Testing 5 Wicked-Quick EVs You’ve Never Heard Of

Motor Trend recently took a field trip to the world's largest car market to investigate whether Chinese cars are really as good as everyone says. Over 72 hours we probed, drove, and tested 19 different cars. We chatted with AI-powered voice assistants. We watched a machine swap a nearly empty battery for a full one in just five minutes. We tried to make sense of the ridiculously cheap prices. And because we're Motor Trend, we drove all of the cars. Hard. As they say, you can take the man out of the Motor City, but you can't take the Motor City go-fast mentality out of the man. Turns out at least a few people in China love speed too, because we found some rockets. Here are the five quickest vehicles we tested in China. Four cars Starting in fifth place, we have the BYD Han, the flagship from the company that is constantly dicing with Tesla to be the world's largest EV manufacturer. The Han is sold as a plug-in hybrid or as an EV, which we tested in dual motor all-wheel drive form. The interior might resemble a Buick from the 2010s, but the Han has got it going where it counts. It makes 510 horsepower and 516 pound-feet of torque. The BYD Han is a very popular car in China. It's interesting. It doesn't seem like the SUV craze has hit quite like it has in America or even in Europe. Sedans are still really popular here, and you see that with the vehicles that NIO and Zeker and Xiaomi and BYD are building. Yeah, there's plenty of crossovers. Tesla Model Y might be the best-selling vehicle here, but sedans are alive and well, and something like this BYD Han feels like it's got the substance in it to be taken seriously in the U.S. I guess that would require American car buyers to take sedans serious. Shall we do it? Zero to 60 in a Han. Whoa! That thing has some giddy-up. Zero to 60 in 3.9, but man it launches harder than that. You see, numbers are great at telling you a lot about a vehicle, but they don't tell you everything. The speed with which this thing delivers torque when you lift off the brake and it just goes makes it feel just as quick as a car that does zero to 60 a second quicker than that. That's why you got to watch a video like this. You get the numbers and the feeling. This car to me doesn't have the kind of minimalist sleekness that we've seen in a lot of the other Chinese EVs. This feels almost more traditional, like something you would expect a GM to build, and maybe that's because BYD has been in the game longer than many of these other Chinese EV startups. Stability control. There's an off switch, but it turns back on above a certain speed, so that's gonna be inhibiting the very intrusive stability control program. When I'm exiting these corners, it does not want to give me full power until about now. Try your best to work around it, but really there's only so much you can do, right? I don't want to come around this corner slowly at the end, but there's several seconds there where it's just not giving me full power when I'm flat on the accelerator. It's frustrating. It's interesting because it feels like if you lift, it will rotate a little bit, but then it just won't give you power. That's unfortunate. That's a unnecessarily aggressive stability control system. It's not even saving you from anything. It's not like power is going to put you in jeopardy at that point. It's pretty well balanced in the middle of the corner. It's just right there where you want to be going back to power. It starts to cut it out. Good body control though, and like I said, fairly neutral handling. So the BYD Hon to me feels like one of the more solid Chinese industry offerings when it comes to electric sedans. Really nice ride quality, good body control, great power delivery. The one thing that I think would hold it back is how traditional this interior is. I think EV buyers, especially in America because we're still looking at early adopters and fast followers being the buyers, want something that feels more novel, feels more stylish, more modern. And this car, aside from this tablet center screen that's kind of hanging out here, feels exactly like a GM vehicle. If you took this out and replaced this with a screen that was more integrated into the dash, I would tell you we're driving in a Buick. That's what I would think we rank. A 0-60 time of 3.9 seconds and a quarter mile run of 12.6 seconds means the Hon won't be winning any races against the Model S. But the vehicle we drove sells for less than $35,000 in China. That's Model 3 money, and the Hon is slightly quicker than the Model 3 dual motor to 60 miles per hour, but three tenths slower through the quarter mile. Call the tie? Maybe? Next up we have the NIO ET5, a sleek two-motor all-wheel drive EV that's sold in Europe as well as China. The ET5's best feature is that you can trade a depleted battery for a full one in less than five minutes at one of NIO's 2,200 battery swapping stations. Since quote-unquote charging is so fast, there's no need to be stingy with the electrons. Step on the right pedal and the ET5 zaps out 483 horsepower and 516 pound-feet of torque. All right, NIO ET5, almost 500 horsepower, more than 500 pound-feet of torque. Here she goes. It's kind of loud, but it does zero to 60 in 3.3 seconds, quarter mile in a 12 flat. So it's got the straight-line crud, it's plenty quick, but they don't quite have the sound figured out. It's really weird to have the audio input there directly correlated with pedal inputs and not just the accelerator, the brake pedal too, right? So I'm leaning into the accelerator, I'm off the accelerator, now I'm going to go into the brakes. Guess what? The brake's overheated. This is pretty cool, you can't see it, but on my instrument cluster there is a small brake disc and caliper icon, and I wasn't convinced it was a brake disc and caliper, it's just a little circle, but it was red a second ago and now it's yellow, and I know earlier it was green. So that's one really cool feature. If your brakes are going to overheat, at least tell me when they are starting to cool down and when they are cool enough to consider them good to go. Nobody knows what they're doing when it this, I can definitively say, is not the solution. It seems quite delayed. The volume is just unreal. I can't even talk to you when I'm driving. All right, there goes the brake warning again. The powertrain soundtrack is incredibly loud, but the tires are also screaming for mercy, and I'm looking at something like a 26.5 figure eight lap time, which is not great. That Xiaomi Su7 did something like a 24.7, so almost a full two seconds quicker in this handling, acceleration, braking test. I think this thing really is struggling with grip. This Neo ET5 feels quite solid when you drive it as if you're on the street, but when you push it to the limits on the track, it definitely doesn't feel like it got the full chassis development workup. Seems like there's not the grip you expect, and it really loves to understeer. Considering how much power this thing has, you'd expect it to be a true sports sedan. It's not really the case. Hitting 60 miles per hour in 3.3 seconds and clearing the quarter mile in 12 seconds flat makes the ET5 a legitimately quick car. This is sports car territory, but don't go thinking the ET5 is some kind of sports sedan. The 100 kilowatt hour battery makes this a chunky boy at 4,817 pounds. It doesn't handle nearly as well as it pulls. This is the Yangwang U8, and we can hear Neo's PR people screaming, who you calling fat, at its inclusion on this list. The U8 packs four motors, a 49.1 kilowatt hour battery, and a four-cylinder engine into a 7,628 pound package, the size of a Chevy Tahoe. It's an extended range electric vehicle, which means the gas engine supplies electricity to the motors, but never directly drives the wheels. That's okay though, because those four motors make plenty of power and torque on their own. 1,180 horsepower and 944 pound-feet of torque, to be precise. This is a Land Rover wannabe, Yangwang U8 leather, suede-like materials everywhere, almost 1,200 horsepower, and she's got some giddo. 0-60 in 3.2 seconds. This one feels a little more solid than most at speed. Quarter mile in 11.5 seconds. Man, this thing is wild. Nice, really nice, really nice. We'll do a couple brake stops from 60. It's got a really soft brake pedal. Brake dive is quite nicely controlled. This is a big heavy machine, so the brake stops are almost 130 feet. That's right up there with some really big trucks in America, even heavy-duty trucks. That was 137 feet. You could feel it kind of get into the ABS and then let off and get back into it on that stop. This Yangwang U8 is powerful, but it's also massive, so let's see what it will do on the figure eight course. Oh yeah, you got to brake early. And you know, it felt good controlling brake dive, but man, this thing rolls. Tons of body roll, but kind of controllable from a... Ooh, I'm not getting full power anymore, buddy. No way is that full power coming out of these corners. Let's try it here. I don't know. Oh, maybe it's an ESC thing. I think that's an ESC thing. Some corners, it's not giving me full power. I can't think of the last vehicle I drove that rolled as much as this one, but it's... it's not wallowy. It doesn't, like, wobble back and forth, toss your head around. It just leans over and sits, and it's fine. Definitely some ESC intervention there. It's not even, like, body roll. It's, like, listing, like a boat. Just parked on an angle. Well, there you have it. 28.31. What does that mean? Eh, she ain't quick, really, around the figure eight course, but what'd you expect? This thing is all about coddling your ass, keeping you cozy and comfy, making life easy. This Yangwing U8 is a competitor to a G-Wagon or a Range Rover, and the build quality is quite impressive on the interior. The fit and finish, the materials used, really, really high-end stuff. So it kind of seems like there's two different worlds here, right? There's the $40,000 world where it looks pretty good, but it doesn't feel like it's up to snuff with what a $40,000 Honda or a $40,000 Ford even feels like, both on the interior build quality and some of the dynamic qualities. Step up to something like this U8, which is $150,000, by the way, and it starts to feel kind of competitive. You know, dynamically, you might get some more advanced chassis systems in a European or American or British luxury vehicle, but this thing feels solid, comfortable, quiet, pretty poised. I'm kind of impressed. The name might be unmistakably Chinese, but the Yangwing U8 is as American as any luxury SUV sold in the States. It's outrageously huge, outrageously luxurious, and outrageously quick. 0-60 takes just 3.2 seconds, and the quarter mile is over in 11.4 seconds. Give it a different name, and the U8 would sell in the U.S. The second quickest car in our testing is the MG Cyberster, a rare two-door EV. This convertible wears the badge of a 100-year-old British brand famous for light, playful roadsters. The roof folds on the Cyberster, and the badge is shaped like a stop sign, but that's where the similarities end. The two-motor, all-wheel-drive model makes 536 horsepower and 535 pound-feet of torque, which makes light work of the Cyberster's 4,376 pounds. This car is not a direct 911 competitor. We're using that 911 as a benchmark, the standard that it needs to meet, maybe. This vehicle is, though, about half the price of a Porsche 911. We're going to start off here with a launch. We are in using the super sport mode, pulls up track mode, and let's see what this does. Three, two, one. Okay, that was bizarre. I was not expecting it to make those noises, which sound like they're straight out of an 80s monster truck video game. It did a 0-60 in 3.1 seconds, quarter mile in 11.5 seconds, and yet kind of devoid of drama. It doesn't really hit you with a huge amount of torque, even though I think it makes a good amount of torque. Let's give it a launch. A little bit of torque there. 0-60 in about 3.1 seconds. It is quicker than a 911. It sounds like it's a 1980s arcade game. It has none of the oral drama of a real 911, but, you know, it goes. That's what EVs do. All right, let's do some brake stops. All right, let's do one from 100. I will admit to being a little bit nervous braking from 100 miles per hour in this car. I'm just hoping that everything stays bolted together. I do not like the way the brake pedal feels. No action there. No feedback. No nothing. Nothing, right? I mean, I know I'm standing on the pedal, but this almost certainly has a brake-by-wire system, and I'm saying that just based solely on how this thing feels. There's no way you're stepping on anything other than kind of a simulated brake pedal. Something that's connected to a box that sends electronic signals to the brake booster to then push fluid to the calipers. The brake stops in this MG Cyberster are longer by about five feet in the MG Cyberster compared to a Porsche 911. I'm sure weight has a lot to do with that. Tires could be a factor as well. You just don't feel like there's any connection to the car. There's a super sport button on the steering wheel. If you push it, it does not activate super sport mode. It activates track mode, so we're in track mode. We've got traction control and ESC off, maybe. Overcooked that one a little bit. Got a brake earlier. Remember, it's an EV. It's quick. Well, chassis balance-wise, it's not atrocious. I shouldn't say not atrocious. It's okay. It's some... it's responsive to brake and throttle. I will say there's nothing about the steering that makes me love it. It is very much the epitome of everything we dislike about bad electric power steering system. I am about a full second slower in this car, which is quicker 0 to 60 than I was in the 911 around the figure 8, right? A little stability control intervention there. So I've got traction control off, but not stability control. And as far as I can tell, you can't turn off stability control. I had some locals help me with that. It's nowhere near as neutral as the Porsche. You're not really having to worry about oversteering this car. It will a little bit if you really provoke it, but doesn't require balancing on the edge like the 911 does. So, you know, it's a grip issue, maybe a confidence issue, a balance issue a little bit, handling qualities. So, yeah, it's what you'd expect almost. The EV is quicker in a straight line, but it can't match the Porsche in terms of handling, in terms of braking, and certainly not in the sense of driving experience. It's nowhere near as fun. The Cyberster's 3.1-second 0 to 60 run and 11.5-second quarter-mile performance makes it quicker than the Porsche 911 Carrera. Oh, and did I mention that it sells for just $50,000 in China, where a 911 costs more than $150,000? MG says the Cyberster is more grand tourer than sports car, and we can confirm that it's not the most agile or engaging car on our figure eight circuit. But it is dang impressive in a straight line. The quickest car we tested in China by a metaphorical mile is the Xiaomi Su7 Max. This Tesla Model 3 performance competitor makes a monstrous 664 horsepower and 618 pound-feet of torque from two motors driving all four wheels. It's another heavyweight at 4,861 pounds, but Xiaomi hides the weight far better than NIO, thanks to that extra power and skilled chassis engineering. I'm in the Xiaomi Su7. This is a kind of Model 3 performance competitor, really. Let's see what she'll do 0 to 60. Oh my god! The squeeze on your chest! 0 to 60 in 2.68 seconds. Quarter mile in 10.71. That is massively quick. 128 miles per hour in the quarter mile. This thing makes about 673 horsepower, if my memory is right. More than 600 pound-feet of torque, and it goes in a straight line. You can see the influence from a Tesla Model 3 in this interior. This horizontal screen, dual phone chargers underneath, large glass roof overhead. But there's some real big differences as well. I've got a nice instrument cluster display here, a head-up display. These materials are so much nicer than what you'll find in a Model 3. There's so much more style going on. It is more expensive than the Model 3 dual motor we have here, and that seems like a pretty incredible deal to me. Let's do some brake stops now. A little bit of lock-up and then a little bit of a release. I'm getting a pop-up warning. I can't read that. I would not be surprised if that has something to do with the brake heat. I did confirm this is a brake temperature warning, which means we're two for two in this electric sedan comparison we're doing on getting brake temperature warnings without doing that much to abuse the brakes. Yeah, we're stopping from some high speeds, but we're not doing a ton of stops here. We're doing three, four from 60 miles per hour, one or two from 100 miles per hour, and then maybe a half-dozen laps of our figure-eight course. If you're going to be a performance car, if you're going to offer 700 horsepower and you're going to do zero to 60 in less than three seconds, you've got to back it up with brakes that can stop the car. People are going to take these to autocrosses. They're going to track them. Maybe not everybody. You've got to do that development work. In addition to a sport plus mode, this car has a master mode where you get to adjust all these different configurations. There's a drift mode. There's the ability to adjust the torque for an app, the ability to adjust the regen braking for an app. There are four different ESC settings plus off, seven different traction control settings plus off. For the sake of our figure-eight course, I'm trying to keep things simple, so I'm leaving it in automatic torque distribution, automatic regen distribution, ESC fully off, traction control fully off. Let's go ahead and see what this car can do. There's my brake warning again. Less than a half a lap in. Nice rear power bias. Lots of fun coming out of here. I'm not getting the braking I need there, so we're gonna have to brake a little bit earlier. But man, it's awesome power oversteer in this car. A little bit of mid-corner understeer that you're fighting with. Hard to get the brakes quite right. Another brake warning, so I've probably got to stop it here after this lap. 24.84 though. That's quite a bit quicker than the Model 3. Obviously, this thing has a lot more power, but it's quite a bit more fun to drive based solely on the corner oversteer on exit, power oversteer. It's wild to me that all these EV companies struggle so much with keeping the brakes cool. I guess that's because in normal driving, they're only using regenerative braking, or 90% of the time they are, and they realize that they very rarely get too much heat into the mechanical brakes. But the German automakers have figured out how to make these 6,000 pound, 600 horsepower SUVs lap the Nürburgring. A 13 plus mile long racetrack, all out, using those brakes super hard. So when we're doing these rinky-dink figure eight laps, maxing out at 80 miles per hour maybe, why is it so hard for them to figure out how to keep the brakes cool? This car is so much fun powering off the corners. It's got this great, easily controlled power oversteer. Mid-corner you're fighting some understeer, but see this being a lot of fun for somebody who's kind of just getting into performance driving. It's fun. Gotta fix the brake heat though. Gotta fix the brake heat to be a true sports sedan. 2.7 seconds to 60 miles per hour. 10.7 seconds at 128 miles per hour in the quarter mile. Here's some context for that. The Su7 is as quick as a Veyron to 60 miles per hour. It is faster than a Corvette Z06 through the quarter mile. And it costs just $42,000 in China. Yet the real mind blower is that Xiaomi is known for making phones and electronics. This is the company's first car and that's what makes China's auto industry so interesting. In a span of 10 years, Chinese cars have gone from factory fresh jalopies to giant killers. If you like cars and technology and yes, going fast, you've got to pay attention to what's happening in China.