest, you can slide that seat fully forward, opening up limo-like space in the second row. The captain’s chairs are kitted out with armrests, powered leg rests, and heated and ventilated cushions. They also get almost pillow-like headrests with side support. 

Up front, both seats offer eight-way power adjustment with lumbar support, which goes a long way toward keeping posture in check on longer drives. And if you slide the second row just a touch, the third row opens up into legitimately usable space.

It doesn’t feel cramped, and Hyundai didn’t skimp on the details back there either: dedicated AC vents, powered recline, bottle holders, dome lights and dual 100-watt USB-C ports.

Because it has a flat floor and nothing obstructing lateral movement, moving around in the second and third rows is easy, especially if you’re petite like me.

Small Details Make Big A Difference

In big cars, the little things matter the most. I’m not convinced every automaker gets that.

The Volkswagen ID. Buzz, for all its charm as a people-mover, skips bottle holders for the second row. Owners can buy a second-row center console, but it’s more of a general storage rack than a true cupholder setup. The Ioniq 9 gets 11 bottle holders: four in the first row, four in the second row and three in the third row.

It also gets a highly modular center console which slides all the way forward, or halfway back—about 7.5 inches—extending the access to both first and second-row passengers. Because there is no transmission tunnel running through the middle of the car, Hyundai has used that space smartly.

The console has a wide armrest that can open from both ends, has generous storage capacity, two large bottle holders, a wireless charging pad and climate settings for the second and third row passengers. That’s a lot of functionality packed into a small, movable unit.

Plush Ride Quality

Despite weighing 6,000 pounds, the Ioniq 9 is surprisingly effortless to drive. Light steering, large side mirrors and a 360-degree camera make threading it through narrow streets far less intimidating than its size suggests.

The ride quality is where it really shines. The suspension absorbs road imperfections with poise, eagerly swallowing everything from small bumps to big potholes. There’s some inevitable lateral movement with an SUV this large. It dives a bit under braking and squats on acceleration, but none of that makes you feel unsettled. The dampers do a commendable job of keeping it all under control.

Hyundai credits that composure to self-leveling dampers and hydro bushings. The self-leveling dampers maintain the correct ride height regardless of the load, while the hydro bushings absorb vibrations more effectively than solid rubber. They’re basically fluid-filled mounts between the suspension and chassis.

Together, they give the Ioniq 9 an almost luxury-car-like ride, making smaller imperfections far less bothersome.

And Hyundai has gone to great lengths to keep the outside world, well, outside. The Ioniq 9 rides on 21-inch Hankook Ion Evo SUV tires (285/45), each wearing a big “EV Soundabsorber” badge. Hankook has a whole breakdown of the technology behind the tires. In simple terms though, there’s foam lining the inner walls and a series of tread and groove designs aimed at killing road noise. After a week behind the wheel, it’s hard to argue—it just works.

Add to that acoustic glass, triple door seals and active noise cancellation and the cabin feels genuinely quiet. Enough that even at 70 miles per hour, you won’t have to raise your voice to talk to the third-row passenger.

It’s Halfway Software-Defined

Hyundai’s software game isn’t at Tesla or Rivian levels yet, but the Ioniq 9 makes it clear the automaker is stepping up.

The 12.3-inch central infotainment screen felt responsive, though not as snappy as a Model Y. But it displays EV-specific data in great detail, better than probably most other automakers.

You get battery health monitoring, efficiency history and a breakdown of energy use split between the drivetrain, electronics, climate control and battery care. It even shows, in real time, how many kilowatts each system is drawing, which can help if you’re obsessive about efficiency like I am.

Hyundai is also improving the software in small ways. One example is that you can electrically fold or raise the second and third-row seats straight from the screen. It sounds minor, but it requires tight software-hardware integration. If someone is trying to load a large item in the back and you need to drop the seats without leaving the driver’s seat, this feature will come in surprisingly handy.

And unlike General Motors, Hyundai isn’t ditching wireless Apple CarPlay or Android Auto anytime soon. Despite the tech-heavy cabin, manual buttons and knobs are still plenty. Key functions, including drive and terrain modes, volume, and climate controls, still get proper physical buttons and dials. Again, a small thing, but it makes a big difference in keeping your eyes on the road instead of buried in menus.

Granted, none of this comes cheap. My press loaner carried a sticker of $71,250, which could be a dealbreaker for plenty of buyers. The base S trim costs $59,000. With the $7,500 federal tax credit, that starts to look like a more reasonable proposition.

Hyundai is also sweetening the deal until Sept. 30, when the federal tax credits expire. It’s offering $5,000 cash discounts across all trims on purchase. And lease options starting at $419 per month for 36 months with $4,999 due at signing. That’s not a bargain by any measure, either, but it does let you skip the steep purchase price and still land one of the best three-row electric SUVs on sale right now.

However, the price isn’t the Ioniq 9’s strength. I don’t think Hyundai intends it to be that way either. The Ioniq 9 feels more like a blueprint. It’s proof of how much capability you can pack into a three-row electric SUV without mechanical or design compromises. It’s proof that electrification is the way to go for family SUVs. 

Remember that this blueprint will only get better as battery tech evolves and costs come down. So, this is just the beginning and the Ioniq 9 is easily one of the most convincing three-row electric SUVs yet.

Have a tip? Contact the author: suvrat.kothari@insideevs.com

If you go looking for stories about the Volkswagen Group’s transition to electric vehicles, you probably won’t find a ton of positive headlines.

The original “pivot to EVs” company has suffered through software issues, delays to crucial new cars, C-suite upheavals and other crises, and now it’s staring down the barrel at brutal new tariffs—arguably none more so than its Audi brand, which doesn’t even build cars in the United States.

When your company’s press releases open with “Challenging half year,” well, the vibes aren’t exactly great.

But here’s what gets lost in all the noise: every single VW Group EV that I’ve driven is a quantum leap forward over the last one.

Nothing illustrates that better than the new Audi SQ6 E-Tron and the related Q6 E-Tron. It’s built on an all-new platform that was once a part of those many delays, but now that it’s here, it’s one of the more impressive luxury electric SUVs on the market. In terms of charging, range, features and performance, it handily outclasses what we’ve seen from Audi’s EVs before. Now, we’ll see if it has the juice to be the sales success that Audi needs it to be. 

(Full Disclosure: Audi gave us an SQ6 E-tron with a full charge for a week, followed by a Q6 E-Tron later on.)  

2025 Audi SQ6 E-Tron: Overview

The Q6 and SQ6 E-Tron models ride on the VW Group’s new Premium Platform Electric (PPE), alongside the related A6 and S6 E-Tron sedans and the similar-but-has-its-own-energy Porsche Macan Electric.

That’s a groundbreaking EV platform for this company on several fronts. It has an 800-volt electric architecture, which allows it to rank among the fastest-charging EVs on the market. It offers over-the-air software updates, an Android Automotive-based infotainment system with native Google Maps, new electric motors that are vastly more efficient than those on its first-generation EVs, along with a host of other new and improved components. 

In the U.S., the Q6 and SQ6 E-Tron models are powered by a 100-kilowatt-hour battery pack with 94 kWh of usable capacity. The base Q6 E-Tron starts at $63,800 before destination fees and up to 321 miles of range and 322 horsepower in single-motor rear-wheel-drive form. Opt for dual-motor all-wheel-drive and you get up to 456 horsepower and an estimated 307-mile range.

If you want more power, go with the SQ6 E-Tron, whose trims come with Quattro AWD only. That bumps the base price to $72,900 and gives you 483 hp—up to 510 hp in Boost Mode—but cuts range to an estimated 275 miles. This test primarily covers the SQ6 E-Tron, but I’ll explain later where the sweet spot is in this lineup.

2025 Audi SQ6 E-Tron: Driving Experience

The best compliment I can give to the SQ6 E-Tron is that it drives like an S-Line Audi should. That’s to say, it handles spectacularly well and it’s damned quick, all while being considerably less vulgar and ostentatious than an AMG or one of BMW’s M cars. 

The old Q8 E-Tron was a good handler by the end, too. This is better. It’ll do zero to 60 mph in a stated 4.1 seconds, but instrumented tests I’ve seen put it more in the high-3 range and I believe it. It’s a genuinely fun EV to drive, especially when the Boost function is used liberally. 

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It has another advantage over even the Macan Electric: adjustable regenerative braking. The VW Group is tepid on one-pedal driving in general, but the SQ6 E-Tron at least offers several different strength settings using a “B Mode” toggle. The steering wheel paddles can also let you adjust regenerative strength temporarily.

Overall, it’s athletic, fun and balanced, but doesn’t offer many surprises in this field. 

2026 Audi SQ6 E-Tron: Exterior and Interior

Let’s get this out of the way first: for such an important car, it doesn’t look like much. In fact, it looks like something the Audi design team won in a low-stakes poker game against the Infiniti design team, and I don’t mean that in a nice way. Its voluminous grille, anodyne profile and those narrow, insect-like headlamps are a far cry from the hits of the past like the Audi TT and R8, or even the comparatively elegant first-generation Q5. And its algebraic name doesn’t evoke anything special, either. Audi seems to get that it needs a reset on this front. 

Hop inside, and a lot of those cares go away. This is a comfortable, tech-laden interior that loses nearly all of the gripes I had with the old Q8 E-Tron, as this car is a completely different animal in terms of hardware. 

The seats are comfortable, bolstered well without being too aggressive (it’s thankfully not an RS Q6 E-Tron, after all) and the cabin is airy and modern. The grippy, rectangular-ish steering wheel is a delight to use. 

I liked the abundance of physical buttons and air vents, although not so much the haptic buttons on the steering wheel. Those aren’t as irritating here as on older cars, but my thumb often slipped when trying to change the audio track on the sound system, for example. Just button-buttons would be preferable. But overall, the quality is exceptional and worthy of its price tag.

2026 Audi SQ6 E-Tron: Technology

Thankfully, those delays were worth it on the tech front, because the PPE cars are a technical tour-de-force. Audi’s infotainment system uses the Android Automotive OS for the first time, and like other EVs it’s featured on—cars from General Motors, Volvo and others—it offers a tremendous degree of speed and customization. Want a certain display or setting featured more prominently? Just drag it on over to where you want it. 

Or you can talk to the voice assistant, which is better than most. It can do a lot of things you ask it to, like change the climate settings or defrost the rear window. It can’t do a lot of physical functions, like opening the windows, for example.

You get a 12-inch OLED virtual cockpit in front of the driver that blends into a 14.5-inch center touch display. There’s also an optional 10.9-inch display in front of the passenger, but like most screens placed there, whoever’s riding shotgun may wonder what they’re supposed to do with it. (This tends to be a vastly more popular feature in China.)

No matter how many screens you get or use, the displays are high-quality and powered by software that’s far more quick and responsive than what was on older Audis. Because it’s Android Automotive, you get a bunch of native, built-in apps, like YouTube, Spotify, and Zoom. 

In terms of automated driving assistance tech, it’s a solid setup, but nothing groundbreaking: adaptive cruise control with lane-keeping, traffic sign recognition, a distraction and drowsiness warning system and other features. But it remains fully hands-on, so visit your Cadillac dealer instead if that’s a dealbreaker. 

2026 Audi SQ6 E-Tron: Range, Observed Efficiency and Charging

Here’s where the SQ6 E-Tron falls down a bit. Going under 300 miles of range is par for the course for modern “performance” EVs (outside of China, anyway), but this model isn’t quite enough of a screamer to justify that range hit.

I drove the SQ6 E-Tron earlier this summer, when it was still on the colder side here in upstate New York. Even on a full charge, I never really got close to the claimed 275 miles of range. This, for a car with a 100 kWh battery; I often wondered where all of those kilowatt-hours actually went. In mixed driving, I saw between 2.7 and 3.2 miles per kWh pretty consistently. Not bad, but nothing at all special in terms of efficiency. 

Where the SQ6 E-Tron acquits itself well is in DC fast-charging. It has a peak rate of 270 kilowatts, so if you find a fast enough charger, you can go from 10% to 80% in just about 20 minutes. On a slower 150 kW charger, I saw it jump from 34% to 60% in just nine minutes. Like their Porsche brethren, these modern Audi EVs do quite well on the charging front. 

2026 Audi SQ6 E-Tron Or Q6 E-Tron: Which To Buy?

Incidentally, I drove a standard Q6 E-Tron Quattro a few weeks after the SQ6 E-Tron, and that’s the one I would tell you to buy. That car offers 456 hp with the same battery pack, the same fast-charging speeds, the same tech features, and largely the same interior. And it’ll do zero to 60 mph in the upper-mid four second range, which isn’t slow, either. 

For all that, you still get Quattro AWD and a much more palatable 307 miles of range. The point is, I don’t think the SQ6 offers enough of a performance premium to sacrifice at least 30 miles of range, and at least $10,000. In real-world situations, they don’t even feel that different. 

My hope would be that Audi adds some spice to the SQ6 E-Tron over time to justify that price premium, or finds a way to boost range across the board. 

2026 Audi SQ6 E-Tron Verdict: Strong Contender

MY SQ6 E-Tron tester came in at $83,395 including the Prestige and Edition One packages. Not at all shocking for a loaded German luxury SUV. (And I don’t want to start any inter-family drama, but it may be a better overall deal than the Porsche Macan Electric is.) 

I like the SQ6 and Q6 E-Trons a lot, and both of them finally put Audi where it needs to be in the modern EV space. Overall, the duo feel like an EV gateway drug for anyone who’s enjoyed their gas-powered SUVs over the years and wants to drive the technology of the future—and that’s a lot of people.

It also feels like a convincing luxury upgrade for anyone moving on from a Tesla Model Y, though those people may miss its hands-free highway driving features or the ubiquitous Supercharger network. (Audi will join that network at some point too, via an adapter at first and a native NACS plug later.) Ultimately, it needs more range and better efficiency to match its impressive hardware and first-rate driving experience, but there’s a lot to like anyway. 

Globally, the Q6 E-Tron family is selling pretty well so far, so it’s good to see Audi’s big swing pay off. We’ll soon see how true that is when tariffs hit in the U.S., but I hope Audi loyalists give this thing a shot. And it’s proof that EV technlogy is getting better, and more quickly, than most people think.

Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com