Charged Up! and ready to go
In the race to gain the EV topspot, it seems many manufacturers have forgotten that often the best application of electric technology is in smaller city cars. After all, the current crop of EVs are quite large; Jaguar’s I-Pace is huge, for instance, while Audi’s e-Tron is a dominating force out on the road. Then there is the myriad of crossovers like the Hyundai Kona Electric and the Kia Soul Electric, which are reasonably large too. But the Volkswagen e-Up! is different. It’s quite small - as is the standard Up! - and it doesn’t look all too ‘outthere’ either. VW has given the e-Up! bigger batteries to improve that all-important range - but can this little car battle it out in a segment dominated by leviathans?
WHAT’S NEW?
If you were to judge what’s new by the exterior of the e-Up!, you’d probably say not a lot. It doesn’t look particularly different from the car it replaces, nor does it appear all too dissimilar to the standard combustion-engined car. No, the bulk of the changes here have been made under the skin. As we mentioned earlier, Volkswagen has boosted the battery count in the e-Up!, helping to extend its range and bolster its appeal. The firm has also added the ability to fast-charge the car - a feature more often seen in ‘premium’ alternatives - which should help to drive down the time you’ll be waiting at the plug.
UNDER THE BONNET?
Underneath the e-Up! sits an electric motor linked to a 32.3kWh battery. Sprinting from 0-60mph takes the Up! 11.6 seconds and all-in it’ll do 81mph. Volkswagen claims that you’ll be able to do 159 miles between charges, while the ability to use combined charging system tech means that the car can be taken from zero to 80% charge in just an hour via a 40kW
DC charger. Use a standard domestic wallbox and that falls to a respectable four hours, while via a three-pin you’ll be looking at around 16 hours for a full charge.
WHAT’S THE SPEC LIKE?
Our test car came in at £20,555 after the government’s plug-in car grant, which doesn’t seem like bad value at all given the kit on offer. Cruise control, parking sensors at both front and rear and a rearview camera are all thrown in as standard, while a dinky five-inch colour touchscreen system - essentially a small ‘strip’ screen - houses Bluetooth connectivity and DAB radio. Volkswagen also - importantly - includes two charging cables, one 16amp unit for use at wallboxes and charge points and another 10amp cable for charging at the mains.
THE VERDICT
The plucky e-Up! can’t deliver the ranges boasted by bigger EVs, but at around 150 miles a charge it offers a useable range. Trips to town and even longer journeys will unlikely trouble the bottom end of the range, while that ability to fast charge means that if you do need to plug in, you won’t be waiting all that long. Most importantly, however, the e-Up! is fun, and that’s something many EVs have missed from the process of driving.