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Updated Renault 5 gains extra range, red paint and Williams style

Tue, 25 Aug 2026 11:19:53 +0100

Aero tweaks, LFP battery chemistry and fresh options for retro electric supermini's second birthday

The Renault 5 has received a range boost and a choice of new colours as part of a light update aimed at boosting its competitive edge against new rivals.

After two years on sale, the retro electric supermini has been made more efficient by slicker new mirrors and lower body trim, which means both versions now crack slightly more miles per charge.

The entry-level Urban Range variant, with a 40kWh battery, now manages 196 miles officially (up three miles), while the more popular 52kWh Comfort Range version has had its range boosted from 255 to 267 miles.

Renault has also announced that the entry-level car will swap its 40kWh battery for the smaller Twingo's 36.5kWh lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) pack in the coming weeks, as previously reported by Autocar.

This is said to be more energy-dense than the current nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) battery, so the car will concede just six miles of range.

It will be capable of charging at up to 6.6kW domestically or up to 80kW on a public fast charger - slightly slower than the other variant.

LFP batteries are cheaper than NMC ones, but Renault has yet to confirm whether this new entry-level model, dubbed Five, will cost less (if it comes to the UK) than the current cheapest 5, which starts at £21,495.

The technical tweaks come alongside the addition of new personalisation options, including a new shade of red borrowed from the closely related Nissan Micra EV, alongside which the 5 is built in Douai, France.

Buyers can also now specify a star-patterned roof and have the choice of a grey roofline, in addition to red.

Techno and Iconic trims also come with the option of gold wheels, which in combination with the midnight blue paint (below) are reminiscent of those fitted to the 1990s Clio Williams hot hatch.

Inside, the seats in Iconic cars are now finished in blue and grey, rather than yellow.

There's also a new wireless phone charger, said to be capable of adding 50% of battery to your phone in an hour while preventing overheating.

Plus, the Multi-Sense drive mode selector button has been removed, as the 5 now gets a Smart function that adjusts the driving mode according to throttle inputs.

You can still change between Sport, Eco, Comfort and Individual modes using the touchscreen or voice control.

A Renault spokesperson told Autocar that plans to launch the updated 5 in the UK remain "under review", with no timings or specific trim details given at this stage.

Opinion: should it matter if you say Skoda or 'Shhhhkoda'?

Tue, 25 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

The Czech firm has been present in the UK for more than a century, and finally wants you to know how to pronounce its name. But why?

My mum was watching television the other day when an advert for a car firm caught her eye and prompted her to contact me with a question: ‘Are Skoda really trying to tell me how I should pronounce Skoda?’

Well, yes, mum, it turns out they are, and I think you’ll find you should actually be calling them Shhhkoda. Once I’d convinced Professor Attwood that I wasn’t trying to shush her but employ the ‘correct’ pronunciation of Skoda, she still had questions. Is Shhhkoda really how you’re supposed to pronounce it? Does it really matter? And why is Skoda, sorry, Shhhkoda telling people now anyway?

After all, Skoda celebrated its 130th birthday last year and has been selling cars in the UK since the early 1900s (you can read more about the brand’s history here). It feels slightly odd to not worry about people pronouncing your name wrong for more than a century before deciding to try and politely correct them.

And yet, here is Skoda with a minute-long TV advert, accompanied by media and marketing campaigns, billboards and social media posts, trying to push the sssh into Shhhkoda. And perhaps Autocar has to admit a small bit of guilt here. After all, the reason Skoda seems to be mispronounced here involves the háček that appears above the S – you know, the little wiggly thing that appears above the S in Škoda, but which Autocar house style means we don’t use for capital letters. But in Czechia, that little squiggle changes the pronunciation of an S to a sh. Hence Shhhkoda. Look, just do an impression of Sean Connery saying shurely shome mishtake and you’ll be halfway there.

In a statement, Skoda UK marketing director Kirsten Stagg said: “The Š has always been part of our identity, but we've never really given it centre stage before.” Trying to push its use is designed to help the firm celebrate its Czech heritage, while “creating something playful, memorable and unmistakably Škoda”.

If this seems an odd move by Skoda, it isn’t even the first car brand to try this in recent years. Not that long ago, Hyundai launched an advertising campaign explaining that Brits should be saying ‘He-oon-day’ and not ‘High-oond-aye’. And there aren’t even any weird accents to blame in Hyundai.

Really, apart from questioning if trying to tell potential customers that they're not always right about pronounciation is actually a good thing, it's the timing of these campaigns that feels a bit odd. Why now? After all, the Skoda campaign is being done at a time when loads of new car brands that nobody has any idea how to pronounce are flooding the UK market. Plenty of people still wouldn’t even know that Jaecoo, Geely, Lepas, Changan and Xiamomi are car firms, let alone know how to pronounce them. Is now the time to make people question your brand's name?

But I think that’s the real genius here: it feels like Skoda is doing a bit of a power flex. People know Skoda and they like Skoda, so the fact the firm can expend its marketing effort correcting pronunciation shows how far ahead of all those Chinese brands it is. People care about Skoda, even if they haven't been saying the name of the brand right.

By contrast, the challenge for firms like Geely isn’t getting Brits to says its name correctly – jee-lee, for the record – but actually making sure they’ve heard of the brand at all. New car firms can’t afford to worry about how many people pronounce their name correctly. They just want people to know they exist. Geely simply wants people to buy its cars; it can teach people how to pronounce its name in a century or so.

But everybody knows Shhhkoda, so Shhhkoda can have some fun with that. And the key is that the campaign is fun and lighthearted, rather than being stern or instructive. It plays into Shhhkoda’s reputation as a relaxed, warm, friendly and likeable brand. Much like its recent sponsorship to rebrand the Peak District as the Peaq District, after its forthcoming EV flagship, raised plenty of smiles. Well, apart from with a handful of slightly po-faced protestors.

Crucially, I don’t actually think Shhhkoda really cares how my mum, or anyone else, actually pronounces Shhhkoda. The important thing is that my mum noticed the TV advert, and knows about Shhhkoda, is thinking about Shhhkoda and has now prompted me to write several hundred words about Shhhkoda. For any brand, it’s important to be talked about, and this campaign is making sure people are.

Will it make anyone more likely to buy a Peaq or an Epiq or a Superb or a Fabia? When so much of modern marketing is about reinforcing brands rather than selling products, I’m not sure that matters. But if people are looking to buy a new car, customers might just be more inclined to buy one from a firm that can laugh about its name, rather than one with a strange name they've never heard of.

EVs and SUVs not to blame for pothole crisis, say experts

Tue, 25 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

Climate change and poor maintenance cited as real culprits for the UK's pockmarked roads

SUVs and EVs are being unfairly blamed for being a major cause of road damage, experts say, as the state of Tarmac across the UK continues to deteriorate.

Over the past nine years, the mean average kerb weight of new cars has increased by almost 400kg, from 1553kg to 1947kg.

Last year, the average weight of cars road tested by Autocar was 2024kg. Of the 73 cars tested, the most common body type by far was SUVs and the most common fuel type electric.

This increase in weight, allied to the growth in the numbers of SUVs and EVs, has led critics of the vehicles to accuse them of damaging roads, and some city councils, including those of London and Cardiff, to consider imposing additional parking charges on them.

In a recent blog published by the Institute of Civil Engineers, Elizabeth Orchard, director of infrastructure consultancy Endelevu, claimed that EVs are a factor in the formation of potholes.

"Roads are designed to withstand a certain number of heavy vehicles during their lifetime," she wrote. "As vehicles - especially EVs - become heavier, the wear per vehicle increases. More damage occurs more quickly, reducing the lifespan of the road."

However, Ali Rahman, assistant professor at the School of Civil Engineering at the University of Leeds, believes some criticism overstates the damaging effects of such vehicles.

"We don't want to blame only heavier cars for the damage," he said. "The fourth power law shows that road damage increases proportionately with axle load. If, for instance, a vehicle's axle load doubles, the damage to the road doesn't double but increases by about 16 times.

"Heavy goods vehicles [HGVs] are the principal cause of road damage. One HGV can cause the same damage as many thousands of car journeys.

"Combined with other factors acting together - climate change, water ingress and delays in road maintenance - it is why SUVs and EVs cannot be singled out for damaging roads."

In March, the Asphalt Industry Alliance said local authorities in England and Wales faced a record £18.62 billion backlog of carriageway repairs that would take 12 years to clear.

It added that 16% of local roads - equivalent to more than 32,500 miles - were reported to have less than five years' structural life remaining.

Later in the year, the government announced a £7.3 billion spending package for roads maintenance over four years to 2030. It also tightened the rules around how councils spend the money to ensure it's used effectively.

In her blog post Orchard explained that the most common cause of potholes in the UK is the action of vehicles passing over the road in combination with the annual freeze-thaw cycle.

"The UK's climate is perfect for pothole formation," she wrote. "Winter temperatures often sit around 0deg C - warm enough for rain but cold enough for freezing soon after. This means the freeze-thaw cycle can repeat many times in a single week, sometimes several times in one day.

"When rainwater seeps into these cracks and freezes, it expands, pushing stones apart and weakening the 'icing' [top] layer. Furthermore, the bitumen becomes brittle and snaps at cold temperatures. As vehicles pass over the weakened area, the material breaks away and a pothole begins to form."

Rahman said "climate change is causing the most damage at the moment", as increasingly hot weather also melts the top layer of bitumen below the road surface.

The Electric Vehicle Association England, which has 7000 members, said claims that EVs damage roads more than ICE cars are inaccurate and based on myth.

CEO Vicky Edmonds, a former head of the governmental Office for Low Emission Vehicles, said: "I do not accept that EVs are destroying roads. They're still passenger cars and not heavy trucks. It's traffic volume that destroys the roads."

Edmonds added that with the continuing development of batteries, EVs are expected to become lighter in the future - while smaller and lighter new models are already arriving.

These include the Renault Twingo E-Tech, with a kerb weight of 1200kg, and the Dacia Spring 100 Expression, at 976kg.

"EVs are still an emerging technology which is constantly evolving," said Edmonds.

First look at Suzuki e-Sky: sub-£20k EV due in UK next year

Mon, 24 Aug 2026 14:35:08 +0100

Boxy kei car will rival the Renault Twingo and Honda Super-N as the brand's entry-level EV

Suzuki has taken the wraps off its e-Sky, a new electric city car that is coming to the UK next year as a rival for the Renault Twingo and Honda Super-N.

It is Suzuki’s first electric kei car, meaning it has been developed according to the Japanese class’s strict limits on size. This has resulted in a boxy upright shape, which is designed to maximise occupant space in a minimal footprint.

The car is little changed from the concept version displayed at last year’s Tokyo motor show. The most notable visual revision is a swap from the concept’s futuristic LED lighting to more a chunkier and more conventional set-up.

Technical details remain under wraps until the autumn but, in keeping with kei convention, it is likely to use a single front-mounted motor with an output of 63bhp.

Japanese media has reported a range of 193 miles, which would put the e-Sky ahead of the rival Super-N (128 miles). However, the Super-N is not actually a kei car: it is based on the Honda N-One E but modified to suit export markets such as the UK with a more powerful 94bhp motor and a wider, more aggressive body. It remains to be seen whether Suzuki will follow Honda in modifiying the e-Sky with extra power to suit the preferences of UK buyers.

Regardless, this model will form a crucial part of the brand’s future plans in the UK. Suzuki UK boss David Kateley previously told Autocar that “the A-segment BEV is vitally important” and that he was “very excited about its prospects”.

To that end, pricing is expected to start at below £20,000 – around the same money as the combustion-engined Suzuki Swift supermini.

The e-Sky is due to arrive next spring and its sales will provide the Japanese brand with a useful boost toward its qualification for the UK’s zero-emission vehicle mandate.

It will be followed a year later by Suzuki’s third EV, which, Kateley said, “definitely won't be an electric Swift”.

Volvo pledges long-range PHEVs that can be “used as intended”

Mon, 24 Aug 2026 10:00:00 +0100

Volvo set to expand line-up of PHEVs as EV adoption slows, warning that the ZEV mandate needs a “reality check”

Volvo will double down on long-range plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) in the UK over the coming years, in response to slower than expected demand for pure-electric models.

Speaking to Autocar, Volvo UK boss Nicole Melillo Shaw said PHEVs will continue to serve as a “stepping stone” for buyers who aren’t yet ready to take the leap into an electric car. However, Melillo Shaw noted that hybrids need to offer a very long electric-only range in order to help Volvo buyers transition smoothly to pure-EV models.

“The important nuance here is not the number of hybrids we sell: it’s whether people are driving them as a hybrid rather than just as a petrol car,” said Melillo Shaw.

“In the past, when plug-in ranges were very low, drivers rarely charged them. Volvo has invested heavily in making sure our hybrids offer a long range so that people can use them as intended. So then it becomes a true stepping stone, and we’ll make sure we have that range available to our customers.”

While Volvo UK's pure-electric sales have increased significantly in recent years – going from 4556 in 2022 to nearly 18,000 in 2024, and 9000 in the first seven months of 2026 – its combustion-powered cars remain vastly more popular. Petrol has powered around 75% (31,000) of the brand's UK sales so far this year, and of those almost 7000 were plug-in hybrids.

Volvo currently offers plug-in hybrid versions of the XC60 and XC90 SUVs, offering a maximum EV range of around 50 miles. However, the new XC70, launched in China and planned for Europe soon, is the first of its so-called ‘long-range’ PHEVs and offers a claimed engine-off range of 124 miles - longer than any PHEV on sale in the UK today (albeit that figure is according to China’s generous testing cycle).

Automotive News recently reported that an upcoming refresh for the XC60 will add a similarly capable long-range PHEV option, with a larger battery set to more than double its EV range.

While Melillo Shaw highlighted the ongoing need for hybrid models such as these, she reaffirmed the brand’s commitment to electrification. However, with EV adoption lagging behind initial forecasts, she called for a “reality check” regarding zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) mandate targets, which are currently under review by the government.

“If everyone decided to drive an electric car tomorrow, we are set up to support that, so there are no concerns from an innovation standpoint,” said Melillo Shaw.

“But If consumer adoption isn't moving at the expected speed, then how can we work together, industry and government, so the outcome isn't just punitive? We need to step back, assess the reality, and partner to keep moving forward.”

Melillo Shaw added that the mandate needs “to examine the facts and data” and assess the consumer adoption curve, not just “EV registration numbers driven by heavy discounting”.

The UK government launched a review last week that will consider whether to soften ZEV mandate targets for electric car sales from 2027 to 2035.

Under the current guidelines, new combustion cars must feature some form of hybrid element in order to remain on sale beyond 2030, with all new UK cars going fully electric by 2035.

'Catalyst', '16V', '800V'? Bring obscure boot badges back for the EV age

Mon, 24 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

Cars once shouted about their tech spec – in such a fast-moving era, we should return to gratuitous badging

I spotted a badge on the back of a new car the other day that took me right back to the good old days, when car manufacturers assumed that owners cared enough about the technology in their products that they would actually advertise it a bit. Two badges, actually, both wonderfully incomprehensible.

The Denza Bao 5, newly arrived in Britain, is a tough-looking, Chinese-made, plug-in hybrid 4x4. I would hesitate to call it an SUV, because it's clearly intended to actually go off road and looks a bit like a discount-shop G-Wagen. There's lots about it that might make you smile, but nothing better, for me, than two badges on its barn-door tailgate that proudly read 'DiSus-P' and 'DMO'. Erm, yerrwhat?

Those rather ambitious initialisms are references to the Bao 5's active hydraulic suspension system and its hybrid-specific 'Dual Mode Offroad' platform respectively. And I reckon the average dog walker who spots one of these cars on a Sunday morning would have about as much chance of guessing that as their Norwegian Lundehund might of digging up the Ark of the Covenant on Greenham Common.

When was the last time you saw such a bizarrely obscure badge on a car? There was, fairly recently, the Renault Kadjar Bose Edition, which actually managed to use the specification of its stereo as its derivative identity, with Bose badges on its wings and everything. I mean, you won't believe it: this Renault has stereo speakers. My ghast is truly flabbered.

But that's not really technical enough to count on this score. This took me back to my old man's dubious lineage of Rover 800 company cars, which at the turn of the 1990s introduced me to both 'Catalyst' and '16v' boot badges (phwoar, etc).

The catalyst thing I remember quite clearly across all sorts of stuff. Google tells me it appeared, either as a badge or a decal, on Volkswagen Polos and Ferrari 328s.

To us today, it would seern about as banal as putting WHEELS!' on a boot badge and then expecting customers to point, coo and go all weak at the knees. But at least it was evidence that car makers expected car buyers to speak roughly the same technical vernacular as them; to have an interest.

That has been missing from mainstream car culture for the past decade or so, it strikes me. Just as the likes of Audi, BMW and Mercedes have started issuing model nomenclature badges that don't actually describe engine capacity the way they used to, makers of electric cars have thrashed around trying to find meaningful reference points to make a more expensive model's identity distinct from a cheaper one.

That's something we need to find a way to reconnect with and rediscover. Car owners need reassurance that it's okay to be geeky about their pride and joy.

We need a new vocabulary, of course. As engines get either less or less important in, or else just plain absent from, our cars, there's chance of 'EFI', 'VVTI , "Turbo D'or "Twin Cam' making a comeback. In the version of the future where we've all been forced to adopt EVs by tax bands, global fuel pricing and social pressure, perhaps there will be a case for simply putting 'Engine' on the bootlid of the one combustion-powered model that any given manufacturer can afford to produce. And then selling tickets to hear it run.

Moving away from the engine bay, I was amused to discover that both the Triumph TR4A and Holden Commodore came at various times with 'IRS' badges - for independent rear suspension', of course. Plenty of the former were indeed sold in North America, apparently; I can't imagine their owners having been popular at dinner parties.

At any rate, batteries, inverters and electric motors have their proprietary innovations and technical distinctions too: it's simply that too many car makers think owners don't care. Well, I reckon they do. I reckon 'X-Pin' (stator winding), 'SiC' (inverter) or '800V' on the back of an EV would be great. I'd like nothing better than boring on about what it referred to.

Car designers seem to like putting lettering on the back of new cars at the moment; it might as well say something useful.

Reborn Toyota MR2: Full story on mid-engined sports car for 2028

Mon, 24 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

Autocar rendering shows how the new MR2, influenced by the FT-SE, could look on the road

Mid-engined model primed with 2.0-litre engine that could offer as much as 600bhp

Toyota is poised to relaunch the MR2 and Celica as part of its transformation of the GR sporting arm into a full stand-alone performance brand.

The GR division is effectively Toyota's equivalent of BMW M or Mercedes-AMG and has its roots in the Gazoo Racing motorsport outfit that created Toyota's most recent crop of sports cars: the GR Yaris, GR Supra and GR 86. It is now being expanded and turned into its own brand, joining Lexus and the Japan-only Daihatsu and Century in Toyota's portfolio.

The new GR GT supercar and its racing GT3 sibling are the first models to be branded purely with GR badges. With the GR 86 and GR Supra now off sale and the GR Yaris set to follow suit before long, the supercars will be the only models in the GR range when they are launched next year.

But plans are fast progressing to expand the line-up at the bottom end and create a family of dedicated sports cars at a range of price points in a segment rivals are exiting en masse.

It's all part of a wider initiative to embrace more enthusiast-focused models under the guidance of company chairman and keen racer Akio Toyoda, who has long made clear his "no more boring cars" mantra and commitment to performance models - particularly those powered by combustion.

GR's new sports cars are being developed in parallel with Gazoo Racing's motorsport activities. The Celica is expected to be the basis for Toyota's next World Rally Championship challenger and the mid-engined MR2 is being developed in plain sight, with a development mule actively competing in one of Japan's biggest race series.

Tomoya Takahashi, president of Toyota's motorsport division, said the move indicates a shift in the company's mindset that places more emphasis on niche models that play a halo role, rather than one of particular commercial significance.

Speaking about the GR Yaris M concept being used to develop the MR2, he said: "In the 2000s, we had what was known as the 'global master plan' and Toyota had become a company that only built cars that made money. Since midship models don't sell in large numbers, they naturally fell by the wayside.

"If we were the old Toyota, I think the response to this project would have been: 'What are you talking about? Forget it!' But under chairman Akio Toyoda's presidency, the company came to embrace new challenges.

"In the past, a newly built car would never have been driven like this and I don't think you would have seen a vehicle at this stage of completion entered in a race, with 'Master Driver' Akio Toyoda behind the wheel testing it out.

"I hope our efforts here demonstrate that we are dedicated to continuing to make cars through motorsports."

MR2 to get punchy 2.0-litre engine

The reborn MR2 will be one of very few mid-engined sports cars on the market by the time it arrives - with the Lotus Emira now the only such model offered by a mainstream manufacturer.

Alpine says its next-generation A110 - another natural rival for a new Toyota sports coupé - could accommodate an engine if needed, but it will be launched as an EV.

The MR2 is expected to use a new 2.0-litre engine that Toyota is developing specifically for hybrid sports cars. The firm has been trialling its new 'G20E' four-cylinder engine in an adapted, mid-engined GR Yaris - going so far as to enter the prototype in Japan's Super Taikyu endurance race series as a hardcore test of its performance and reliability.

The G20E is based on the 1.6-litre unit that powers today's GR Yaris and is said to "push the limits of performance and efficiency". It has been designed to take up as little space as possible, to enable compact vehicle dimensions and a low centre of gravity - crucial attributes for a mid-engined sports car.

It is said to produce in the region of 400-450bhp in standard tune and upwards of 600bhp in the race car, making it potentially one of the most powerful four-cylinder engines yet created. Mercedes-AMG's 'M139' engine is the most powerful four-pot in a production car to date, making 416bhp in the A45 S hot hatch.

While the mid-engined GR Yaris M prototype is powered purely by petrol, the engine will be compatible with hybrid and PHEV powertrains, taking advantage of a shorter piston stroke than today's engine, which means it takes up less space.

Toyota moved the engine behind the cockpit in a bid to address the dynamic shortcomings of a front-engined performance car. It said: "Vehicles such as the GR Yaris have a front-mounted engine, concentrating the load on the front tyres during all driving operations of braking, steering and acceleration.

"In circuit environments, this significantly affects tyre wear and leads to a tendency for understeer when cornering at the limit due to reduced grip."

The mid-engined arrangement, devised and engineered in collaboration with chairman Toyoda, is said to address those issues while allowing "drivers to control [the car] exactly as they intend".

The M concept - named in reference to its mid-mounted engine and as a nod to 'Morizo', the name under which Toyoda races - drives both axles like the standard GR Yaris, but it is unknown if that would be the case for a small sports car using the same engine.

The original MR2's tail-happy handling was intrinsic to its dynamic character and a successor would be likely to follow suit - especially if it is to retain the name, which is often interpreted as meaning 'mid-engined, rear-wheel-drive two-seater'.

However, the drivetrain in the GR Yaris M is capable of splitting power equally across both axles, or channelling it all to the back. This could allow the MR2 to remain true to its roots while benefiting from the enhanced stability and poise of a 4WD set-up.

Toyota has trademarked the GR MR2 name and the new car is likely to go without Toyota badges entirely as the GR GT does - to cement the sporting brand's positioning as a stand-alone marque.

Testing of the eventual road car is thought to have ramped up recently with the deployment of a new sports car prototype at the Toyota-owned Fuji Motor Speedway.

Wearing a mish-mash of body parts from existing Toyota models - Lexus LC doors and GR Yaris lights among them - the two-door test mule is clearly mid-engined (based on its huge side air intakes and vented hood) and, in video taken from the side of the track, can be heard to emit a purposeful turbo four-pot soundtrack.

Even though it gives clues to the size and engineering of Toyota's new entry-level sports car, the test car is not thought to closely preview its styling. Instead, the new Emira rival is expected to be heavily based on the bold FT-SE concept Toyota revealed in 2023.

While it was originally destined to use an all-electric powertrain based around Toyota's new-generation energy-dense battery packs, the FT-SE was unmistakably 'mid-engined' in its proportions and could make production relatively unchanged by virtue of the new G20E engine's compact proportions.

Since the FT-SE was revealed, Toyota has doubled down on its commitment to a 'multi-pathway' energy strategy, investing in new petrol and hybrid powertrains, as well as hydrogen combustion, in parallel with the expansion of its EV line-up - and paving the way for a new generation of combustion-engined sports cars.

What the Yaris M test car tells us

Toyota is aiming to eradicate "prayer time" with its new mid-engined platform. That's what chairman Akio Toyoda calls the moment when a high-output front-engined car understeers into a sharp bend: "It's time to pray to God."

The firm touts the success of the standard GR Yaris in motorsport - having competed in the World Rally Championship, Super Taikyu and Nürburgring 24 Hours - but says characteristics inherent in its drivetrain layout ultimately limit its performance potential.

"The front-engine 4WD packaging means that all of the vehicle's functions - stopping, turning, accelerating - are concentrated around the front section," said Toyota. "This layout places a heavier load on the front tyres, which wear out more easily and must be replaced three times as often as the rear. Increased wear can also result in understeer."

Moving the engine to the middle of the chassis in the GR Yaris M concept helps to address these shortcomings - plus, said Toyota Gazoo Racing boss Tomoya Takahashi, it makes "cars that are fun for customers to drive".

He referenced the original MR2 as an example of a car with "incredibly well-balanced weight distribution between the front and rear" but acknowledged its notorious reputation for snap oversteer in fast bends. "What made the car turn so well also let it spin out easily on corners," he said.

However, by combining the mid-mounted engine with a four-wheel drive system, said Takahashi, "you transform the power that causes the vehicle to spin into a force that pulls the car forward, improving stability through corners".

He added: "When you get behind the wheel, we hope the first thing people notice is how well the car turns."

After taking to the wheel for a practice stint ahead of the car's competitive debut last year, Akio Toyoda was cautiously encouraged by the prototype's potential: "It's a fun drive, but there's still work to be done, isn't there?"

He added: "If I don't improve my driving skills, I won't be able to handle this car."

People have been complaining about noisy cars for 115 years

Sun, 23 Aug 2026 16:00:00 +0100

"Unsuitable devices for unnecessarily intensifying the volume" of cars have been around for a century

"The Commissioner of Police thinks it advisable to call upon all owners and drivers of motor vehicles to do what is in their power to reduce the annoyance caused, especially at night, by the use of unsuitable devices for unnecessarily intensifying either the timbre or volume of the sound emitted."

Anyone who has ever been woken at 3am by the droning and banging of a modified Audi RS3 or somesuch would second that plea – yet it's one that was circulated 115 years ago.

At that time, the only regulation governing vehicle noise compelled use of a horn at hazardous junctures. Little wonder there was a "growing volume of complaints against the nerve-racking, strident noises" of Britain's fast-growing motoring set.

We felt "the seriousness of car noises was greatly exaggerated", but regardless just five months later "the agitation culminated in the issue of a further regulation by the Local Government Board, prohibiting the use of cut-outs" – devices that let a car's exhaust gas avoid its silencer to boost power.

Enjoy full access to the complete Autocar archive at the magazineshop.com

This was "fairly sweeping, as it not only prohibits use of cut-outs but practically insists upon the use of silencers which shall deaden the noise of the exhaust blast very considerably" – all caused by those few "of caddish propensities".

Moreover, we complained, no curbs had been placed on the far greater irritants that were "lumbering traction engines that shake the very foundations of the houses they pass" and "iron-tyred horse vehicles of all sorts".

By summer 1928, traffic noise – described by one MP as "inflicting considerable suffering and being a general menace to health" – had come to the fore again. In just the past year, some 10,600 drivers had been prosecuted for excessive noise, and consequently a broad-based committee was set up to investigate. Its recommendation, delivered the next spring, was more regulation.

Thus, from August 1929, "use of any car which causes any excessive noise either directly or as a result of any defect, lack of repair or faulty adjustment or loading" was illegal.

There remained one big problem, though, as reader EJ Burrow noted: "Unless some method is invented for its reasonable enforcement, the law is likely to become a futile absurdity, more honoured in the breach than in the observance. The police seem utterly at a loss as to how to approach the subject."

Clearly not all of them, though, as by the end of the year, 1282 people had been prosecuted under the act, despite noise being unquantifiable. That would soon change: in 1937, by which point "silence had rather fallen away from the golden standard", we enjoyed our first try of a sound measuring machine.

Already two units of sound had been devised: the decibel, a pure measurement of mechanical energy, and the phon, one of loudness to the human ear, accounting for variables in how it perceives differing frequencies.

The Ministry of Transport had recommended that no car should exceed 90 phons – slightly above the potency of sitting by an open window on an express train. The Wolseley saloons that we tested peaked at 77 when cruising at 30mph in top gear, 18ft from the microphone.

More regulation was introduced in 1955, as car ownership became democratised: "Every [ICE] vehicle shall be fitted with silencer, expansion chamber or other contrivance suitable and sufficient for reducing as far as may be reasonable the exhaust noise."

Yet, as an MP argued in 1959, "many vehicles are particularly obnoxious in this respect, especially motorcycles and sports cars. They probably do not make an excessive noise when they come from the manufacturers but, after having been improved in the view of the owners, a hellish noise is created which is completely unnecessary."

That winter we joined Southend Police as they employed a decibel meter to "remove the arbitrary nature of the assessment of the sound defined in the regulation". They set their threshold for warning or prosecution at 95dB – "slightly above the level inside a tube train". But the loudest we heard was 92dB, from a "notoriously noisy sports car driven at full bore in second gear".

Still, another government report on the issue was commissioned in 1960. An MP scoffed: "When I hear a sports car going through our streets with the tremendous roar which accompanies it, my main feeling is one of almost embarrassment that a grown-up should seek to show off in such a childish way." Well, quite.

It was 1970 when 'excessive noise' crossed the boundary of objectivity in British law, being defined at 87dB.

Home improvement: The mechanics turning your drive into a garage

Sun, 23 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0100

The RAC is one of many firms offering services at home or a place of work, and the idea is catching on

In most jobs, gratification is rooted in hard metrics: leads, customer conversions, sales and such. But for the RAC's army of mobile mechanics it comes from something altogether more tangible.

Sean Kimberlin, the RAC's mobile mechanic of the year and guest speaker at the Autocar Drivers of Change awards, says the true marker of a job well done is, in fact, whether the customer offers tea and biscuits.

"You get the 'thank you so much, you don't know how much you've helped me out'. And for me, that's enough. It's a bit corny, but I always think about the customer as a member of my family, and it's important to me that I deliver the sort of service I would want my wife to get or my elderly parents to get," he says.

Kimberlin represents the spearhead in a new era for the RAC. Its bright orange breakdown patrols are a familiar sight on the nation's roads, but in 2023 the RAC launched a new mobile servicing arm to help increasingly time-strapped motorists maintain their cars.

The concept is simple: you book a service as you would with a garage, then a mechanic comes out to you - be it on your driveway at home, or in your office car park as you work. Paul Coward, head of the RAC's maintenance and repair arm, says the mobile servicing tackles "everything from simple stuff to brakes and starter motors".

He adds: "We're probably the biggest buyer in the UK of rotating electrics - starters and alternators." That's a good indication of the scale of the work a mechanic can do on the move.

Convenience is by far the service's biggest draw. "The coffee in my local dealer is lovely," jokes Coward, "but you have to get there at 8am and then you don't know how long it's going to take when you drop it off. Then you have to leave work early and ask your boss whether you can get away before 5pm to pick the car back up."

The ability to have your car worked on from your front porch saves such hassles, because you can see what work is being done and therefore how much longer it might take.

The ability to see what is being done also means you can be confident that you're getting what you've asked for, says Coward. Most dealers or big garages encourage you to go elsewhere while work is carried out - "and then you get the phone call saying it's going to be expensive".

But that isn't the case when having your car worked on at home. Coward adds: "We price up front. If that's what it is, that's what we charge. Obviously, if it [becomes more complex] and your ECU or head gasket is broken, we're not going to fix that for the price of a service. We'll have a conversation with the customer to say it's probably not worth doing a service: you need to go to a garage and get it done. So you know exactly what we've done with your car."

But what of the 40% of the nation that doesn't have a drive? "We are working on that," says Kimberlin. "We've got a couple of partners with facilities that we can, in some areas, use. We have business partners all over the UK with areas we can work in." He adds that there is more to come on this front and highlights London as a particular problem area, but the RAC hasn't quite finished working on a solution just yet.

We can expect such services to become a mainstay in the years to come. As our lives get busier and rents get ever higher, which forces independent garages out of business, mobile mechanics might just become the lifeline that the nation's car parc needs.

Indeed, some newcomers to the UK car market are using mobile mechanics as a lifeline for getting customers' cars serviced while they expand their nascent dealer networks.

Chinese brand Aion has partnered the AA's rival service, which it views as vital to building customer confidence.

What's in a mobile mechanic's van?

The RAC's recovery vans are a familiar sight on our roads, liveried in bright orange and fitted with all manner of important gear. But while they may look superficially identical, the mobile mechanics rigs actually carry a completely different payload.

Sean Kimberlin drives a Ford E-Transit Custom. He admits he was "sceptical" about driving a short-range electric van every day when it was first assigned to him, but he has come to admire its easy-going drive. With frequent charging forcing him to pause for 40 minutes every so often, "it's actually a much healthier lifestyle" than quickly refilling a diesel van and getting back on the road, he says.

Chief among the mechanics' kit is a gateway tablet. This allows Kimberlin to tap into a car's software and carry out diagnostic tests or software updates, as if it were a main dealer doing the work. This is not something for which every independent garage is certified, and it gives the RAC a crucial leg up against the competition.

Otherwise, there is a comprehensive set of hand tools used for dismantling cars - screwdrivers, wrenches and such - and parts that might be required, including filters and oils. Completing the package is a large ground sheet, which is placed below the car being serviced before any work begins, to prevent any spillages onto a driveway.

Why you need a used Honda Civic Type R – even if it costs £40k

Sun, 23 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

It's still £40k, and for maybe the zenith of hot hatches worth every penny

In 2022, jaws dropped when Honda announced the starting price of the 'FL5' Civic Type R as £46,995 - £15,000 more than the 'FK8' had cost six years earlier.

It was an example of supply economics: numbers were limited in Europe due to CO2 emissions regulations (the Type R emits 186g/km), so even at that inflated price demand outstripped supply.

Even now, used cars start from around £35,000, or similar money to the equally acclaimed swansong Ford Focus ST Edition.

Beneath the FL5's calmer styling are fundamentals from the FK8, but this was more than a mere reskin. As for the chassis, the wheelbase is a touch longer, the track is 15mm wider and torsional rigidity is 15% greater.

Moving to the turbocharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder VTEC engine, the flywheel is lighter and the air intake capacity greater, resulting in slightly stronger peak outputs of 325bhp at 6500rpm and 310lb ft at 2200rpm (up 9bhp and 15lb ft).

As before, all of that is sent to the front axle via a fabulous six-speed manual gearbox and a mechanical limited-slip differential, while the brakes are four-piston Brembos.

The only disappointment was that the Type R gained weight between its generations, primarily due to the mandated addition of a petrol particulate filter - which also had a negative effect on the exhaust note.

Nonetheless, the FL5 feels like a racing homologation special on the road - like the FK8, only more so. To get the best out of it - the most satisfaction and feedback - you need to drive it hard, so it's a hot hatch for a serious driver who wants to extend it on challenging roads.

When you do uncork the Type R, you will find beautifully fluid suspension, which in combination with communicative steering makes pushing on intuitive and natural. It sticks to the road like no front-driven car has a right to - and has the power to really shoot you out of corners.

You soon get into a rhythm, with a real driver and machine relationship building, just like in any of the other all-time performance car greats.

You can choose from Comfort, Sport and +R modes; Comfort is all you really need in the UK, but there's also an Individual mode (unlike in the FK8) that lets you separately tweak things such as the engine note, steering weight, damper stiffness and more.

Whichever way you go, the FL5 is particularly good at making you feel at ease. The driving position is near enough spot on and the control weights feel just right. The comfortable and supportive seats locate you low enough to give a sports car feel, while offering plenty of adjustment, and other familiar touches like an aluminium gearknob and Alcantara-wrapped steering wheel are pleasing to touch and amp up the engagement factor.

Otherwise, it's all pretty familiar from the standard 11th-generation Civic, which is to say well built and easy to use - with what might be the best balance of physical switchgear to digital screens in the class.

In terms of practicality, it's on the larger side for a hatchback, so the cabin is roomy in both the front and the rear (although the Type R does lack a middle perch) and the boot is impressively capacious, at 410 litres.

If a hot hatch is to be your only car, that will make this Honda more usable than an equivalent Focus or Volkswagen Golf, at no penalty to your driving enjoyment.

What we said then

10 August 2025: "The 'FL5' Type R is a tribute to the skill and commitment of the people behind it, and a riot to drive as they intended. But they also intended it to be driven flat out: to set front-drive lap records. If you like a car that entertains at lesser speeds, it might feel like it's missing something. In the grander scheme of things, however, it will be the hot hatchback market that's missing something when Honda sells the last of these cars."

An owner's view

Steven Baker: "Having owned many a performance car over the years, I've come back to the Type R. It was a scary price to spend on a front-wheel-drive hatchback, but I have no regrets so far. It's definitely hardcore: the ride is firm and the road noise is obvious. But it's never uncomfortable to spend long periods of time in, because the steering, gearchange and driving position are spot on."

Buyer beware

Reliability: So far, most FL5 owners have reported flawless reliability, in typical Honda fashion. In the future, watch out for rattles and cracked or buckled wheels from the stiff suspension and low-profile tyres. Many cars will have been ragged and taken on track, so ensure the service history is bang up to date and the car has been generally looked after.

Modifications: Many modifications will be purely cosmetic, but some owners have fettled their cars' mechanicals. Make sure that any such mod was done by a reputable company with history. Aftermarket 18in alloys are often fitted for improved performance and ride comfort rather than simply for aesthetics, because the standard wheels are quite heavy.

Aloof character: Owners liken the FL5 to serious Porsche 911 variants. It's extremely capable and rewarding when you're pushing on but much of the time lacks excitement and personality. The preceding FK8 had a more aurally interesting soundtrack (blame legislation) and more torque steer with which to entertain drivers.

Refinement: This may be a fantastic all-rounder, but if you're looking for a quiet motorway cruiser, look elsewhere. Road noise in particular is pronounced, if not overbearing. The Volkswagen Golf R and Ford Focus ST are quieter. Owners report that lining the boot with sound-deadening material makes a big difference, however.

Also worth knowing

Honda sold the FL5 in just a single well-equipped specification in the UK and offered only three optional extras. These were paint colours other than grey, the Illumination Pack (comprising puddle lights and red ambient lighting inside) and the Carbon Pack (carbonfibre mirror caps, rear spoiler and diffuser, plus some interior bits).

In 2025 the UK received 10 of 40 Ultimate Edition cars, priced at £57,905. These were painted in signature Championship White with red racing stripes and gained extra carbonfibre, including for the rear wing, door sills and centre console.

Americans can buy the DE5 Acura Integra Type S, which is basically a rebodied FL5. It's probably a better car more of the time, with a fruitier exhaust, nicer interior and more sound deadening. It will be going on sale in Japan soon, so expect some to arrive in the UK not long after as grey imports.

How much to spend

£35,000-£38,999: Cars that have previously been written off or damaged.

£39,000-£43,999: Two- and three-year-old cars with 10,000 to 30,000 miles. Some Japanese-market grey imports are available for a little less, like for like.

£44,000-£50,000: Nearly new cars, around a year old and with fewer than 10,000 miles. Ultimate Editions will be at the top of this range or possibly even above if you can find one.

One we found

Honda Civic Type R 2.0 VTEC Turbo, 2023, 22k miles, £38,995: This is as cheap as a clean FL5 gets. This Championship White car is still owned by its original buyer and has had three services. It also comes with 18 months' worth of a Honda service plan.

I kerbed a wheel – but are car designers really to blame?

Sat, 22 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0100

I feel bad, but I wasn't being careless - are car design trends putting wheels needlessly at risk?

I have kerbed a wheel. Quite notably. This is something that deeply irritates and embarrasses me from a point of professional pride: not to blow my own trumpet, but I’m pretty good at parking cars. You probably are too, or you certainly would be if you had to shuffle them around a tight office car park as much as your Autocar correspondents do.

I wasn’t good on that morning, though – not two and a half hours into what would be a four-hour drive, when what I needed was a quick break.

For context, the road in question has marked parking bays along one side, empty, so I was just easing into one as I approached forwards. But it is a narrow road, so a parked car leaves enough room for just one car to pass it, and then without much generosity.

It is lined, as country town roads often are, on both sides by old-fashioned, rough-hewn, brick-shaped kerb stones – attractive and rustic but unforgiving.

I needed to be close to the kerb so that I wasn’t poking out into the road where my mirrors might receive a whack from a passing car or so that I didn’t squeeze one too far towards the kerb on the opposite side. I wanted to not be a bother.

My Skoda Kodiaq vRS is 1864mm wide across the body, 2133mm across the (extended) mirrors, so it isn’t a narrow car. Hence I wanted to park as close to the kerb as possible. These, then, are the excuses.

That’s not bad, a bit closer, a tiny bit, closer… graunch. Urgh. This is going to be a faff, and expensive. These kerbs really are unforgiving. And I feel terrible.

Should I, though, really?

I used to feel guilt when the shower cubicle in my hotel room leaked, say if its door or curtain didn’t secure properly or was located in the wrong place, so that when I got out of the shower I’d notice a pool of water on the bathroom floor. I’d diligently mop it up with towels while feeling like I’ve let the side down, of course. Very British: apologies, chaps.

But actually I’ve come to realise that this isn’t my fault at all. My shower at home doesn’t throw water over the bathroom floor, yet it was decorated and is maintained by me, and I’m not a bathroom expert. Hotel bathrooms are designed and made by people whose job it specifically and literally is, yet some of them still leak everywhere. Sort it out, hotel bathroom people. (Also if you could design it so I could turn on the water from outside without it splashing all over my arm, that would be super-helpful, thanks.)

Anyway, likewise, should I be tired of feeling that bad for kerbing an alloy wheel when I wasn’t being careless? I didn’t design the car to be two metres wide. I didn’t design it with 20in, black, polished alloy wheels that protrude from low-profile tyres. And is it realistic to expect that the people who built the original track during the medieval period could have anticipated and designed for its later conversion into a two-lane road and then, a er 600 years, the arrival of two-metre-wide cars with diamond-cut alloy wheels?

And should I be better at knowing to the nearest millimetre (I wanted to park within 100mm of the kerb, really) where my wheel is, when it’s maybe two and a half metres away from me and I can’t see it?

There is a limit, I think, to quite how guilty I should feel about that. What I could (and I acknowledge should) have done is stop ahead of the bay and reverse for the last few moments, with a lowered door mirror to help me, but you don’t get an excellent view of the Kodiaq, the focal length is maybe six metres and it still wouldn’t have shown me the front wheel (protruding more, on lock, than the rear one). The risk would still have been evident.

I don’t want to single out the Skoda here, by the way. It could – and would – have been anything that day. As previously with the bodywork of supercars, wheels are being increasingly placed in harm’s way needlessly. I still feel bad, but modern car design has got a case to answer.

MOT price hike: why it's worth paying more to your mechanic

Sat, 22 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

The Independent Garage Association has called for MOT prices to rise to £95 – and it makes perfect sense

I know what you’re thinking: motoring hacks get paid too much. What other credible reason could there be for one of their number (me) supporting a rise from £54.85 to £95 – or 72.7% – in the price of a standard annual MOT car test.

This dramatic move is about to be proposed in all seriousness by the Independent Garage Association when it holds talks with the government aimed at lifting the current MOT test price cap. I reckon it’s not just a thoroughly good idea: it’s long overdue.

There are many good reasons, but two stand out. First, the current test price has been in place since 2010. Twenty-ten! Which of us in other walks of life would tolerate doing something without a price rise for 16 years? Seasoned British MOT testers must have '£54.85' engraved on the insides of their skulls.

Second and most important, many of the small garages of this world are far less solvent than they used to be. MOT testing stations disappear with regularity because their proprietors can’t afford to stay in business. And if you consider – as industry stats show – that of the UK’s 35 million cars in regular use, 85% are more than three years old and thus need annual testing, it’s easy to see why we need healthy test stations, preferably staffed by contented, even-handed testers.

Further arithmetic shows that every year, 29.75 million cars, between three and 39 years old, need testing. Assuming testers don’t work Sundays, around 95,000 MOT tests are needed in this country every single day. It’s a serious business.

But there’s much more to this than statistics. It is inside the independent garages of Britain that most of our practical car knowledge reposes. It’s also where lifelong car enthusiasm burns brightest. I’m not knocking big-note dealerships; most are professional and ethical. They’re needed too. But as their Taj Mahal estates show, they’re often more motivated by a love of money than a love of cars.

Everyone has a small garage story, but here are a couple of mine. When I was young, working in the far north of Australia, I was offered my first job interview as a motoring journalist. This entailed an 1800-mile drive in my old Merc, broken beyond my means to repair it. There was one mechanic in town, Tom Brown by name, who said he’d fix it as long as I sent him the cash “when you can”. He also made sure I had £100 “to pay for the petrol south”. It took me five months to pay him back – and when we met again and I pressed the notes into his hand, he smiled so widely you’d have reckoned it was me doing the favour.

Much more recently, I enjoyed a continuing soap opera starring a master mechanic near Farnborough that our little community knew as Gerry the Genius. He was forever getting difficult cars back on the roads, casually discovering, for instance, that a super-expensive starter motor for an Alfa Romeo could actually be sourced at £20 from a crashed Vauxhall; that kind of thing.

Gerry was a genius with wiring too, having been involved further back in his career with intricate, secret work for a nearby defence supplier. He was amazingly dextrous; locals who couldn’t get a new headlight bulb to fit (many are impossible these days) would bring it for Gerry to sort with a twist of the wrist. Any cost? Nah.

His finest hour – that I saw, at least – was the repair of a well-used but much loved Audi. The car had been rear-ended at low speed by a tractor, and the damage to its tailgate and driver’s side rear pillar was horrible. The owner knew that telling his insurers wouldn’t work. They’d write it off over the phone. Gerry set to work, finding a new tailgate on eBay, drilling holes in the damaged pillar, adapting jacks as pullers, thinking and banging and beating and filing. And filling too, but not too much of that. He hated filler. All the time the banter continued, as it always does in these places, with Gerry’s amazing hands refusing to be distracted by the jokes.

In a few days, the Audi was done, including perfect painting, which Gerry seemed able to pull off behind a few sheets of plastic in his old barn without needing all the modern gubbins. History doesn't record the cost, but it won’t have been as much as £1000.

All of which is why I believe in these people, and thoroughly support anything that helps them stay in business.

As it turns out, I’ve got a test booked for a motorbike tomorrow at 7.30am. The tester, another sole trader and one of God’s good men, happened to hear that I was under time pressure so he offered what he calls “an emergency appointment”. He’ll be no pushover as a tester but I know that if the chain needs lube or one of the hydraulic reservoirs looks a bit low, he’ll sort it as he goes. It will be fine. So here’s to next time. And I hope it costs more.

Exclusive: Mercedes boss on why car fans will love its future EVs

Sat, 22 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

Its cars are becoming more electric and digital, but Merc's CEO won't lose sight of the brand's spirit

Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius is clearly proud of the new C-Class Electric saloon. Proud enough to travel from Stuttgart to Helsinki to pop into the launch event and, after spending 20 minutes fielding questions from a buying pack of eager reporters, take me on a private 45-minute drive of the Finnish countryside. He wants to show off this car and is keen for Autocar readers to understand what it can do.

“It’s nice and quiet and feels more like an E-Class,” says Källenius, as we glide along in notable tranquillity. “We’re doing 80kph [50mph] now, but if we were on the autobahn doing 200 [124] you’d have the same feeling…"

At this point Källenius is interrupted, not by me with a probing follow-up question but by the C-Class itself: “The feeling of driving at high speeds on the autobahn can be exhilarating.”

Having his own car vocally interrupt an interview is a first for Källenius, but this surreal moment encapsulates the complex, balanced transition that Mercedes is undergoing, as it adds huge digital capabilities to its vehicles while still maintaining the traditional premium strengths that have underpinned them for 140 years.

With its first generation of electric vehicles, Mercedes kept the two strands separate – for example, selling the EQE beside the combustion-engined E-Class. But the new C-Class and closely related GLC mark a distinct shift in offering you the choice of powertrain – albeit with the ICE and EV versions built on different platforms.

“We had buyers enter the brand with those first electric models in the market. They learned to love Mercedes later in their life, maybe,” says Källenius. “The traditional Mercedes customers are now coming into this. But if they still want a high-tech combustion engine, we can do that. It’s not a problem. Customers will decide when to switch at their own convenience.”

The introduction of the new MMA and MB.EA electric platforms (which respectively underpin the new CLA and GLA and new C-Class and GLC) has kick-started a rapid rollout of new EVs, along with heavy updates to keep their ICE equivalents in line. Mercedes is midway through launching 40 models in three years by the end of 2027. Even for an industry giant, that’s a huge undertaking.

“The key is a thought-through architecture strategy,” says Källenius. “If every nut and bolt on every one of those cars was new, you could never do it, but if you have a modular strategy and an operating system platform strategy – the whole brain and central nervous system of the car – you don’t have to fundamentally develop a new each time.”

Thus the MB.OS operating system of the C-Class Electric in which we’re currently sitting is also used in the new GLC and CLA EVs as well as the new ICE S-Class and forthcoming ICE C-Class. As Källenius notes, it’s not only Mercedes’ new generation of EVs that will be ‘software-defined vehicles’.

Källenius has been chairman and CEO of Mercedes-Benz since 2019, when he took over from the much-admired Dieter Zetsche. Having worked for the company since 1993, he was an establishment choice, but the Swede was still a notable appointment as the first non-German to lead Mercedes (his wife is German and he now holds dual citizenship).

Automotive CEOs usually come from either a business or engineering focus, but Källenius’s 33-year career has spanned every aspect of the firm.

“I started my career as a trainee on the management side and meandered over to the engineering side,” he laughs. He initially worked in procurement (“if you work in procurement and supply, you’re like the wingman of the engineers”), eventually being made executive director of operations for McLaren in 2003, when Woking was developing the SLR McLaren. From there he had stints running Mercedes’ Formula 1 engine division in Brixworth and its US arm, then in 2010 returned to Germany to lead Mercedes-AMG. He joined the board of management in 2015, leading sales then engineering before becoming CEO.

“I went through production, management and sales and then ended up as engineering director for the whole company,” says Källenius.

“But I do believe that fundamentally, if you’re working for a car company, whatever you do centres around the product and the technology. You must have that constant curiosity to look at what’s happening with the product. Technology remains at the centre of Mercedes’ strategy.”

Electric cars and software remain hard sells to some car fans – especially the sort Källenius tried to appeal to in his AMG days. So how do you make people who grew up debating V8 and V12 engines excited about improved inverters and faster computer chips?

“For traditional car nuts it feels like you’re learning a new language,” he acknowledges, “but are you really? When I was in uni, it was: ‘Do you have a 386 or a 486 processor on your massively heavy laptop?’ The technology race has always been there as a combination of hardware and software, but now you have that in cars too, and you’re then talking about: ‘Okay, how many tops [trillion operations per second] do you have?’

“Why do you need tops? Well, you need tops to power very sophisticated generative AI-based end-to-end software models, and if you don’t have the ‘horsepower’ to do that, you don’t have the driving features. The horsepower of the digital side is provided by chipsets.”

So how much of Källenius’s time as Mercedes CEO is spent debating tops and chipsets and how much is spent sitting, like he is now, behind the wheel of a new car for evaluation?

“The board drives and evaluates everything, because at the very end the buck stops with us,” he says. “But I’m the first to admit the excellent engineers we have are better trained than us to do that. It’s not our job to do their job. But we are customers too. When I test a car, I put myself in customer mode. How would I feel if I’d spent €60,000 [£51,000] or so to buy this? Is it really delivering? Then we debate that.

“The fine-tuning of the chassis and handling and so on is vital, because it’s a Mercedes, right? But now we spent a lot of time working on the UI [user interface] and digital side.”

But don’t think that the firm is now so focused on technology that the human element is lost because, well, it’s a Mercedes, right?

“It’s a science and an art,” says Källenius. “You can measure everything, such as the hertz frequency of the movement in the chassis, but it’s the experts who ultimately sign off the car and set how it rides and drives.

“There’s a human component to that: it’s like they have sensors in their bodies somehow that translate into the perfect set-up. Different brands have different characteristics, and Mercedes customers have an expectation to feel safe and in control and comfort but to know they can push it if they want to.”

With his experiences at McLaren and AMG, Källenius maintains a particular interest in ensuring that Mercedes continues to deliver when people want to push their cars. He recalls fondly taking part in track days with friends during his six-and-a-half-year stint in the UK (“my favourite circuit was Goodwood, which is just fantastic to go round”) and is clear that he wants the Affalterbach division to keep growing.

“Our intent is to over-proportionally grow the performance side of the business,” he says – something that he’s sure will appeal to, well, you. “Having been more or less a lifelong Autocar reader, I know that Autocar readers know their stuff about sports cars,” he laughs.

AMG is now beginning to develop cars atop bespoke platforms to maximise their performance, albeit using the wider synergies of the company (“the way a climate control system works, do you need an AMG version? No, you don’t”), but Källenius insists that there will remain “cross-fertilisation” between those models and the wider Mercedes line-up.

Exclusive: Ola Källenius promises next AMG GT will be "insane"

One example of that is the new AMG CLA 45, which features an electric powertrain that can simulate a V8 engine, down to pops and bangs and feedback on the virtual gearchanges.

“When I first drove the CLA 45 with that system, I was like a born-again Christian,” says Källenius. “It was the best V8 I’d ever driven: it had all the feeling of a V8 but with more power and torque.”

Not that a virtual, electric V8 is about to replace the real thing: while Källenius thinks that the industry has “turned a corner” on the road to electrification, he admits that “the consumer is not quite there yet”.

He says that Mercedes “didn’t wobble” from its ultimate goal of becoming electric-only but nor did it abandon its commitment to “high-tech electrified combustion engines”.

Another area where Mercedes has maintained a singular focus is in its commitment to keeping its knowledge in-house. Aside from Smart, now a 50:50 joint venture with Geely, the company has eschewed the general industry trend of forming partnerships with other manufacturers.

That, says Källenius, is because “if you have the ambition to be a global leading player, you have to know the whole thing. So we have deep partnerships with tech companies and traditional suppliers but we remain the architects of the cars.”

Sadly, with Källenius turning the C-Class back into the entrance for the launch venue, it’s time for us to leave this comfortable house on wheels. But, I wonder, with electrification now mainstream and software-defined vehicles on the road, will car development start to slow down soon?

“I think it’s going to speed up,” counters Källenius. “With AI, who knows what’s going to happen? And the process of development is also speeding up.

“[Our company founder] Karl Benz once said: ‘The love of inventing never dies.’ It’s like in F1: every time you believe you have found the last nine-thousandths of a second, there’s always a new idea. It just never stops.”

GM reviewing plans to relaunch Cadillac in UK

Fri, 21 Aug 2026 13:00:00 +0100

US brand planned to launch cars in the UK this year, but is reconsidering as market "evolves rapidly"

General Motors is reconsidering its plan to relaunch Cadillac in the UK, citing uncertainty in a "rapidly evolving" marketplace.

Speaking to Autocar last year when he was CEO of GM Europe, Pere Brugal said the brand would return "soon", starting with the Lyriq - a rival for the BMW iX5 and Mercedes-Benz EQE SUV. He called the UK "one of the [markets] that we're focusing on" and said a launch was "coming close".

But the company has yet to make a firm commitment on a launch date and, a year later, has set up only one dealer for right-hand-drive Cadillacs: Charles Hurst in Dublin, Ireland, which offers the Lyriq alongside the smaller Optiq and seven-seat Vistiq.

Just 20 Cadillacs were registered in the UK between July 2025 and March 2026. Of these, 16 were the new EV models. GM-authorised and London-based dealer Clive Sutton continues to import left-hand-drive Cadillac Escalades.

A GM spokesperson told Autocar: "As the UK market and EV landscape continues to evolve rapidly with new competitors emerging, we are actively reviewing our future Cadillac plans to ensure they remain aligned with market conditions and customer demand, and we will continue to assess future opportunities accordingly."

The threat of new Chinese brands in the premium sector has left little room for Cadillac to break ground in the UK. Many newcomers have launched electric SUVs comparable to those of the US marque. Also, Europe's biggest premium brands - chiefly BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Volvo - have recently launched new and upgraded models.

The reappraisal comes as Cadillac adjusts its wider global strategy. The brand had originally planned to go electric-only by 2030. However, on its recent first-half earnings call, GM CEO Mary Barra said: "Starting next spring and continuing into 2028, we will begin launching the next generation of Cadillac ICE vehicles." A new generation of the CT5 - its BMW 5 Series rival - is among these models.

Aion to Zenvo: Every new car coming to the UK in 2026 and 2027

Fri, 21 Aug 2026 11:10:51 +0100

This is your handy guide to every new car coming in 2026 and 2027

This year has already been one of the busiest yet for the car industry, with plenty of models – and entirely new brands – making their debuts.

And the momentum will only keep rolling as 2027 approaches, bringing high-profile arrivals from all corners of the world.

From the baby EVs that didn't seem possible only a few years ago to rip-snorting V8 supercars and VIP-hauling vans, there's something here to catch the eye of everyone.

Here's our breakdown of every new car coming to the UK in 2026 and 2027, from Aion to Zenvo.

Every new car coming in 2026

Aion UT

On sale October

New to the UK but long established in China, Aion is adding this Volkswagen ID 3 rival to its line-up in the coming weeks. Due to be priced from £28,950, it has 204bhp and a range of 268 miles.

Everything you need to know about the Aion UT

Alpine A110 EV

On sale 2027

The long-awaited follow-up to one of the best sports cars in decades will be electric – and, Alpine's bosses claim, even better for it.

The new Alpine Performance Platform will allow similarly low-slung proportions to those of the old A110, thanks to its use of two battery packs: one under the front bonnet and the other where an engine would traditionally sit.

Everything we know about the Alpine A110 EV

Aston Martin Valen

On sale 2027

Crikey. This £1.5 million limited-run supercar is the most powerful front-engined car yet, boosting the Vanquish's 5.2-litre twin-turbo V12 to 838bhp. It also introduces more aggressive design cues that could influence future Astons, including an angry snout.

Everything you need to know about the Aston Martin Valen

Audi A2 E-tron

On sale December

New EV riffs on the cult-classic, MPV-aping supermini. Just like the original, it is focused strictly on efficiency: even the sidewalls of its tyres are shaved down to reduce drag.

It will be the new entry-level Audi, indirectly replacing the A1 and Q2 that went out of production earlier this year, with pricing tipped to start around £30,000.

Read our review of an Audi A2 E-tron prototype

Audi A6 Allroad

On sale October

Allroads lead to this: a comeback for Audi’s 4x4-lite sub-brand. This jacked-up, bulked-out take on the latest combustion-engined A6 estate is the first in a new line of rugged executive cars.

Everything you need to know about the new Audi A6 Allroad

Audi Nuvolari

On sale 2027

Surprise replacement for the R8 – at least in spirit – puts striking new bodywork on the Lamborghini Temerario's underpinnings. It is the first car to wear Audi's new look, and it serves as a "statement for the future".

Everything you need to know about the Audi Nuvolari

Audi Q7

On sale September

Audi reinvents its seven-seat SUV with clever interior tech which includes MagSafe wireless phone chargers that prevent your mobile from going flying as soon as you approach a slight curve. It keeps diesel power, too.

Read our Audi Q7 review

Audi Q9

On sale December

Indirect replacement for the A8 saloon is a towering SUV – so wide that it won't fit through a great many of the UK's urban width restrictors. European cars will be offered with a diesel V6 at first, while the US and Middle Eastern markets get the option of a 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8.

Everything you need to know about the Audi Q9

Bentley Torcal

On sale 2027

This is a big moment for a mainstay of the luxury market: it's Bentley's first electric car.

Closely related to the Porsche Cayenne Electric, it could pack north of 1000bhp in its most potent form and will offer a range of more than 300 miles. And, rather than replicating the roar of a big combustion engine, its acceleration will be soundtracked by drums.

Everything we know about the Bentley Torcal

BMW 7 Series

On sale December

New look shrinks the limousine's mahoosive front grille, and there are big changes inside. The electric i7 will now be capable of covering 457 miles between charges.

Everything we know about the new BMW 7 Series

BMW i3

Read our Denza Bao 5 review

Denza Z

BYD goes Porsche 911 hunting with this sleek electric sports car packing a big punch: its three motors combine for 1584bhp, allowing it to hit 62mph from rest in 1.96sec.

Read our Denza Z review

DS No7

On sale October

Couture rebrand is intended to drag the French firm back into the fray with an edgier design and the addition of an electric model with a range of 460 miles.

Read our DS No7 review

Ferrari 12Cilindri Manuale

On sale 2027

The first manually shifted Ferrari in 14 years – and the first with a V12 since the 599 GTB – is a £508k special edition of the 12Cilindri. Curiously, it retains the existing 12Cilindri's dual-clutch automatic gearbox: gears are rowed not through a physical linkage but by wire, meaning it can still be used in automatic mode if so desired.

Everything you need to know about the Ferrari 12Cilindri Manuale

Fiat 500 Hybrid

On sale September

The petrol-powered 500 returns. Sort of. A beardy 64bhp 1.0-litre engine has been crammed into the 500e's EV platform – just don't mention the 16.2sec 0-62mph time.

Read our Fiat 500 Hybrid review

On sale 2027

The drop-top G-Class returns after more than a decade.

Everything we know about the new Mercedes G-Class Cabriolet

Mercedes-AMG GT 4-Door Coupé

On sale September

The future of Mercedes' performance arm is a car of big numbers: 1169bhp, £150,000 and 432 miles of range, to name a few. The range-topping GT 63 also replicates the sound and vibration of AMG's signature V8s, but, curiously, the lower-rung 53 variant has a straight-six character instead.

Read our first drive review of an AMG GT 4-Door Coupé prototype

On sale 2027

Based on the Renault Twingo, this electric city car is expected to become Nissan's most affordable model when it arrives next year. It will draw on the brand's 'Pike Cars' from the 1980s and ’90s for a cute retro design.

Everything you need to know about the Nissan Wave

Omoda 4

On sale November

Yet another Chinese SUV, but this time a pretty eye-catching one that draws inspiration by outer space. Expect both ICE and electric versions.

Peugeot e-208 GTi

On sale June

The first Peugeot GTi in yonks is unashamedly inspired by the legendary hot 205. It has the mettle to back it, too, with a 277bhp electric motor and a limited-slip differential.

Everything we know about the new Peugeot e-208 GTi

Polestar 4 SUV

On sale 2027

Swedish brand's strange coupé-crossover gets a rear window as it becomes a more traditional family SUV. It will be vital for growing sales as Polestar faces financial struggles.

Everything we know about the Polestar 4 SUV

On sale 2027

Like the Honda Super-N, the e-Sky will be based on one of Japan's diminutive kei cars. To that end, expect a low price and outsized practicality for such a small car.

Everything you need to know about the Suzuki e-Sky

Toyota GR GT

On sale 2027

After years of rumours, teasers and concepts, Toyota's thoroughbred is finally here. Packing a hybridised twin-turbocharged 4.0-litre V8, the GR GT puts out 641bhp and 627lb ft, although Toyota has said these numbers could increase as development continues. It's targeting a top speed of 198mph.

Notably, there isn't a single Toyota badge on it. We're keenly awaiting our first go, but we expect it to become a mainstay of the race track before hitting the road in significant numbers.

Everything we know about the Toyota GR GT

Toyota Yaris Cross

On sale October

Big-selling hybrid crossover gets a light retouch with a honeycomb grille and new headlights. The entry-level 116bhp model has been dropped, but prices across the rest of the range aren't expected to change significantly.

Everything we know about the updated Toyota Yaris Cross

Vauxhall Corsa GSE

On sale September

Vauxhall hot hatches are back! The new Corsa GSE is the brand's first spicy supermini since the Corsa VXR was discontinued more than eight years ago, and it packs nearly twice as much power as the regular Corsa Electric. It also gets an overhauled chassis and styling inspired by the classic Nova GSi.

Everything we know about the Vauxhall Corsa GSE

Volkswagen Golf Hybrid

Autobots, roll out - meet the androids changing car factories for good

Fri, 21 Aug 2026 11:00:00 +0100

BMW last year used its Figure 02 robot to support the production of more than 30,000 X3s

Autonomous features are turning cars into robots that nag you into paying attention, flash speed limit warnings and slam on the brakes if you’re about to hit something.

Fully autonomous taxis and delivery vehicles are on the way, and before long we may see fully autonomous private cars.

On top of all that, the way cars are produced is also becoming increasingly robotic.

Robots have been used to build cars for more than 40 years. In the past they didn’t resemble the two-armed, two-legged sci-fi variety, but that’s changing, and humanoid robots are already working alongside real people – and the drive to increase their cognitive ability is under way.

The Hyundai Group liked what pioneering robot manufacturer Boston Dynamics was doing so much that it bought the company. And Ford is using a Boston Dynamics Spot robot under the watchful eye of its handler at the Halewood plant. It’s fitted with thermal cameras and microphones for detecting heat changes and air leaks to prevent equipment failure and downtime. Spot uses lidar to help it navigate the factory, and it knows to give people the right of way and to stop should anyone get within two metres of it.

The use of those two-legged machines is on the rise. Boston Dynamics’ latest creation, Atlas, is a 6ft 2in, 90kg, ‘general purpose humanoid’, and Hyundai intends to mass produce it for use across industrial sites.

By 2028 Atlas will be deployed at the Hyundai Group Metaplant America, a new EV plant that makes the Ioniq 5, Ioniq 9 and Sportage Hybrid. The robot’s AI-driven ‘brain’ will be directed to perform ‘sequencing tasks’, which in manufacturing means selecting components and delivering them to a production line in the right sequence, at the right time.

BMW introduced a humanoid robot, Figure 02, in collaboration with tech company Figure AI, at Plant Spartanburg in South Carolina last year. Figure 02 supported the manufacture of 30,000-plus BMW X3s over 10 months in the body shop, inserting sheet metal parts for welding. BMW is now moving to Figure 03, which has wireless charging, soft components for safety and speech-to-speech communication. It also has more human-like hands with tactile sensors and cameras to increase precision and dexterity.

Elsewhere, scientists at Queen Mary University, London, have come up with a new sensor that generates an array of different colours when pressure is applied. Mounted in robotic fingertips, along with a camera inside each finger, this will allow robotic hands to ‘see’ touch and respond with greater sensitivity. Applications for it could include prosthetics and surgery as well as precision manufacturing.

How long will the battery last in my electric car?

Fri, 21 Aug 2026 08:54:33 +0100

Should you be worried about the battery life of an electric car? Not if you pay close attention to our guide

For many car owners, the electric car represents an entirely new way of driving and brings with it many queries and worries. One of the largest concerns is how long the battery life is on an electric car.

You may well have read horror stories about electric car owners facing hefty bills for replacements or contemplating cutting their losses on cars that are otherwise worthless because they literally don't work.

And it’s not hard to see where these rumours and anecdotes come from, because our extensive experience of mobile phones, tablets and laptop computers has shown many that, even over a relatively short period of time, the batteries powering them can quickly lose efficiency, resulting in the need for more frequent charging.

In extreme cases, the degradation is so severe that the device won’t even fire up unless it’s permanently on charge, which is obviously no use for an EV.

There’s also no denying that battery technology doesn’t come cheap, and should the cells ever need replacement, it’s quite likely that they will cost more to swap than the car is now worth - which is why we tend to replace mobile phones in their entirety rather than replace the battery pack.

Battery swapping stations, where depleted electric car batteries can be changed for fully charged ones in mere minutes, are beginning to crop up in Europe and may offer an answer to battery life queries.

But how bad is the electric car battery problem really? The good news is that the more electric cars that are out there and the longer they are run for, the more evidence is produced to show that the power pack will often last the lifetime of the car.

Better still, there are plenty of tips and strategies you can follow to make sure your car’s batteries will survive better than most.

Battery life for electric cars

Generally, electric car batteries last for as long as the rest of the car. But like with your phone or laptop battery, they degrade over time.

Ultimately, the cells should still have at least 70% of their capacity even after 200,000 miles, which is the sort of mileage that few cars ever reach, whether they’re combustion-engined or electric.

As an example, a number of Tesla Model S taxis operating from Gatwick airport racked up more 300,000 miles each over three years and all retained at least 82% battery health.

Why does an electric car battery lose charge or degrade?

The truth is that batteries degrade over time and with use, meaning they become less efficient as they age and provide a shorter range.

Continual advances in battery technology mean that issues surrounding degradation of performance are being reduced all the time. However, even the latest lithium ion cells aren’t completely immune to losing performance over time, with a number of factors playing a role.

Perhaps the biggest single contributor to the decline in efficiency is the cycle of use and charging. Frequent draining of the cells followed by a full charge can over time damage the battery’s ability to maintain its optimum energy storage. That's why manufacturers typically recommend charging only to 80% and never letting the range drop to zero miles.

Rapid charging also plays a part, because channelling so much electrical energy and so quickly generates much higher temperatures in the battery pack.

Liquid cooling of the cells helps mitigate this, but use a rapid charger frequently and over time these extreme heat cycles will cause damage to the lithium ion packs.

In a similar but less extreme way, cars that are used in hotter climates tend to suffer a subtly greater reduction in performance than those used in cooler conditions.

How long do Tesla batteries last?

Tesla claims its batteries last between 300,000 and 500,000 miles. For a Tesla Model 3 Long Range with a 436-mile WLTP range, that makes for between 700 and 1500 battery charge cycles.

We have experience running used Teslas on our fleet, including a four-year-old used Tesla Model 3 that had covered roughly 40,000 miles. Despite this, its battery had degraded only 2%.

Hundreds of other examples point to our findings too, so it's safe to say that Tesla batteries can last for a long time and hold their all important percentages.

How can I care for my electric car battery?

Happily, there are ways you can help preserve the power and efficiency of your battery over time. One of the major ways of protecting the cells is by carefully managing the charging and discharging of the cells, which in an ideal world means trying to avoid the charge dropping below 20% and not adding more than 80% when charging - above the latter figure is when batteries tend to get hottest, which takes a toll on the cells’ delicate chemistry.

Happily, most EVs now give you the option to programme your car’s charging schedule, allowing you to decide when the electricity flows and, crucially, letting you set a cap on exactly how much pours into the cells.

By the same token, it’s best not to completely drain the battery. Most EVs will always make sure there’s a bare minimum of energy left even if it won’t allow the car to move, but storing your car for long periods and allowing electricity to leech away is to be avoided.

Speaking of charging, it’s best to only use DC rapid chargers sparingly. Although fine for topping up on longer journeys or in emergencies when you need a quick burst of energy, a by-product of rapid chargers’ speed is the increased, lithium-ion-damaging temperatures in the battery as it copes with the electrical onslaught.

If the car is to be used in extremes of hot or cold weather, always make sure the car is plugged in to charge (with the maximum limit set to 80%, of course) regardless of range. This trickle-charging technique allows the battery’s thermal management system to continue working and keep the cells at the optimum temperature for longevity.

Finally, the way you drive your EV can affect its battery life. Much like rapid charging, quick depletion of the cells can cause damage that over time will lead to reduced efficiency and range. Ultimately, the faster you drive and the more you make use of an EV’s trademark instant torque for lightning getaways, the more you cause damaging heat build-up in the battery. So it’s best to take it steady if you want longevity.

Electric car battery warranties

Manufacturers are acutely aware that potential electric car buyers could be put off by the possibility of premature and expensive battery failure. The truth is that when treated correctly, most modern lithium ion batteries are likely to last the lifetime of the car. Even so, most firms cover the battery with a separate, extended warranty.

Most car warranties are around three years and 60,000 miles, but this is increased for the battery element in EVs. For instance, Audi, BMW, Jaguar, Nissan and Renault cover the cells for eight years and 100,000 miles, while Hyundai ups the mileage limit to 125,000.

Tesla has the same eight-year timeframe but a mileage limit of 150,000 on the Model S and Model X, 120,000 on the Model 3 Long Range and 100,000 on all other versions.

And apart from Audi and Tesla, most include a maximum allowable capacity (between 70 and 75%) for the battery, which will trigger a replacement if it dips below this figure during the warranty period.

Inside the new tests making ADAS systems you'll actually want to use

Fri, 21 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

Driver assistance systems annoy motorists on real roads, but testing body Thatcham Research is on the case

Just inches from the crash test mock-up of a compact SUV, the automatic emergency braking system (AEB) fitted to the Tesla Model Y that is travelling at 12kph towards it deploys, bringing the car to a dead stop.

The test is repeated but now at 6kph. This time the AEB doesn't deploy, forcing driver Yousif Al-Ani, principal ADAS engineer at Thatcham Research, to apply the brakes instead.

He now swaps the Tesla for a BYD Dolphin Surf. It approaches the target but this time at just 4kph. The AEB cuts in as expected, bringing the car to a stop, but then, two or three seconds later, it drives on. Al-Ani brakes but, as he points out, were this a live scenario - a busy roundabout, for example, where the driver of the BYD mistakenly believes the car in front has pulled away - they could be facing an angry driver and an expensive insurance claim. Had the car they'd rear-ended been a pedestrian instead, the consequences could be far more serious.

These events are a fraction of what Al-Ani and his team of engineers based at Retford Gamston airport - owned by Thatcham Research and where the organisation tests vehicle safety and technology - are discovering about AEB and the other features collectively known as advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS).

They know what each is designed to do to satisfy GSR2, the EU safety regulation that mandates them. What the members of Thatcham's event-based testing programme have been doing since it was launched in September last year is understanding how they work in the real world during repeated use, partly on a closed track but mainly on public roads, away from the EU's controlled test environments. The results have surprised them.

Four years since GSR2 came into force, many drivers are familiar with how annoying some ADAS features can be with their often indeterminate warning noises, aggressive lane departure corrections, inconsistent and erroneous speed sign recognition and hesitant autopilot behaviours.

The Kia Sportage Hybrid that I drove to Gamston applied moderately aggressive steering corrections and sounded frequent alerts in response to speed limit breaches and changes (thankfully, different sounds for each). Meanwhile, in a review of the Leapmotor B10 recently, Autocar's tester described the vehicle's ADAS functions as "some of the most annoying yet fitted to a car. The lane keeping assistance tugs the wheel very aggressively and there's an orchestra of bings and bongs that are hard to tell apart."

Al-Ani is acutely aware that badly designed functions undermine the safety argument for ADAS but says car makers are deaf to the subjective criticism that characterises current debate.

"If you go to a manufacturer with subjective feedback on their product, they're not interested," he says. "However, if you go to them with objective data - 'Here are the logs. Your car has done this this many times. This is the real-world impact. This is what it's going to cost you in insurance' - they're very responsive to having that conversation." Thatcham's ADAS test project aims to generate data that will make them take notice.

Al-Ani and his team use a comprehensive instrumentation system to measure the circumstances around the multiple deployments of each ADAS feature they test, plus its performance in terms of its availability (when and how often it deploys), its ability to collaborate with the driver (whether it can be adjusted on the fly) and its configurability (whether it can be customised).

Whether or not warning sounds are differentiated, so that the driver knows what they're being alerted to, is also recorded. Performance is tested in all weather conditions and on all types of roads.

Ultimately, it comes down to how usable an ADAS feature is, and if it isn't, whether it will cause drivers to switch it off. To help judge this, the team also scores each system on factors such as how annoying it is, how often it does something they don't want it to do and how often it intervenes when it shouldn't.

"With our knowledge of each system's limitations, we can tell manufacturers that if they make a system to this level, most drivers will accept it, but if it's below that, they will turn it off," says Al-Ani. "We can tell insurers what is likely to happen when the system is used for real and manufacturers what more they need to do to improve it. We can also go to the regulators and tell them that if they're considering adopting a system for GSR2 or for GB type approval, these are the tweaks they should consider that will mean people actually use the system."

Among the team's more startling discoveries so far is how the current EU test standard for intelligent speed assist (ISA) may not be fit for purpose. For this test, ISA systems are assessed based on their accuracy over distance travelled but it can overlook performance at key moments, such as when speed limits change. In contrast, Thatcham's event-based testing measures ISA's accuracy at each of these change points. When applied in real-world conditions across three vehicles, it produced very different results.

The worst-performing vehicle, an MG ZS, scored 91.3% accuracy across the driven distance, but when assessed on an event-based metric, Thatcham found that its ISA was 74.3% accurate. So in around one in four events, its ISA was displaying the wrong speed limit.

The best-performing vehicle, a BMW i5, scored 98.39% and 90.3% respectively. Al-Ani is unimpressed: "Even the i5, the best ISA of the three cars on our test fleet, is wrong in one in every 10 events. That's not good enough." Thatcham also found the ISA systems it tested displayed speed limits that aren't legal in the UK. They included multiple instances of 5, 10, 15 and 100mph.

"When ISA misreads speed limits, it can lead to unexpected or inconsistent system responses. Over time, this risks reducing driver confidence in the technology, which is critical to achieving its intended safety benefits," says Al-Ani.

What follows is the scenario where the first thing a driver does on entering their car is turn off as many of its ADAS features as possible. Al-Ani sympathises but believes that greater configurability of systems is the correct way forward. "If the ALK [active lane keeping] is too sensitive, rather than turn it off you should be able to turn it down. BMW is getting very good at offering levels of configurability so the driver can set up the system the way they like it and it stays that way. You don't have to reset it when restarting the car. Until ADAS have improved sufficiently, that's a better condition to have."

On the road with Thatcham

Thatcham Research's event-based ADAS test programme takes place mainly on public roads but also, for more controlled work, on a closed circuit. Three cars are used: a BMW i5, Tesla Model Y and MG ZS. In terms of their ADAS, says principal ADAS engineer Yousif Al-Ani, they represent around 10% of new cars.

Each car sports a roof-mounted, 360deg lidar plus cameras inside for recording the infotainment screen and ADAS functions. These provide forward and roadside views that are key to recording the presence of speed signs and lane markings and the car's position relative to them.

Driving the Model Y, Al-Ani showed how its ADAS can do things that prompt drivers to switch it off. The first was how, in autopilot mode, the car slowed excessively for a sharp corner on a main road. Then, entering a built-up area and rounding a corner, it braked excessively for a parked vehicle.

"This car has software designed only to pass the EU regulation," says Al-Ani. "In the slow-moving queue we've joined it's brilliant, but for many drivers its unpredictability is enough to discourage them from using it at all."

Al-Ani is critical of the way the Tesla's system disengages each time he makes the slightest correction: "It's not collaborating with me, so I become frustrated and leave it off."

Later, a bus turns into our road from the right while, a little way ahead, a pedestrian crosses in front of us: "The car braked for the bus when it needn't have and the steering correction was for the pedestrian who was still a safe distance away. The system then disengaged, leaving us in a bad situation with not much time to react. Working at its best, Tesla's system offers real benefits, but drivers need to understand its limitations."

Thatcham vs Euro NCAP

Like Thatcham Research, Euro NCAP, Europe's main vehicle safety body, is running a real-world test programme to make sure the ADAS technologies it judges in the laboratory are delivering in practice. Every vehicle that it tests is equipped with a suite of exterior and interior sensors to accurately monitor its system's responses to a variety of road signs and conditions. It is driven a total of around 1200 miles in at least three European countries and every reaction is logged.

"We have worked on ADAS for years and now we want to make sure the technologies are delivering not only on the test track but on the road," says Adriano Palao, ADAS technical manager at Euro NCAP. "For example, is the lane keeping assist annoying and aggressive? What is the accuracy of the speed limit information? Were there any false braking events? This is the first time we have sought to find out what is the experience of the end consumer."

Thatcham Research was an active member of Euro NCAP for 22 years but earlier this year ended its relationship to focus on its own test programmes.

Yousif Al-Ani, principal ADAS engineer at Thatcham Research, denies its departure risks weakening Thatcham's power to influence regulators and car makers. "We have quite a lot of power, actually," he says. "We hold the keys to motor insurance risk rating in the UK, the second-biggest car market in Europe. "Vehicle manufacturers listen to us when something threatens their customer base. It's no use having systems that work well in France or Germany where approval testing is carried out but not so well on British roads."

Insights from ADAS engineer Al-Ani

Lane keeping assist: "We didn't find a single false event in the BMW i5, while the MG ZS recorded just 0.43 per 100km. These latest systems display less aggressive assistance too."

Crash avoidance: "In a variety of scenarios, the Tesla Model Y deploys its brakes sooner than the other test cars, although the BMW i5 runs it close. However, instances where the test driver has to intervene are roughly equal between the Tesla and the BMW."

'Ghost braking': "Instances where the cars braked unnecessarily were greatest in the Tesla, at 122 events, versus eight in the BMW and six in the MG. The Tesla's sensitivity has been turned up to exceed the regulation but at the risk of annoying the driver, who will just switch it off. It avoids crashing but is overly sensitive."

Lane markings: "Almost a quarter of our test routes had no road markings, meaning we couldn't score a lane keeping event, because the system had nothing to detect. If you [the authorities] want to get the best benefit for road safety, leave the potholes and repaint all the lines."

AEB vs LKA: "Autonomous emergency braking has a much bigger impact on safety than lane keeping assist systems."

The case for testing: "ADAS can be incredibly effective. But how well vehicles perform outside the regulated test scenario and in all conditions and environments, that's a big unknown. For us it's about finding the differentiation."

Mercedes aims to stimulate luxury MPV market with plush new VLE

Fri, 21 Aug 2026 05:00:00 +0100

Luxurious new electric MPV looks to find success where the previous EQV didn't – and London will be key

Next year’s UK launch of the new Mercedes-Benz VLE will jump-start the market for high-end van-based people carriers from its current low base, predicts Mercedes’ head of vans in the UK.

The VLE is based on Mercedes’ new electric VAN.EA platform and will be positioned as a much more premium proposition than the current Vito-based EQV and combustion-engine V-Class.

“VLE will actually expand the market here in the UK. It's going to give us a much wider customer base,” Iain Forsyth, managing director of Mercedes-Benz Vans UK, told Autocar.

The EQV has struggled to find a market here in the UK. Just 32 examples were sold in the first six months of this year, down a third on the year before, according to figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders. The V-Class performed better, with sales of 842.

However, the VLE significantly raises the luxury factor with an optional MBUX Superscreen, panoramic roof, ambient lighting and 31.3in retractable rear display. Even higher-spec VLS and VLS Maybach versions are also planned. “They will be distinctly different from the Vito,” said Forsyth.

The vehicle has been given a new category title of 'Grand Limousine' on the brand’s website, a promotion from the EQV’s ‘Van’ label, and it promises to be a much more usable proposition for the target chauffeur market.

The new 115kWh battery for the launch 300 model offers up to 443 miles of range, compared with 222 miles for the current EQV with a 93kWh battery. The new model has much more charge power, at 300kW versus 110kW for the old one, which means less downtime for chauffeurs and taxi drivers.

All new private hire vehicles for the key London market must be zero-emission capable, according to Transport for London’s requirement, which means emitting no more than 75g/km of CO2 with a minimum 20-mile zero-emission range. Most of the big-mileage drivers have turned to plug-in hybrids, but Mercedes hopes the long range and fast charge capability of the VLE will persuade them to switch to electric.

“Private hire is really where a lot of the success will come from,” said Forsyth. The posh van has largely elbowed out the stretch limo and is probably squeezing the market for the S-Class, which logged 248 UK sales in the first six months, down 29%.

The unwieldiness associated with driving a van will be partly negated by the rear-wheel steering. “Manoeuvring the tight streets of London will definitely become much easier than that in a V-Class,” said Forsyth.

The brand is hopeful the long range will also appeal to families, whose choices for more car-like electric passenger vans are currently restricted to the Volkswagen ID Buzz and new Kia PV5.

UK prices have not yet been revealed but in Germany the VLE has been priced from €78,348 (£67,000), compared with €59,100 for the EQV with the smaller, 60kWh battery. A cheaper version of the VLE using an 80kWh battery with lower-cost lithium-iron-phosphate chemistry is also planned.

Production of the VLE has already started at Mercedes’ Spanish plant for “select markets”, including Germany.

The VLE makes for an upmarket launch for the VAN:EA platform, which will also underpin future replacements for the Vito. A combustion-engine version of the platform, called VAN:CA, is also planned and will be used to create passenger van versions, likely with the familiar Mercedes diesel.

The VLE, while a product of the highly profitable Mercedes Vans division, will stand outside the van organisation in the UK and be sold alongside the brand’s passenger cars.

Geely Monjaro coming to UK as big PHEV family SUV

Thu, 20 Aug 2026 15:02:44 +0100

Kodiaq-sized SUV is the fourth UK model from Volvo parent's own brand

China's Geely will go after the Peugeot 5008 and Skoda Kodiaq with a big plug-in hybrid SUV called the Monjaro.

Already on sale in the brand's home market as the Xingyue L, the Monjaro is a 4770mm-long crossover equipped with the same EM-i hybrid powertrain technology as the smaller Geely Starray.

The SUV will go on sale in Egypt in August before "steadily expanding into global markets". A European debut is set to follow soon, before a UK launch – likely next year.

The EM-i system is a new addition for the Monjaro, which is not yet offered with PHEV power in other global markets, and Geely has not yet given specific details of the powertrain.

The Starray EM-i uses a naturally aspirated 1.5-litre petrol engine and an electric motor to produce 258bhp, with the larger of two available battery options giving an engine-off range of 81 miles.

Unlike the front-driven Starray, however, the Monjaro's PHEV powertrain will drive both axles.

The Monjaro will face off with a growing number of Chinese D-segment hybrid SUVs in the UK, including the closely related Omoda 9 and Jaecoo 8, as well as the MG HS, BYD Seal-U and Leapmotor C10.

Geely has not given prices for the UK yet, but a starting price in the low £40,000s would position it clearly above the Starray while lining it up with those rivals.

The company says the Monjaro will be a "global advanced handling and quality benchmark among the D-SUV hybrid segment", and will serve as the flagship for its growing global line-up.

Cape Crusader: This MG ZR rally car conquered Africa and won't quit

Thu, 20 Aug 2026 13:00:00 +0100

This MG ZR took part in the 10k-mile London to Cape Town rally in 2012 – fourteen years later it's still going strong

Among the assorted hatchbacks competing in his local rally, Edward Luxton's MG ZR is something of a celebrity. Fourteen years ago, it took part in the London to Cape Town Rally - 29 days of hard driving across some of the world's most unforgiving terrain. Prepared by Owen Turner of Complete Rally Services and crewed by Rachel Vestey and Suzy Harvey, it finished 28th out of 41 cars.

And now here it is, at the ripe old age of 25, still doing the business but this time on a challenging course around a military base in north Devon. "It's my first time behind the wheel - until now I've been the navigator and Dad's done the driving - but I'm loving it!" says Edward, an apprentice with National Grid and soon to turn 19.

"It may be his last chance if he carries on the way he is," says his dad. It's banter, of course at this early stage of his career, it wouldn't do for the kid to be too cocky. In any case, out of the driving seat there's maintenance work to be done.

Edward lets slip that his dad has a collection of ZRs and Rover 25s that runs into double figures, most of them, like Edward's ZR, sourced from Facebook. More than 10? "A few more than that," he says.

It sounds crackers until you remember how popular the MG ZR once was. In fact, during the four years that it was on sale (from 2001 to 2005), it was one of Britain's most popular small sporting hatchbacks and it became a firm favourite with younger, cash-strapped drivers in its later years.

It was offered with a choice of engines - petrols represented by 16-valve K-series units ranging from a 1.4-litre to a range-topping 1.8-litre VVC producing 159bhp, and diesels by a 2.0-litre engine available in two power outputs. Towards the end of its life, it attracted the attention of designer Peter Stevens - of McLaren F1 supercar fame – who gave it a well-received facelift.

However, one thing bothers me about Edward's ZR: its engine. It's a 1.6. As far as I know, there was never a 1.6 ZR. Correction: there was a 1.6-litre engine but it was used only in the ZR's siblings, the Rover 25 and 45. The government's MOT check service confirms this car's engine capacity as a 1.6, so what's the explanation?

A call to Owen Turner provides the answer. "The class rules of the rally dictated that 1600cc was the maximum size, so I fitted engines from Rover 45s to the three ZRs I entered. The other two cars are also still being used," he says.

Staying with the MOT checker, the car's MOT history makes fascinating reading. Its 2012 test in particular reveals just what a state it was in on its return from the London to Cape Town Rally. It failed on 11 serious faults, most notably corrosion of all four coil springs.

Today, its suspension is in better shape largely thanks to that ZR/25 collection of Edward's dad, which, says Edward, exists to provide an inexhaustible supply of spare parts. "When something breaks on this one, we cannibalise another for its replacement," he says.

It sounds like a sad end for a once well-regarded model but at least those 10 or so ZRs/25s are helping to sustain one of their kin and a young man's dream of rally stardom.

Tesla Semi: 1073bhp, 325-mile electric lorry confirmed for Europe

Thu, 20 Aug 2026 11:28:03 +0100

Rival for the Mercedes eActros and MAN eTGX is bound for European roads following a facelift

The Tesla Semi will be sold in Europe, almost a full decade after the electric lorry was first unveiled.

The lorry – which was updated last year with fresh tech and a new look to bring it into line with the Model Y – will be presented at next month’s IAA Transportation show in Hanover, Germany. Tesla said it will confirm European specifications and launch plans at the event.

Tesla will be hoping that the Semi can invigorate the electric HGV segment in the same manner as it did with passenger cars a decade ago. Electric lorries from mainstream manufacturers are few and far between, and hauliers remain concerned about their range, charging and carrying capacities. To that end, Tesla claims the Semi is more powerful, more efficient and cheaper to operate than traditional lorries.

In the US, it is offered in two specifications. The Standard Range is claimed to be capable of covering 325 miles between charges and its tri-motor powertrain combines to send up to 1073bhp through its dual rear axles.

Tesla says it can replenish 60% of its range in 30min when connected to one of its Megachargers, which deliver up to 1200kW.

The Long Range version has the same powertrain, but an extended rear section of the cab holds additional batteries that boost its range to a claimed 500 miles.

It remains to be seen whether both versions of the Semi will be offered in Europe, but Tesla’s UK website quotes figures for only the Standard Range.

For reference, the 40-tonne MAN eTGX has power outputs of between 328bhp and 536bhp, ranges of up to 358 miles and the ability to recharge at up to 1000kW. The Mercedes eActros 600 has a range of 311 miles and is due to gain megawatt charging capabilities in the future.

The Semi was first revealed in 2017 but faced a stunted development cycle, and the first examples entered operation with PepsiCo in the US five years later. Tesla has yet to disclose how many Semis it has delivered but recently sold 500 examples to Swedish transport firm Einride, which is claimed to be the biggest single order for the lorry yet.

10,000rpm, £354k Ford Escort is a car 'nobody else could build'

Thu, 20 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

Boreham Motorworks is readying is official reimagining of the rally icon for early next year

Boreham Motorworks is putting the finishing touches to its £354k Mk1 Ford Escort continuation ahead of deliveries starting early next year - and its creators pledge that the retro, sub-tonne two-door will be unlike anything else available at this price point.

The Mk1 RS, having now been revealed in its final production form, is the first in a series of continuation cars created with the official blessing of Ford by a crack team of industry design and engineering heavyweights.

Boreham has already confirmed a new take on the RS200 Group B rally car, and the entire Ford catalogue is open to the British firm as it carves out a niche in the performance car market.

With the first customer handovers just months away, a test mule is currently being run around British proving grounds in a bid to break Boreham's screaming, race-honed 'Ten-K' engine - an entirely bespoke development that, as its name suggests, redlines at 10,000rpm.

With roughly as much power as a Volkswagen Golf R and weighing at least 100kg less than a Mazda MX-5, the Mk1 RS promises to be the quickest and most extreme road-going Escort yet.

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While Boreham has yet to reveal performance figures, it should keep pace with most modern supercars.

But beyond straight-line performance, Boreham is rigidly focused on ensuring its debut model is just as engaging to drive and usable day to day as similar-priced rivals from big-name manufacturers.

It will always be a more exclusive proposition, though. Production will ramp up slowly at first: only 10 cars are earmarked for production in 2027, to help isolate any potential hiccups early in the car's life cycle - and only 150 are planned in total.

Icon reinvented

"We didn't want a car that anybody would either consider or could capably build themselves," John Mitchell, Boreham's director of Ford Heritage (above, left), told Autocar.

A member of the original Ford Motorsport team responsible for all Escort RS models, as well as the Capri 2.8 Injection and the Sierra Cosworth, he added: "It just had to be different."

Stylist Wayne Burgess - previously a lead designer at JLR and Aston Martin - said his ambition was to build the Mk1 Escort he had always wanted, having previously owned five.

Its fundamental structure is based on that of the contemporary touring car campaigned by Alan Mann Racing - which Boreham is also now reproducing to its original specification.

This competition Escort had its front axle set 30mm further forward than the road-going car, which, explained Burgess, gives a better dash-to-axle ratio, improving its proportions.

"I'm going to sound like I'm describing a Jaguar E-Type here, but this car has all of those classical attributes," he said.

Burgess explained that he was "very concerned" with achieving the right relationship between the wheels and body.

At 15in, the alloys are larger than the original 13s, but they are still shod with thick-walled tyres, in order to preserve the Escort's signature look. Several designs of wheel will be offered, each paying tribute to those fitted in period, including Rostyles and Minilites.

Inside, concessions have been made to usability. There's now a Bluetooth stereo, air conditioning and backlit instruments. However, the rear seats have been removed.

The Escort's defining elements have been retained, though. While the six-dial instrument panel is "not the easiest thing to see through a steering wheel", according to Burgess, it had to remain in place as a signature element. "We fixed the crooked [offset] steering column but we kept the instruments," he said.

Likewise, there are Breitling rally timers and a five-speed dog-leg gearbox, stirred by a rally-style high-set lever, which was developed specifically by motorsport transmission specialist Holinger to give a precise, 'kerchunk' shift feel.

Of all the new elements on the Mk1 RS, Burgess highlighted the bonnet and boot hinges as among his favourites.

Having "never designed hinges in my life", he drew inspiration from the Spitfire model aircraft kits he made in his youth.

"The design content in this car - the design density - is way beyond a normal volume-production car," he added.

Under the skin

Chief technical officer Simon Goodliff said Boreham's ambition was to build a car with a "traditional approach but very modern technologies, materials and [methods]".

For example, there's electric power steering to assist with low-speed manoeuvring, but this is disengaged at higher speeds to allow greater feel.

The new car's basic formula mirrors that of the original, retaining a naturally aspirated four-cylinder engine, a manual gearbox and a live rear axle.

"We always wanted to have a live rear axle," said Goodliff. The independent-rear [suspension] Escorts are not the way to go."

Much work went into strengthening and lightening those components, however. The rear axle was completely redesigned. It now has a thin-walled casing for its Quaife torque-biasing limited-slip differential, with titanium tubes pressed into the casting, and gun-drilled driveshafts. The new axle saves 40kg alone.

Described as a "race engine" by Goodliff, the Ten-K produces 325bhp while weighing just 85kg. It's connected to a dry oil sump and breathes through individual throttle bodies, and a carbonfibre airbox is in development too.

"All in, with electric air conditioning and fully leathered, it weighs less than a tonne," said Goodliff. "Depending on the spec, we can build it down to 895kg."

Chinese car makers take a fifth of the UK market – can they keep growing?

Thu, 20 Aug 2026 05:00:00 +0100

Affordable electrified vehicles power a huge surge in Chinese car sales, as legacy firms struggle to stay competitive

Chinese brands accounted for almost a fifth of all UK registrations in July as newcomers Omoda-Jaecoo and BYD both celebrated their 100,000th UK sale in quick succession.

A mix of keen prices, electrified drivetrains and high levels of standard kit are persuading more customers to make the jump, to the detriment of more established brands, which struggle to match them on costs.

The share of Chinese brands hit 19.1% in July, according to figures from industry body the SMMT. The January-July share reached 17.7% after total sales ticked over 200,000. Autocar doesn’t include Geely-owned Volvo or Polestar in the tally.

The speed at which Chinese newcomers are outpacing brands with decades of presence in the UK market is unprecedented.

Omoda-Jaecoo, a division of Chery, shot past 100,000 total UK sales in July after launching the Omoda brand in August 2024 and Jaecoo in January 2025.

The combined share of the two brands reached 4.8% this year, higher than Mini, Hyundai, Mercedes or Skoda. Combined with Chery’s self-titled brand, the company’s share of 6.4% beat that of Ford.

Meanwhile, BYD recorded its 100,000 sale in July after launching the brand in March 2023 with the Atto 3. Together with Chery, BYD has become the strongest competitor to SAIC-owned MG, which held a 4.3% share.

Behind the big three, Stellantis-backed Leapmotor and Geely’s self-titled brand both passed the 1% share mark in July.

The lightning growth contrasts with the relative slow-burn acceptance of other brands in the UK market. For example, after Hyundai launched in the country in 1982, it was still selling fewer than 10,000 cars annually 10 years later.

Tesla, meanwhile, celebrated its 200,000th UK sale in 2024, 14 years after launching its first car.

“The Chinese push into the UK market has taken off in the past three years at a speed never seen before,” Ian Plummer, commercial director of Autotrader, told Autocar. “New entrant brands are already on the verge hitting a fifth of the market, a level that five years ago we envisaged they could potentially achieve by the end of the decade.”

The UK is providing ideal conditions for the Chinese brands, who have matured fast enough in their own market to develop models acceptable to UK consumers at prices that reflect much cheaper costs in China. Autotrader reports consumer interest beyond that of their current market share, suggesting more sales are to come. Plummer now predicts a 30% share could be possible by 2030. “Their upward trajectory doesn’t look ready to tail off any time soon,” he said.

The UK’s decision not to apply EU-style tariffs on China-built EVs has boosted sales of Chinese brands at a time when more buyers are turning to electric or plug-in hybrids to counter rising fuel prices sparked by the Iran war.

China’s car makers accounted for 18% of UK EV sales this year through to July, while their share of PHEV sales so far this year stood at a huge 41%, according to SMMT data.

The UK’s appetite for Chinese cars is the highest in Europe. It was China’s third largest export market for its cars after Russia and Brazil, with 255,260 shipped in the first half this year, according to figures from the China Passenger Car Association. Of those, 181,260 were either electric or plug-in hybrid, according to the data, more than double from the same period the year before.

Exports have been a boon to China’s car makers, which have been dealing with a sharp market contraction at home, most recently down 21% in July. Exports, meanwhile, grew 54% from January to July compared with the year before.

China’s success has dealt established car makers a blow as they struggle with the costs of electrification. The UK has angled its Electric Car Grant to avoid paying incentives to Chinese car makers, or those exporting from there, but sales haven’t significantly dimmed because the Chinese offer discounts to match.

Established car makers have been reluctant to explicitly call on the UK government to impose tariffs equivalent to those levied by the EU on Chinese-built EVs. “I'm not against Chinese and Chinese competition, not at all. The only thing is I want to have fair competition,” Honda’s head of Europe, Hans De Jaeger, told Autocar. “We at Honda have been in the same position and we found our space in European markets.”

Genesis GV90 revealed: Rolls-Royce rival is Europe's largest EV

Thu, 20 Aug 2026 04:00:00 +0100

Bentayga-sized flagship kicks off brand's new era with huge battery, cinema screen and coach doors

Genesis has stepped up its assault on the luxury car market with the unveiling of a bold new flagship SUV in the mould of the Bentley Bentayga.

The new GV90 is the production-ready version of the Neolun concept the brand revealed in 2024 and is larger and more luxurious than any model the company has yet launched.

The SUV is the spearhead for a reinvention of the Hyundai-owned Genesis brand, as it marks 10 years since the launch of its first bespoke model, the G90 limousine.

Hyundai Motor Company president and CEO Jose Muñoz called the GV90 a “landmark arrival” because it “opens a new chapter for Genesis, building on our track record of bold innovation, elevated customer experiences and an unwavering commitment to excellence.”

Hyundai Motor Company’s design boss SangYup Lee, who co-designed the Bentley Bentayga in a previous career with the VW Group, called the GV90 a “status car”, and said it is “maybe our first true luxury car, as opposed to what you might call a ‘premium’ car”.

He told Autocar: “This is a change of gear for us. It’s not for us to judge what its true rivals are: the customer will judge, otherwise it’s egotism. We will continue to listen and respond to them.”

He said the GV90 heralds a new era of Genesis as a “pluralist brand, not only focusing in one place” - describing the marque’s three core brand pillars as “luxury, performance, and what we like to call ‘cool factor’. All three have an important place in the future of Genesis”.

At almost 5.3m long – larger than its sibling models, the Kia EV9 and Hyundai Ioniq 9 – the GV90 is roughly the same length as the Rolls-Royce Cullinan and the longest, EWB version of the Bentayga. It will be the largest electric car available when it goes on sale in Europe next year.

It rides on an adapted version of the Hyundai group's modular EV architecture, dubbed eMP (Electric Mobility Prime) – which the brand says is "exclusive" for its flagship models – and is “the culmination of Genesis's elevated hospitality ethos", said the firm, referring to its 'Son-nim' policy of treating "each customer as an honoured guest".

It has a huge, 3245mm wheelbase, a flat floor throughout the cabin and a slim, upright cockpit, which combine to offer a cavernous, private jet-style interior that's far removed from that of the brand's more mainstream cars.

It will be offered with the choice of seven seats or with a VIP-oriented four-seat arrangement (with rotating front seats) in range-topping Neolun trim, which also comes with pillarless, reverse-opening rear doors. An innovative dual-motion, sliding-hinge arrangement means that, unlike those seen previously on the likes of the Mazda RX-8, BMW i3 and Mazda MX-30, they can be opened independently of the front doors, and the back-seat passengers can get in and out more easily.

Extra reinforcements to the body shell compensate for the missing B-pillar, but Lee said that the unusual arrangement was one of the biggest challenges in taking the Neolun concept to production. "This car wasn’t just a design exercise; it has really pushed our engineering and manufacturing teams, and our suppliers. A hidden B-pillar on a small car like a BMW i3 is tough, but doable. Executing that on a car this size and weight, and still getting a five-star crash result, was almost an impossible mission."

There’s ambient lighting, too, and a 25-speaker Bang & Olufsen sound system, which brings a new Virtual Venue function that can replicate the ‘signature acoustics’ of arenas such as Boston Symphony Hall and Wembley Stadium.

The interior material options have been chosen, Genesis says, “to deliver the attention to detail expected of a flagship” and include genuine stone, wood flooring and cashmere wool.

Lee said the primary aim of the design team was to ensure the GV90 retained as many of the Neolun concept's features as possible. "We really tried to deliver everything from that show car: the 24in wheels, the full-width OLED taillights, the hardwood floor with the underfloor heating, and the crystal jewellery-look, cold-injection-moulded, strip headlamps. We didn’t overlook anything.

"We actually developed the concept car and the show car simultaneously. The concept had to be finished sooner, and so with some of its features we even managed to improve on them for the production car. The headlights are a great example. On the concept car, these had a more two-dimensional appearance; in the finished production car, they look even better, more jewel-like."

Up front, the centrepiece of the cockpit is a whopping 23.6in-wide free-standing touchscreen that runs Hyundai’s new Pleos infotainment system. It can be raised by 90mm when parked to give a 24.6in cinema screen that can play “a wide variety” of multimedia content. There’s a 25in head-up display too, which, Genesis says, allows the driver to see their speed, sat-nav instructions and ADAS alerts without taking their eyes off the road.

The GV90's generous footprint also means it can accommodate a colossal, 123.5kWh battery, which is expected to be good for a range of up to 311 miles. Equipped with 800V hardware as standard, the GV90 can charge at up to 350kW, with Genesis claiming a 10-80% top-up in just 22 minutes.

The battery powers a pair of motors – one at the front and one at the rear – which combine to give 648bhp and 590lb ft, making the GV90 more powerful than any EV from the Hyundai group stable so far, including its hot new GV60 Magma sibling.

Each motor is equipped with its own limited-slip differential – a first for the company – to optimise power delivery at each corner in all conditions, and rear-wheel steering is fitted as standard. Genesis says the result is “agile handling” in high-speed corners, and greater control on slippery or rough roads.

Adjustable multi-chamber air suspension configures the ride height to suit the conditions and uses dual-valve adaptive dampers to achieve the optimum balance of bump isolation and body control.

The windows are more than 5mm thick all round for maximum noise-cancelling qualities, while the windscreen has a thin metal coating that can defrost the glass independently of the in-car climate control. The optional panoramic roof is equipped with liquid crystal technology that allows its transparency to be controlled across six individual sections.

The GV90 will go on sale in South Korea next month and Europe in the first half of 2027, with precise timings for a UK entry still to be confirmed. There is no indication of price yet, but it will be comfortably the firm’s most expensive model, with orders set to open north of £100,000.

Volvo EX60

Wed, 19 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0100

Important new SUV introduces Brits to Swedish brand’s latest EV technology Volvo’s EX60 has arrived in the UK, bringing a new electric platform, ultra-rapid charging and an enormous range of up to 503 miles. Headline-grabbing stuff, but this new electric SUV will also need to show considerable polish if it is to worry about the game-changing rivals from Germany. At the beginning of the year, the BMW iX3 made its main foes look like amateurs, but instead of having the premium medium-sized corner of the electric SUV market to itself for the foreseeable future, it’s now facing two fierce opponents. First there came the Mercedes-Benz GLC Electric with very competitive specs, and now Volvo is entering the ring with the EX60. In brief, it’s a 4.8m-long electric SUV that sits between the Volvo EX40 and Volvo EX90, and brings a raft of new technology, most notably a new electric SPA3 platform, new batteries and a clever, cell-to-pack construction. The outgoing SPA2 platform that underpins the EX90 and Polestar 3 had a tough launch, with software gremlins and reliability issues making it feel unfinished. Volvo has sought to mitigate these challenges with the EX60, which is basically all new. But does this long-range, rapid-charging new Volvo have the credentials to challenge its main challengers from BMW and Mercedes-Benz? Let’s find out.

Bold new look for reinvented 2027 Hyundai Tucson

Wed, 19 Aug 2026 08:24:09 +0100

Chunky new Art of Steel design language brings Hyundai's best-selling car into its fifth generation

Hyundai has reinvented its best-selling Tucson crossover with a bold new 4x4-inspired look for its fifth generation.

Revealed overnight in Korea, the new Tucson is described as "bolder and more robust" than today's car, which is one of the most popular mid-sized SUVs on sale, ranking in the UK's top 10 best-selling cars for the past four years in a row and becoming the world's seventh-best-selling car in 2025.

The Toyota RAV4 rival's chunky new look is in keeping with Hyundai's new Art of Steel design language, which was introduced with the second-generation Nexo and will be rolled out across the line-up over the coming years.

Defining features include an upright, two-box silhouette that departs from the outgoing car's rounded form, and distinctive lighting signatures including a new H-shaped motif at both ends formed by a slim, wraparound light bar and vertical daytime-running lights.

Dramatically swollen arches, lower body cladding and a prominent skid plate, meanwhile, add an element of off-road flavouring and help to give the "stable stance characteristic of an SUV", says Hyundai.

At 4700mm long, the new Tucson is a significant 180mm longer than the current car, which effectively bumps it from the C-segment into the D-segment, where it will more directly compete with the likes of the Skoda Kodiaq, Honda CR-V and Renault Austral.

It's also around 100mm longer between the axles, with a wheelbase of 2785mm, and 40mm wider, which Hyundai says means it offers "best-in-class interior space".

Head room is also up in the second row by 29mm – most likely a result of the flatter roofline – and the back doors now open wider to make it easier to get in and out of.

The cabin itself is a dramatic departure from that of the current car, following the new Ioniq 3 in adopting a cleaner and more minimalist treatment centred on a substantial touchscreen, with a slim digital display above the squared-off steering wheel said to "minimise driver distraction".

Hyundai has given no details yet on which powertrains it will offer in the new Tucson; the current car offers the choice of mild, full and plug-in hybrids, as well as a cheaper pure-petrol engine.

UK firm's self-driving lorry ditches cab for more capacity, less weight

Wed, 19 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0100

Voltempo's coach-sized 'smart trailer', to be tested and built in UK, boosts capacity by 15%

Electric vehicle specialist Voltempo is developing a cabless, autonomous rigid lorry that’s 15.6m long, exceeding the current maximum length for a non-articulated lorry, which the company claims will maximise space and payload.

The prototype aims to extend a rigid truck’s proportions and capacity beyond the current maximums of 12m, 32 tonnes and four axles to 15.6m, 42 tonnes and five axles, making it the same length as a coach. Removing the cab frees up weight and space, creating what Voltempo founder and corporate development officer Michael Boxwell dubbed a “smart trailer”.

Berkeley Coachworks is constructing the body and a prominent truck manufacturer is supplying the electric drivetrain. The prototype is scheduled for completion by September 2027 and testing is expected to start later that year at an autonomous vehicle test track in South Wales. The UK’s Automated Vehicles Act allows driverless vehicles to travel on public roads from this year, so trials could extend to the highway. Production is tipped to begin in late 2027, with first deliveries expected in mid-2028.

“If you get rid of the cab, you’ve got a 15.6m-long, longer semi-trailer, in effect,” said Boxwell. “An articulated tractor and trailer unit is about 15-17 tonnes as a diesel vehicle, and as an electric vehicle, it’s maybe 19 tonnes. With this smart trailer, we can get the laden weight down to between 10 and 12 tonnes as an electric vehicle. That means you’ve got 15% more space compared to a standard-length trailer.

“You’ve got a significant amount of extra payload – five to seven tonnes – and, bearing in mind the weight of a cab is two tonnes… we worked out that your typical HGV is carrying 16 tonnes on average. Now, we can make it 18.6 tonnes, because of the extra space. You’ve got something which is 1.5m shorter than an articulated HGV, but your average weight on the road is three times lighter because of the rigid body.”

According to Boxwell, every truck manufacturer in Europe has signed up to approve the prototype as an official vehicle classification and “they are prepared to build vehicles to that specification”. He said production versions would first be built in the UK, then on the continent. “We will get British hauliers in on the act before anybody else,” he said.

Boxwell added that the first vehicles are likely to be deployed on fixed routes, which would first need to be approved by local authorities, and he expects the number of routes to increase if initial attempts prove successful. He also said the prototype’s greater length and capacity could reduce the number of trucks on the road and that autonomy may help to address the ongoing driver shortage.

"You haven't seen the peak yet..." Gerry McGovern on life after JLR

Wed, 19 Aug 2026 06:00:00 +0100

Exclusive: McGovern addresses "disinformation" around his exit from Gaydon, and maps out next steps

Gerry McGovern is in his element, leaning back in a comfortable chair, clad in a characteristically colourful tailored blue jacket, holding forth on the minutiae of vehicle design and smiling a lot.

It's as if nothing has changed since his Range Rover days. We're in a large meeting room with a bunch of late-build prototypes visible through the glass wall. Just down the hall is a big design studio.

What's different is that this is Norton Motorcycles' HQ on the outskirts of Solihull, not JLR down the road. Once a John Lewis warehouse, it is now repurposed - as part of a £250 million global 'resurgence' strategy - as Norton's design and development HQ. It's where the company's just-launched flagship superbike, the 1200cc Manx R, is being made. A second model, the 585cc twin-cylinder Atlas adventure bike, designed here but made in India, is arriving in dealerships now.

Though we're talking two wheels not four, the similarities to McGovern's former working life are striking. The newly revived Norton company, like Tata-owned JLR, has a well-financed, well-established Indian owner as its backer, the Chennai-based TVS Motor Company that made nearly six million motorcycles last year.

Back in 2020, TVS paid £16m to buy Norton out of administration, after a previous owner had attempted to keep it alive by pillaging its pension funds. Its chairman and managing director today is Sudarshan Venu, who led the acquisition of the outfit and is now very much the driver of Norton's expansion.

Sudarshan has already been described by McGovern as reminding him of "a young Mr Tata", praise indeed since McGovern's own design skills were rapidly recognised at JLR by the late legendary patriarch, Ratan Tata, who was regarded as unusually design-aware among global business leaders. It was Ratan Tata who introduced McGovern to TVS in the first place.

It's 18 months since I've seen McGovern. The last time was at the reveal of Jaguar's Type 00 concept, whose transition to production is nearing conclusion. However, McGovern sensationally left JLR at the end of last year, having allegedly been escorted from the building before returning to leave amicably a couple of months later. There's no polite way of asking exactly what happened, so I dive straight in.

"Such a lot has been written about this," says McGovern wearily, "and is disinformation. The reality was in the formal announcement: I decided to move on and try other things. I'd been at JLR for 24 years and was proud of what we'd done. But there's a point where you start wondering how long you can go on. I'd done three generations of Evoque, two of Range Rover and two of Range Rover Sport. Plus the new Defender. That was a lot. And then there was the Jaguar. Leaving was on my mind and I'd been talking to the company about it for a while. So the speculation about me was pretty inaccurate."

McGovern feels no animosity or awkwardness towards JLR now: "Why would I? I still love those brands. You can't just walk away. I've got a Defender Octa right now. When I'm in London, I love seeing Range Rovers and Defenders. Twenty years ago when I talked about Defenders in an urban environment, I'd get laughed at..."

Foolishly, I make some reference to McGovern's "new roots at Norton" so he reminds me he's known the TVS bosses since well before the Norton acquisition. He was actually at dinner with Sudarshan on the night six years ago when the actual deal was done.

McGovern was soon invited to advise TVS on rebuilding Norton's brand, design structure and products, and in 2025 he joined the company officially as its chief creative advisor. You might reckon his arrival spelled difficult times for Norton's existing head of design, Simon Skinner, a straight-talking motorcycle 'lifer' who admitted in his first meeting with McGovern that, as an engineer first and foremost, he had far less specialist design experience than his new mentor.

Yet the two have bonded well. Skinner finds McGovern easier to deal with than many other design professionals he could name. McGovern is impressed that Skinner's instinct for reductionist, modernist design matches his own.

Skinner, severely short of resources, was previously designing Norton stuff on his own kitchen table; McGovern has helped him establish a proper design structure. And when the current models were mooted, the pair set off to the nearby National Motorcycle Museum to find "salient points" about previous Norton designs that might help.

"What impressed me about Simon was that he recognised immediately I was coming to help, not take over," says McGovern. "Also, I don't believe in retro design, and neither does he. What we discovered from investigating Norton's heritage was that the bikes were very forward-looking against their opposition, which was something we could use."

McGovern says he approached bike design with trepidation but discovered it had much in common with cars: "If you're developing a brand, you've got to consider its perspective first. What's its reason for being? Where was it born? When was it established? What are its values? Defender's an example. It was born in the country and it liberated people. It was purposeful and took them on adventures. That informed the new design."

One challenge to the bike designer with reductionist ideals, says McGovern, is dealing with exposed mechanicals – making components look integrated rather than "like a bag of spaghetti".

But painstaking efforts have worked: the Manx and Atlas look graceful and integrated, not least when artfully parked by Skinner next to a selection of spiky-looking opposition products.

Bikes are all very well but I'm keen to talk cars again, specifically McGovern's latest Range Rover, in my view his greatest design. It's so perfect that I often wonder if he has an idea in his head that would move it into a third generation – and here's a chance to ask.

"Maybe that's why I left," he says, only half joking. "I just couldn't see a new generation. I mean, if you look at the way Range Rover has evolved from the original to where it is now, it does now have a very high level of sophistication. It's pared back to within a fraction of its life. You couldn't refine it any more. Mind you, we would never have reached today's level if we hadn't done the car before it. But another Range Rover like the current one would be a massive challenge."

McGovern is intrigued by the arrival of Ferrari's new Luce EV, given that he knows its star designers, Jony Ive and Marc Newson, well and understands car company politics better than most.

Ferrari was brave to get such fresh opinions on how much the marque's DNA needed to change for an EV project. McGovern is pretty sure that if the firm had given the job to specialist car designers, they would have produced a less shocking result, but probably less polarising.

"What's my own view of the car? I've learned that you never comment on a design until you've seen it in the flesh – and I haven't," he says. "But I look at its interior and I can tell it is built to an extremely high level of quality. Jony Ive is incredible in the way he approaches that."

McGovern reckons Ferrari's mistake was how it communicated the Luce's significance. It needed to make clear whether this was the direction for all future Ferrari design, or just electric models, and it didn't. Understandably, McGovern abhors the personal criticism directed at the designers after the car's launch. "I've had some treatment," he says, "but nothing like that."

Talking about controversial car projects soon introduces the Jaguar Type 00 – McGovern's own time in the firing line – but he seems to have few regrets about how it went.

"Most people hadn't realised that Jaguar needed to be reinvented," he says. "The brand was failing. It had been great in its heyday, but nobody was buying cars. It was losing big money for many years. We needed a complete reimagining of the brand and the product."

Behind the eventual Type 00 stood 17 full-size proposals, says McGovern, but knowing that a prestige brand is much more than a concept car, Jaguar's people recognised that they also needed to build and develop the brand values. That's where the controversial 'androgynous people' video came in, so comprehensively hated by the likes of Donald Trump, Elon Musk and even Nigel Farage.

"It was taken out of context," says McGovern. "What we were trying to say is that Jaguar had to be unique, a copy of nothing. That film took us into a bigger cultural debate about behaviour; at the time I didn't even know what wokeism was. But it did mean Jaguar was the most talked about brand in the world for four months. And it hadn't been talked about at all for years before that..."

McGovern has spent much of our interview being genial and emollient, but when I ask if he reckons history will see the Type 00 as the peak of his design career, he's firm and unflinching in his rebuttal. "You haven't seen the peak yet," he retorts. One car that really is a peak, he will allow, is the latest Defender, surrounded in the beginning by controversy of its own, mainly generated by people who just wanted to keep building the outgoing model, or something a lot like it.

"If you do a car and everybody's instantly comfortable with it," says McGovern, "it's probably going to fail. I can remember people coming onto our stands at motor shows and saying I was killing the brand with the new Defender. I'd ask how they'd like it to look and they'd say 'like the old one'. I'd have to explain about the legislation that stopped it."

McGovern has been designing cars for half a century. What comes next? McGovern's eyes tell me he thinks about this often. "I want to do new stuff," he says carefully, "and I'm aware there are many opportunities out there. I've had a lot of approaches. I'm very particular about what I want, and who I work with. But I'm definitely going to do more cars. They're in my blood."

Strong sales, high costs: Why BMW needs to rethink Mini's future

Wed, 19 Aug 2026 05:00:00 +0100

Oxford factory is key to Mini's image but also brings high costs

As parent company BMW hits headwinds, Mini's resilience comes into question

Amid all the talk of cost-cutting on BMW's recent earnings call, there was a moment of awkwardness when one analyst asked whether the Mini brand should be given the chop: “It looks to me that Mini is loss-making. Is that a brand BMW really needs long term?”

Unusually, the head of the brand was actually on the call. Stefan Richmann was fielding questions in his other role as group treasurer, but instead of answering he got mock offended. “That hurt me personally,” he said, without clarifying whether the pain arose from an accurate hit or the mere suggestion.

BMW doesn't separate out Mini or Rolls-Royce finances, leaving banking analysts to guess, but questions about Mini's profitability have long swirled. In normal times, BMW has the luxury of a healthy group profit margin, but woes in China have cut that to 3.6% in the first half of the year, putting fresh focus on Mini.

Mini is an enigma, with a negative to every positive. Sales are thriving, rising 12% in the first half year to 149,535 on the back of demand for the Countryman SUV and Cooper hatchbacks. But the brand is tied to high production costs in Britain (ICE hatchbacks and Convertible) and Germany (Countryman). The Cooper and Aceman EVs are built in low-cost China but attract punitive EU import tariffs on Chinese-built EVs.

Mini rules the premium small car market, but true competitors are few and far between, suggesting it's not easy to compete with volume players. Most recently, Audi axed the rival A1.

Mini has also aced the EV transition, 37% of its global sales in the first half of 2026 being electric. But with battery costs still elevated, that success also reduces its profitability.

Perhaps it's telling that, within the BMW Group, Mini is leading the move to direct sales, a key cost-saver. By selling directly to customers, Mini can charge a single, country-wide price and theoretically reduce discounting. Mini rolled this out in China in 2023, and the BMW brand will now move to the so-called agency model from 2027.

A worldwide brand like Mini is just too small to thrive within the new global rules. The newly tariff-imposing US is too niche a market to justify moving manufacturing there. China's future both as a market and an export base is too uncertain. And EU emissions rules threaten its profit margins without a move to lower-cost production locations like Hungary.

BMW is unlikely to drop the Mini brand, but a heavy reworking surely awaits.

Keep your V12s - Porsche's Mezger flat six is my all-time favourite engine

Tue, 18 Aug 2026 14:00:00 +0100

You need only hear this legendary race-bred lump at full chat to be convinced

From the likes of the 4.0-litre six that powers the 992 GT3 RS to the thunderous dirty dozen in the legendary 917, Porsche knows how to build a boxer engine.

They're all brilliant in their own right, but for me the 'Mezger' flat sixes are the absolute cream of the horizontally-opposed crop - partly because of their outrageous performance but also because of the history behind them.

Named after Hans Mezger (1929-2020), who led the engineering team behind the original air-cooled 2.0-litre '901' engine in the first 911, the unofficial Mezger nickname most commonly refers to a generation of water-cooled units used in the 996 and 997 GT cars, as well as the 996 and 997.1 Turbo models (even if you could technically apply the moniker to any air-cooled Porsche six).

That they have received the surname of the legendary engineer is testament to Mezger's legacy at the company, the fundamental layout of his original 901 flat six going on to function as the basis for every air-cooled flat six that left the Porsche factory over the next three decades, as well as the powerplants used in several of Porsche's race cars. With features like a durable split crankcase and a dry-sump oil system, the engines were, above all else, remarkably tough.

Mezger retired in 1993, and four years later Porsche moved away from his air-cooled design for the first time in more than 30 years with the 996. However, the all-new water-cooled 'M96' engine used in the 996 suffered from big problems: cracked cylinder heads, bore scoring and catastrophic intermediate shaft bearing failures (IMS is perhaps the best-known acronym in Porsche enthusiast circles) to name a few.

So when the time came to homologate the 996 for motorsport and the brand needed a competitive but reliable powerplant, Porsche headed into the archive for inspiration.

Using a derivative of the block from the Le Mans-winning 911 GT1, which itself was derived from Mezger's engine for the 962 Group C racer, Porsche designed a new water-cooled, naturally aspirated 3.6-litre flat six for the 996 GT3 in 1999. It had a split crankcase and was dry-sumped in a similar fashion to its air-cooled predecessors, with a gear-driven IMS rather than the M96's compromised chain-driven one.

Before long it came to be known as simply the Mezger by enthusiasts, in recognition of its links to the legendary engineer and to separate this new engine from the problematic M96.

The M96/7x (used in the 996) and later M97/7x (from the 997), to use their proper code names, went on to become some of Porsche's most celebrated engines. And, especially in their naturally aspirated guises (3.6-litre, 3.8-litre or full-fat, near-500bhp 4.0-litre), they are simply among the greatest combustion powerplants ever used by series-production cars.

They wear their motorsport roots on their cylinder sleeves: the gauges dance wildly and the cam chains rattle around on idle, yet they rev so quickly and freely and produce the most satisfying mechanical howl in the process.

And, despite them being more than happy to go well beyond the heady realms of 8000rpm, there's no sense of fragility: the Mezger has powered race and rally versions of the 996 and 997 GT3s without issue, and there are several cases where owners have done hundreds of thousands of miles on their original block with only the most basic of maintenance.

Yes, there are Bugatti W16s, Cosworth V12s and Lamborghini V10s to consider, but for longevity, history, reliability and character, this Porsche flat six has to be regarded as one of the greatest engine designs produced by any car maker, ever. Maybe the greatest.

Government must ease electric car targets to protect UK automotive

Tue, 18 Aug 2026 11:53:29 +0100

Nissan's Sunderland factory is a key EV hub, but the current trading environment poses a threat

Consultation on ZEV mandate will hear arguments from both sides, but the need for change is clear – and urgent

Much of the confusion that surrounds the controversy over whether or not the government should ease the terms of the ZEV mandate stems from the fact that the arguments are very convincing, and extremely well rehearsed, on either side.

Car makers and importers cite several years of severe financial pain, amounting to billions, that have resulted from providing the incentives a sluggish EV car market has needed even to get close to meeting the mandate’s required volume of sales.

Providers of charging infrastructure, frequently criticised for tardiness and unreliability as they struggle to turn their investment into profit, are alarmed at the prospect that their flow of customers, and the prices these customers pay, might now be held back by changes they hadn’t expected.

Autocar believes government action is urgently needed – and is perfectly possible – to benefit both sides. First, our legislators must urgently ease the gradient at which EV sales are required to rise. Buyers simply aren’t available in the numbers mandated for our industry to continue coping. It seems obvious that for the overall benefit of our country and its economy, car makers that comprise one of its key industries need help.

And much as any review of the ZEV mandate will likely help, the automotive industry really needs further government action.

We need to be reassured that the electric Mini can be viably made at Plant Oxford. We must be sure that Nissan’s Sunderland plant can continue to set high global standards for making EVs (and not just those of an arriving Chinese partner). We need to know that because of strong demand and containable costs, JLR can keep the manufacture of most forthcoming electric Jaguars and Land Rovers in the UK, rather than wholly exporting projects as it did with the pioneering I-Pace EV, built in Austria.

It’s not as if the industry is anti-progress: its representative body, the SMMT, continues to state in the first line of every utterance that its members firmly embrace a net-zero target for transportation.

Infrastructure providers, especially those who specialise in public chargers, must be encouraged by a dramatic VAT reduction. The massive cost difference between public and home charging – an unfair and undeserved penalty on those who live where home charging isn’t possible – has emerged as one of the most glaring anomalies of modern motoring.

However, the mammoth change that would benefit all sides would be a permanent, substantial cut in the price of electric energy in the UK.

According to The Economist, energy costs here last year were 50-100% greater than those in the prominent countries of mainland Europe, and three times those of the US. The reason? Gas is expensive and sets the ruling power prices; our vaunted renewable sources (though increasing in volume and declining in cost) still can’t provide a steady supply. When there’s a glut in renewables, we’re rubbish at storing it.

The current government came to power promising cheap energy as a top priority. It doesn’t even look like providing it. For the sake of our struggling (and declining) UK motor industry, it needs to do what it promised.