Have you ever seen an attractive electric vehicle? Sure, I can hear some smart ass jesting that EVs are inherently unattractive because they don’t make loud noises or have gears, but I’m not talking to them. If you are interested in buying an EV, or if you own one already, was your interest grabbed by how it looked? Really? Does anyone look at the formless, egg-like design of a Tesla and think “that is a beautiful car”? If they do, I think they’re lying, or kidding themselves.
Early EVs, like the original Nissan Leaf, seemed to be wilfully unattractive and even when Jaguar had a go – the first big brand to do so – with the I Pace, it wasn’t pretty. There seemed to be a desire to point out, from a distance, that EVs were not normal cars.
You can argue for Kia’s EV3, EV5, EV-etc range of SUVs, if you like, but I would argue the only attractive SUV in existence is the Porsche Macan, which is an EV now. But it’s still an SUV, so, no.
Porsche’s Taycan and Rolls-Royce’s Spectre could step into this argument, I guess, but who can afford such a thing?
All this preamble is to prepare you for the shocking news that an EV recently won the 2026 World Car Design of the Year. Furthermore, we’ve just driven one at its Australian launch and had a good look at this thing, the Mazda 6e, in the flesh and can confirm that, finally, the world has an electric vehicle that you could buy on looks alone.
This is just one of the interesting things about it, however. The fact that it’s a sedan – they can calll it a hatchback, but it sure looks like a sedan – is unusual, because no one buys those any more, but this Mazda looks so good it could, and should, change that.
Then there’s the fact that it’s a Mazda. An EV from one of the companies I would describe as most resistant, in the past at least, to the very idea of electrification, something they made clear with their previous and only other EV, the MX-30 Electric, which was weird and expensive at $65,490. It almost felt like they didn’t want to sell any, a goal they achieved. In the two years it was notionally on sale the company alleges it sold 131 of them. I doubt it.
Back to the looks of the Mazda 6e for a moment though – and damn it is lovely from the kerb – because it is also very, very impressive inside, in a way that makes a Tesla look and feel like an empty cardboard box from Ikea.
The other absolute top-line thing to know about the Mazda 6e is that it undercuts just about everyone on price, with a starting sticker of just $49,990. A good looking EV from a trusted – almost beloved, in Australia – brand for under $50K, so what’s the catch.
Well, it might strike you that the Japanese simply can’t produce an EV at that price, and you’d be right because the reason the 6e is so temptingly affordable is because it’s joint-venture with China’s Changan Automotive, which provides the very affordable platform – shared with the Deepal LO7. This makes how good it looks even more impressive.
It also means that I had some concerns about what it would be like to drive, and some of those were justified.
For a start, the driving position is wrong – you just can’t get the seat low enough that you feel like you’re in a Mazda, let alone a sedan. Mazda says this is because the battery is so big – it’s 78kWh, producing 190kW/290Nm and a claimed range of 560km.
Actually, the start is also an issue, because this Mazda has no start/stop button, and to turn it off you have to get out and lock it, which is the sort of thing that drives me mad about Chinese EVs, but obviously something the Japanese couldn’t change here (is it just cheaper not to have the button – it’s certainly not better).
Speaking of buttons, there aren’t any, at all, in fact, which again is more Changan than Mazda. You have to do absolutely everything through the screen, even setting up your wing mirrors, and the OS is, in large part, BS.
The other predictably annoying thing about the car is the safety systems, which very much mirror the Chinese approach rather than the Mazda one. While it has many of the annoying bongs, bings and stupidity of other EVs from that region, it adds a new and very strange one, with a system that intermittently alerts you, audibly, that there is a “Sharp Curve Ahead”.
It’s not always right about this, but it’s always annoying, because I have to clever things in my face, marvels of evolution frankly, called eyes to tell me that.
Right, so these are, sadly, just the things you’re going to have to put up with to get a Mazda EV to market at under $50k, and I will stop complaining about them now because I don’t think any of them are going be deal killers for customers. Indeed, I think a lot of people have been waiting for a car just like this to leap into the EV world , although it’s interesting to note that 54 cent of the hundreds of pre-orders the company is holding are from people who were not previously Mazda customers.
And the good news is that it is very pleasant and even, at times, involving to drive. It’s not fast, with a zero to 100km/h time of a tardy 7.8 seconds, but thanks to the joy of EV torque punch, it never feels slow, either, and there’s instantaneous overtaking urge when you want it.
The ride and handling are good and while some of my colleagues disagreed, I thought the steering was fairly Zoom Zoom too, although not in the MX-5 range, obviously. The fact that it’s rear-wheel drive, and a sedan, with all the low centre of gravity benefits that adds, really does make it feel like a bit of a driver’s EV.
And it’s beautiful, and less than $50K. I think it’s going to upend what we think we know about sedans, and I’d have one over a Tesla, or any of its competitors frankly, every day.
Price: $49,990
Basics: BEV, 5 seats, 5 doors, sedan, RWD
Electric Range: Up tp 560kms WLTP
Battery capacity: 78kWh
Battery warranty: Eight years
Energy consumption: 15.9kWh per 100km
Powertrain: Single permanent magnet AC synchronous motor, 190kW/290Nm
AC charging: 11kW
DC charging: 150kW 30 to 80 per cent in 15 minutes
0-100km/h: 7.8s (claimed)
