BMW's i3 city car will cost £25,680 when it goes on sale at the end of this month. That price includes the government's £5000 electric vehicle grant.
That price is for the pure-electric version, with 168bhp and a top speed of 93mph coming from its synchronous electric motor.
Rivals to the i3 include the Nissan Leaf, priced at £20,990 including the electric vehicle grant, and the Chevrolet Volt at £30,255, again inclusive of the grant.
The i3 is based around BMW's 'Life Module' concept, and uses a carbonfibre reinforced plastic body structure. It rides on a chassis made of almost pure aluminium.
BMW has yet to release official prices for the range-extender model, although it is believed to command a significant premium over the base model of the i3.
Autocar recently had the chance to drive a prototype of the i3, where it transpired to be a practical and individual alternative to existing city cars.
Order books for the i3 will open towards the end of this month, with the first deliveries expected in October.
Join the debate
Add your comment
2 Car Strategies
Isn't the point of EVs to help reduce emissions? Ironically they seem to encourage 2 car ownership; the EV to be a trendy runaround and a proper car for everything else. Why not just buy one proper car for all duties? That way you reduce whole life emissions by having only one car manufactured for you and without the need for incredibly damaging materials being mined for the batteries and using coal-fired power stations to provide the power to charge the EV. Moving emissions from the tail pipe to the power station is like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
spqr wrote: Isn't the point
In my household we have 2 cars already. Changing one of them for electric would suit me just fine. I also don't believe that 'saving the planet' is a motivation for me - I just like refined, effortlessly powerful cars and am interested in the technology.
Hot hatch pace
25 grand for a car that makes the 0-62mph dash in 7.2 seconds that makes it faster than Kia's Pro-Cee'd GT.
Wow, that's cheap
That is much less than I was expecting it to be.
Time GM reconsidered its pricing policy on the Ampera/Volt, I think. BMW's pricing of the i3 makes them suddenly look very expensive.
price
The Ampera/Volt is a much bigger range extender type vehicle the i3 range extender version price hasn't been announced yet.
Looking forward to GM's next Range extender car which should have been announced by now if they want to stay ahead of the competion
Not that much bigger
The Volt / Ampera isn't that much bigger though - both have similar wheelbases, only seat four and have fairly small boots. The BMW may be shorter but it is taller, possibly wider and should be better packaged with no large petrol engine and transmission to accomodate in the nose.
I agree that it is time for a follow-up Volt to be announced - have any details leaked out or did GM stop working on them once it had secured its bailout funding from Washington?
A lot bigger
With the Ampera coming in at 4514mm it’s well over 2 foot longer than the i3 and the boot has a 1000 litres capacity compared to the i3’s 200 litres.
xxxx wrote: Clarkey
The Volt boot is 300l, the figure of 1000 l is with the back seats folded down. They will both offer similar interior space overall. The extra 2 feet of length will largely be wasted by the engine and transmission.