All-Electric Drive and Review: 2023 BMW iX M60 on Everyman Driver

Today on EverymanDriver, we're going to take a full detailed look at this new 2023 BMW iX M60, which is fully electric. Let's get started. Welcome everyone to this iX M60, the M Performance version. And this is going to start at around $106,000, but as equipped, we're at $115,000. Now starting right up front, you're going to get these huge kidney grilles right here. This looks so iconic and so unique. You're also going to get LED headlights. These are the Icon Adaptive LED headlights with laser light. I'll talk about that more in a second, but you've got the LED running lights here as well. Just a big, massive front end. That means business. You've got some venting going through on the sides as well. What do you think of this front end overall? LED turn signal here, standard, and the BMW laser light. But on the back, you've got the floating roof with the iX badging right there. Now this paint color is called Storm Bay Metallic. What do you think of it? It looks almost a little bit matte sometimes, but it is slightly metallic-y. Plus this has the optional 22-inch wheels. They're aero 22-inch wheels with some blue calipers and a black underbody down there. The mirrors are going to have turn signals, cameras in them as well, automatic dimming, and blind spot indicators so you're set. Dimensionally, it's 195 inches long, so kind of in between two and three-row SUVs for the most part. Ground clearance is good at 8.8 inches, and it's got the adaptive dual axle air suspension for the optimum height at any speed. Then rounding things out at the back, you've got this kind of like wagon-esque design back here, at least from what I think, LED taillights, super long LED taillight with the red LED blinker, iX badging here, and the M badging over on this side, the M60. And of course, we are fully electric, so no exhaust outlets. Now getting to the cargo area of the iX, it is a fairly long vehicle considering what it looks like, and you've got good cargo space back here. You get a power liftgate standard, but you also get the foot-activated liftgate. There it goes. I'm not always perfect with that, but you get this foot-activated liftgate standard as well to open or to close it. And behind the second row, you're going to get about 35 and a half cubic feet. It's good space, it's flat and wide, and then you fold things down and you get 77.9 cubic feet. So this is a pretty darn spacious area, and it includes a 40-20-40 split fold. Underneath the floor, you're going get some extra storage. This is the box for the charging kit right here, extra space there, plus there's a little bit more space up underneath of there too. And there's no spare tire in here, you get this little inflator kit, that's it. Now if we look at BMW's key fob, you've got the lock button as the BMW logo, the M branding and lines on here, trunk and unlock. It's glossy black, so I bet it's going to get scratched up really quickly. No remote start on the key fob, you have to do that through the app. And the way this works, even as you approach the vehicle, it will recognize you, the mirrors unfold and flash, and you have electronic door handles. So it is a smart key system, you can press that button right there to lock it. Otherwise, if you just put your hand in here and squeeze, it's going to open and unlock. I'm not a fan of electronic door handles, but it is what it is, that's the way things are going. And then, if you just walk away, it's going to sense that and it will automatically lock for you, just like that. Another thing is that these are actually soft close doors, so never slam a door again, you basically just get it to almost latch, and it'll just pull itself back in. Now climbing into the front seats, there's so much to talk about right here. First of all, over on the door, you're going to find memory settings with this crystal look on them, even your seat adjustments are right there. Plus you've got a full soft armrest, everything over here is really soft, padded, and comfortable, decent space down there, and a massive speaker grill. Inside, Sensotec material is actually standard, a synthetic, but we have these perforated leather, this Amigo perforated leather. The seat itself is very comfortable as well, there's more adjustments than it shows on the door, I'll show you that on the screen in a little bit. You've got some moderate bolstering on the sides, as well as the bottom, and they've got good cushioning to them overall. Since they are memory settings, you've got a power operated steering wheel as well, so you can have an entry exit system, movable seat, and steering wheel. You can adjust all your seat information right here, so you can customize between passenger and driver, and check this out, you can go over here, you can, you know, go off of your seat position, you can activate the massaging function in here, that's pretty cool, you can have a few different options for the massage. If we go back to the actual seat, depending on which of these dials you have right here, you can adjust the backrest, which you can do on the door as well, but check this out. If we go to the bolster, you can adjust how wide the bolsters are, you can adjust the lumbar up and down, the seat up and down, all that on here too. These seats are also heated and ventilated, and we have the radiant heating in here, so our armrests are heated, the seats are heated, even the panels like the dash panels will radiate heat to give this cabin so much warmth and comfort in the wintertime. Plus the steering wheel is heated as well. One thing to note is that this has safe exit, so it's an electronic system, you saw that with me opening the door on the other side, you actually push this button, and the door will pop open, you can push it open from there. This is electronic, I don't love that, but there is a actual mechanical release lever down here, if you can't get it open, it helps to prevent you from opening the door if a car is coming or a cyclist, something like that, so it keeps you and them safe. Now climbing into the back seat of this iX, you're going to get soft materials all along this door panel, even some ambient lighting here in the back seat, and just like the front seat, you got the safe exit assist or the safe exit button right here, so it won't let you open the door if there's something coming behind you, but the actual release lever is down there, and you've got decent storage and a bottle holder there. Space in here is also pretty good, all things considered, comfortable looking seats here as well, and for those of you that are parents, you've got this easy convenient little pull tab, and then boom, there's your anchors. Also you don't have to fold things down from the cargo area, you can just pop that down, and there it goes. Second row passengers are a little bit spoiled, first of all, look at this, you've got USB ports on the back of each seat, and you can tickle your driver, plus you've got pretty good space overall, I have this seat in the lowest position, and I can still slide my feet under there a little bit, hard mat pockets right there, you also get your own climate controls back here, this is a four zone climate system, so you get your own climate controls, we also have heated seats back here, no ventilated seats, I'm surprised at this price point, we don't, but you've got full AC controls with vents there, and vents over on the side pillar, plus the back seat passengers can take a look at this giant roof, passengers will also get this folding armrest, this is padded, then you've got some pop out cup holders right there. One really nice note is that back seat passengers even get a little bit of ambient lighting down from, or from up there as well, and there is a ton of headroom in here, I mean you've got plenty of space, I'm five foot nine, so I'm not that tall, but taller people should be comfortable in here, it's a nice back seat. Alright, let's take a good look at this interior, there are just nice materials all over the place, large screens, everything is really nice in here, I mean just the materials, the layout, the functionality is good, although a little bit more complicated than it has to be, but let's take a look at these screens. Now you'll see these pieces of tape, those are only there to cover sensors that make sure you're paying attention, they flash red like crazy on camera, but you don't see them in person. These steering wheel controls control everything on the display, particularly over on this side, cruise control stuff is over here, it's a little bit to get used to. So this display is controlled with the steering wheel, like I said, let's go, you can change the layout on here, so you've got a couple or three different options there, I've kind of just kept it right there, otherwise things stay pretty much the same. The content on here can be changed as well, whether it's more of a navigation type of thing, directional, driver assistance, things like that, or just kind of basic trip computer status, all of that. The head-up display is also really large, and there's a couple different views, more of a basic one, a navigation style, driver assist style, or kind of a larger style with the speed like that too, so it really just depends what you like, and you can turn it off if you want. Now coming over here, I already showed you some of the seat controls, so be sure to check that out if you want to, but also let's go to the climate controls on here. So one thing I don't like is that if you want to do basically anything except adjust the temperature, you have to go into the climate menu, the screen menu, and touch the screen or use your control knob, which is right there, and I love using the control knob. I also like the ability to touch the screen, but just to turn up maybe like your fan speed or something like that, or your change directions of where the vents are going, things like that, or what part of the cabin is being cooled and whatnot, you got to go into the screen. Just a little bit annoying. One other thing that you really have to go into the screen for that bothers me is some overhead lighting. So you push this button. If you want to turn on like both of these lights at the same time and have maybe even all the lights on for interior lighting, you have to go onto the screen again. You can turn on your map light or the other map light, but not all the lights at the same time, or just for example, you know, things like that. But otherwise, I really do enjoy this screen. There is so much that you can do on here. It's pretty incredible. Different apps, different features, different customization, all sorts of different things in here. It's just crazy. Now, one really impressive feature of this car is the Bowers & Wilkins Diamond audio system. You can adjust the speakers in the seat, the bass in the seat, and how much you actually feel it. It's really impressive. You can also adjust the temperature or excuse me, the volume with your finger, but I'm recording with binaural audio. You can hear that. So plug your headphones in and let's take a listen. This also has wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. It takes up most of the screen and it works well. Plus, if you want to adjust something aside from going into the screen, you can go like this. Hello, BMW, I'm cold. All right, it will be warmer right away. And she just turned on my heated seat, raised the temperature, things like that. And it works pretty well. It just, you know, takes a little time, but you can make it shorter. You can use different keywords, things like that. Now let me show you another thing on the screen. If I go into reverse or hit this little parking button, you're going to get this panorama view monitor. Now you have the backup camera, obviously, but you also have this one over here where you can see specifically different parts of the vehicle. You can have it be automatic, but you should never get curb rash again. You even have an actual parking assistant, the professional version here where you can record a new path. I believe it's like 200 meters of new path of, let's say, driving in a parking garage or different areas where you frequently go to where it can park the car for you. And this seat is getting darn hot in here already. Aside from the parking, you've got this option. This is an upgrade right here, the crystalled controls. Just look at this and this open pour wood right here. So you can adjust the suspension right here. You got audio controls, volume seeking shortcuts around there. Your shifter is down here. Start button, parking, automatic brake hold. Just below that, we have like a two tiered system right here. You've got wireless charging on there, USB charging ports, USB-C ports, 12 volt power outlet and cup holders. And I got to say, I'm not a fan of the cup holders being down there. I understand that makes us look nice, but it's a little bit awkward trying to kind of reach and finagle, especially larger bottles in there. Not a big deal though. If you don't put your phone down there for the wireless charging, there's a slot built in right here. This is an iPhone 11 Pro Max, and there's still some wiggle room just for size reference. And there's a spot to be able to put your cord right up through there to charge at the same time. Armrest here is comfortable. Push this button to open it. Little storage slot, extra big space down there. BMW even gives us a soft opening and softly lined glove box, an automatic dimming rear view mirror with garage controls, all LED lighting overhead, vanity light and mirror. But check this out. This will move to the side, but there's no adjustment at all. Are you kidding me? $115,000 and we can't get an expandable visor? We also have this sky lounge roof right here. Check this out. So you can have it so that you can see through the roof like that, or there's a little button up here and it can haze over like that to block some light. Now the glass does still get hot and it does feel like there is some radiation of heat. You know, obviously they're going to do things to make it so it's not hot, but I would still prefer to be able to have a little bit of a cover. And at night there is multiple color ambient lighting standard on every trim. And be sure to check out my night review if you want to see the details. Now, obviously we don't have an engine under the hood, but with electric components in the battery, we have 106.3 usable lithium ion kilowatt hour battery and two electric motors to push this one to 532 horsepower and 749 pound feet of torque. But that can go up to 610 horsepower and 811 pound feet of torque making the zero 60 in about three and a half seconds. And it's got all wheel drive. Now charging this IX is actually fairly simple. You can do it with two different options from the car, 120 volt or a 240 volt. And as you can see on the screen, there's different charging times here and it can DC fast charge about 90 miles in 10 minutes. So charging is pretty good, especially if you can charge at home. All right, y'all we're finally getting behind the wheel of this BMW IX and we are going to go through how fast it is, how fun it is, what it's like for one pedal driving, everything like that. And let me tell you, this is just a blast to drive. One thing about it is we have the all driver assist features. This has a new generation of sensors. I mean, we've got blind spot monitoring. We've got the adaptive cruise control lane changing system. It will actually change lanes for you, keep you centered in your lane, however you want, whatever you want. It's even adaptive. It can even modulate the distance shorter or further based on your preferences too. It's pretty advanced. Now to start with, I'm going to put us in one pedal drive mode. You just move that shifter back to the B and we're just kind of in a normal mode right now. But with one pedal drive mode, as soon as you start letting off the accelerator, it will regeneratively break as much as possible. If you've never seen this in EVs, this is one way to get and recapture as much wasted energy as possible. It essentially brakes for you. It will bring you to a stop and just hold you there until you push on the accelerator. So it's almost as if you don't have a brake. You just have an accelerator that controls your accelerating and your decelerating. So it's pretty interesting. Now you can still just even partial pedal this thing. It's bananas. Accelerate and just get going. I'll really get on it a little bit later. So you got an idea of what that's like. It's so fast. It's so fun. And right now in just our normal driving mode, it's comfortable and smooth too. The ride comfort, especially for an EV, I feel like EVs tend to kind of be a little bit stiff. The weight of the vehicle is very low with the battery pack and it's just, it's comfortable to drive. It handles well. For a performance vehicle and something this fast, it's extremely impressive. Okay, I'm going to take the one pedal driving off. This also has a thing called adaptive braking. So you can have it be adaptive or just like normal. You can brake just like normal if you want to, or you can have it adaptive to where depending on whether or not you're behind somebody or if you're going down a hill or different scenarios where the car thinks you're going to want to brake, it will add more regenerative braking or let you coast. Like right now it's not braking at all. It's just letting me coast. And it's pretty good to where it will probably prevent some accidents for some people. Okay, now I'm going to put us in sport mode. You got to tap down there and you can go to sport mode right there. It'll turn off traction control. So you activate that and it's all wheel drive. You've even got some rear wheel steering and this thing is just absolute bananas. It's a single speed transmission style with this being electric, but let me get ready and pedal down. And those sounds, that iconic sound, you can have the iconic sounds on or not. It's just absolutely bananas fast. I mean, it gets going instantly. That's what you get. You get instant torque and it handles well. You can hustle this if you want. It does feel heavy. Electric vehicles are heavy with their batteries, but you can have so much fun in here. Drive efficiently and just have spaceship sounds. It's crazy. And it brakes so well too. It's just phenomenal with that. So whether you want to drive for fun, drive for efficiency, drive for comfort, it's got you covered in all aspects. Now we're just cruising along 40 miles an hour up to about 80 in a flash. It's just, it's so fun. It's crazy. Overall, everything else in here is really nice. I mean, the screens are nice, crystal clear. You've got soft surfaces and nice materials all around you. BMW did a nice job of making this unique, but also feel like something special. And it's just really nice. Now in terms of road noise, this is a very quiet vehicle on rough surfaces, wind noise wise, it doesn't have like the double pane laminated glass, but it's still very quiet. I'm sure it's super aerodynamic even on my rough textured road surfaces. This is real quiet just for a quick show. We're on that rough textured surface. If you listen to my or watch my other videos, this surface brings in so much road noise on a lot of vehicles, but on here, it's still quiet. Interstate speeds, rough surface, road speeds, very, very quiet. So to wrap things up on this 2023 BMW iX M60, it's super fun to drive. It's very unique, purely electric, a great blend of luxury, performance, electricity, good range, but it's expensive, but you get a lot for it. I would love to know what your thoughts are of this M60. It was super fun to drive, an absolute blast to live with. It gives you a really nice, luxurious feel driving it around as a daily driver as well. But let me know what your thoughts are down below. Subscribe for more videos just like this and have a great day. One final note, if you are in the market for a new vehicle soon, great. Connect with your local dealership and price and test drive at least three different vehicles. Vehicle strengths and weaknesses can only be discovered when you are behind the wheel. My reviews can be good, but you need to test drive these yourself. Visit quotes.everymandriver.com, select the make model in your zip code, and you'll get invoice pricing in your area on those vehicles. Shop smarter with price quotes at quotes.everymandriver.com. Thanks for watching. Please click subscribe and give us a thumbs up. See you next time.