r/AustralianEV

I’m looking to buy my first car, ideally just a good standard electric car, under 35k
I’ve got my eyes on a MG4 Urban and a BYD Dolphin, although I can’t tell which one would be better

Anyone have any experience, or any other options in that price range that’s jsut as good as these 2?

The GAC Aion UT is a compact electric hatchback from GAC, a new Chinese brand which launched in Australia last year. We tested the Luxury grade ($37,990 driveaway) and came away genuinely impressed for the money although there is a glaring issue.

The good:

• Interior quality that feels well above the price point, soft-touch surfaces, padded dash, properly bolstered seats
• 430km WLTP range from a 60kWh LFP battery, with real-world mixed driving closer to 400km
• 150kW / 210Nm motor, 7.3 sec 0-100, genuinely punchy and fun around town
• Rear passenger space suprisingly ample for a small car
• Feature packed: 14.6-inch touchscreen, wireless CarPlay and Android Auto, 360-degree camera, heated and ventilated seats, panoramic roof, V2L all standard on Luxury
• 8-year unlimited km vehicle warranty and 8-year / 200,000km battery warranty
• Estimated $322 per service, $1,607 over five years

The not so good:

• ADAS is a glaring issue: phantom braking, constant driver attention warnings, speed alerts that trigger at the slightest creep. Disabling requires navigating the touchscreen on every start. GAC needs to prioritise an OTA fix here.
• Almost no physical controls, climate and most settings are touchscreen only
• DC charging peaks at 87kW (10-80% in 34 min), which is on the slower side for a 2026 model. AC Charging at 11 kW is a nice to have.

Verdict:

Best value FWD electric hatch on sale in Australia right now. Suits first-time EV buyers and urban commuters. The interior, driving character and warranty package all punch above the price. The ADAS issues however need to be fixed in order for the Aion UT to provide a good ownership experience for its future customers.

I'm looking at purchasing a new vehicle due to outgrowing our existing 2011 Hyundai i30.

Have 2 children ages 1 and 4, currently do low km, around 5000km/yr. Have offstreet parking but are likely to convert our garage into a bedroom (within 5 years) as one of our kids bedrooms is nicknamed the Harry Potter bedroom.

We are inner suburbs with 3 nearby shopping centres each with chargers, as well as a handfull of other nearby charging options.

Our vehicle use is typically a weekend run around to shops/sports and the occasional weekend away. We will drive Melbourne to Adelaide return around once per year. We both work white collar in the CBD and catch PT there M-F. Weekend camping trips will hopefully be in our near future.

Tossing up between an ev (Geely ex5 or similar) or a hybrid (Subaru Forester Hybrid or similar). With street parking only in our near future I'm interested in your opinions in whether the ev or the hybrid is the way to go.

TL;DR - EV or Hybrid with low yearly km, parking on street and good public charging available

Bit of a milestone worth noting. BYD launched in Australia in 2022 with the Atto 3. Four years later they've delivered 100,000 cars and are now the number one EV brand by volume in the country.

The day after hitting that milestone they announced plans to bring an extra 30,000 vehicles to Australia in the coming months.

For anyone who's been waiting on stock, particularly for the Sealion 7 which has had some wait times, this is good news. More supply means shorter waits and less dealer pressure.

A few things worth knowing if you're considering a BYD right now:

All the popular models, Seal, Sealion 7, Atto 3, sit comfortably under the $75k FBT threshold so you get full exemption on a novated lease until April 2029

The Sealion 7 is currently Australia's best selling EV with sales up 342% year to date

BYD's Blade Battery continues to hold up well in Australian heat based on real world owner data

Anyone here currently waiting on a BYD delivery? Curious how the wait times are looking across different states.

>“At the very least, we can make parts and components including batteries here,” said the PM, according to the Herald Sun. “Indeed, there are companies looking at doing just that.”

Hey guys,

I live in Victoria and I’ve been thinking about buying a new Tesla Model Y.

But then one of my friends who bought a BYD Sealion 7 instead of the Tesla told me the main reason was insurance costs.

So I started checking quotes myself and honestly I got shocked.

The cheapest quote I could find was around $3400/year with RACV, and everywhere else was close to $4000.

I’m 34M, never had any accidents or insurance claims, got my licence at 21, and I’ve been driving a Corolla with comprehensive insurance for the last 8 years.

I honestly didn’t expect Tesla insurance to be THIS expensive.

Can someone explain why? Is it because repairs are expensive or parts take too long or something else?

When I buy a car, I usually keep it for 7–10 years, so insurance costs matter a lot to me long term.

Would love to hear from other Tesla owners in VIC and what you guys are paying.

PS: I live in Kalkallo, 3064

You could just buy the car that most suitable for your needs

Does anyone own a 2026 BZ4X AWD? Can you switch from AWD to FWD as you like? And with FWD-only mode, can you improve on the WLTP range of 517km?

This is an update on a post I had about experiencing significant 1-2 second lag in take-off when I put my foot on the accelerator.

In short, the issue seems to have resolved itself in a very strange way. The car seems to have reset itself somehow.

I had my MG4 2026 Essence charging through the day yesterday. The charging was scheduled for when the solar panels of our house are typically generating power. I checked the MG iSmart app to see the SOC, but the app kept timing out and said that the vehicle was in "deep sleep" or something similar. I then went to the car and pressed the lock/unlock button on the driver side door (without the key) so the screen inside could activate and show me the SOC that way. I just wanted to see if the car was charging. First press of the button - nothing happened. I pressed again and the car started ticking and activating systems as if it was coming back to life/waking up. I could see the car was indeed charging, but thought it strange that it was in "deep sleep"

Today, I needed to take the car to the dealership for a full day of diagnostics. I unplugged the car, pulled out of the garage and drove off. Sure enough, the car had the same major lag issue as before. I tested this a couple more time at intersections of my suburb, and sure enough it was still there.

I had to wait for traffic to clear a bit before I could pull into one of the main roads going past my suburb. During that time, the trip data page reset itself. When I put my foot on the accelerator, the car took off almost instantly as it's supposed to. I had a few traffic lights to test the take off capabilities, and sure enough the car was behaving as it should with no issue.

I arrived at the dealership to explain the situation, but no-one there seemed to know I was booked in for today, even after me showing them the email details. Nevertheless, they got their lead technician to come out and have a look at the car. I explained what the issue was and that it seems to have resolved itself. Apparently, some cars can develop a temporary software error and the car can't clear the computer. They said that they can do it manually for me if it happens again and also check battery health etc. In short, they did not really have an answer and did not have a booking for me as I expected them to have. Since the car is fine now, and I at least have a paper trail of this issue, I decided to leave it as is.

I drove to work and also noticed the car being more energy efficient than when we first got it, with the ride being smoother. The percentage power applied is also a lot less now with acceleration than before. So, I am thinking some software issue caused some light braking to be applied at all times. Since the vehicle seems to have reset itself somehow, the issue is resolved.

This whole saga has left me confused and perplexed. My only hope is that this was a one-time issue and I don't have to go back to the dealership again until scheduled service time.

I'm Chris. I've run Oneway Lebanese Bakery in Lalor for 20 years, but before that I was a Qantas aircraft engineer. In aviation, if proof isn't independently verifiable, it doesn't exist. I couldn't see why used EV sales should be any different.

I'm not a tech founder with venture backing. The product works. What I don't know is whether enough people will pay $99 for it , and I'm not going to find that out sitting in my bakery. I'm a dad of two who got obsessed with a massive breakdown of trust in the used EV market. Buyers are genuinely terrified of getting stuck with a degraded battery , and they have every right to be, it's the most expensive part of the car. But right now, sellers have no credible way to prove their battery is healthy. It leaves both sides guessing, stressing, and haggling in the dark.

I spent months talking to private EV sellers on Facebook Marketplace and Carsales. Most told me the same thing: dashboard screenshots get dismissed, service centre printouts can be questioned, and the dongle-based services that actually produce a real certificate cost $300 and take two weeks. For a private seller with a buyer waiting, that's not a real option.

So I built something called EV TrustSeal. Or I'm almost done building it. Which is why I'm posting here.

I had one seller during my research , a guy selling a $61,000 Model 3 — tell me he "probably wouldn't use a service like this." He didn't say why. I've been thinking about that ever since. I don't know if it was the concept, the price, or something I still can't see. That uncertainty is part of why I need real people to test this before I launch.

What EV TrustSeal is:

An EV battery audit that connects through your car's existing manufacturer app, no hardware, no dongle. You connect via Enode (the same read-only API your car's own app uses), drive and charge normally from 20% to 80%, , and receive a certificate with a QR code. When you're selling, the buyer scans that code themselves, taking them to a public verification page tied to your specific VIN. They don't have to take your word for anything.

Three things worth saying upfront:

The connection is read-only , it cannot touch firmware, change any setting, or affect your warranty. Nothing shows up on your car's computer. No record is left that a test was ever run.

Unlike Service Mode, your car stays completely drivable. Factory diagnostics like Tesla's Service Mode lock your vehicle down for up to 24 hours, drain the battery to empty, and render the car unusable. With TrustSeal nothing changes. Your car stays drivable throughout. All calculations happen off-board on our servers.

Your result is entirely private. We don't publish it, sell it, or share it with anyone until you choose to share the QR code.

If you use Tessie or a similar app: great tool for monitoring your own battery over time. The limitation for selling is the data lives in your account , the buyer sees a screenshot they can't independently verify. Our certificate uses a live QR code the buyer scans themselves on a public page tied directly to your VIN.

Where I'm at Step 1:

Right now I need to verify the raw data we can successfully pull across different makes and models once connected. Before I finalise the full charging calculations, I need to know the connection works consistently on real Australian cars in real conditions.

The methodology calculates SOH from kWh delivered during a real charge event versus the change in state of charge , real measured capacity, not what the BMS self-reports. But I can't validate that until I know the data connection is solid across different vehicles.

What I'm asking:

20 people willing to connect their EV just once so I can run this initial data check. You don't need to do anything special , just connect and let me verify what we receive.

I've built a bakery that's survived 20 years in a competitive industry and spent years certifying aircraft systems where lives depended on the accuracy of the measurement. If something doesn't work in your test I want to hear it from you directly , not find out when a paying customer has a bad experience.

What you get:

• The full data check on your car at no cost
• A free certificate for your car at launch , use it yourself if you're selling or give it to someone who is now or at a future date.

Brands I especially need: Tesla (any variant), BYD Atto 3, BYD Seal, Hyundai Ioniq 5, Kia EV6, Polestar 2, MG4. But I'll take any supported EV.

What I need from you: Connect once. You don't need to do anything special , I just need to verify the data we receive from different vehicle models.

Comment , DM or Email me at chris@evtrustseal.com with your car make, model, year, and odometer in the subject line. Twenty spots. I'll reply with everything you need.

Thanks for reading this far.

Chris (Oneway Lebanese Bakery, Lalor · Former aircraft engineer, Qantas · Founder, EV TrustSeal)

G'day fellow Aussies. As im sure you all know, the Holden Special Vehicle Maloo is essentially the perfect vehicle for the everyday working Aussie mans needs. It is therefore strange to me no motor vehicle company, foreign or domestic, has attempted to capture that same lightning in a bottle and put a two door cab ute with a covered tray on the market BUT with a high power motor and decent battery instead of an engine. It would be cheaper to run, faster, tow the same amount, do bigger burnouts after peeling out of the industrial yard. You could give it fake engine noises like a 6 litre V8 and an optional 4wd and range extender for the Aussie man that demands more from his high performance utility vehicle. Given that our Utes were also popular overseas for the rare, brave people that imported and converted the, again, rare examples you can find in the United States, i feel they would do well in other markets given the chance. Anything but another SUV. The ute platform also provides benefits for battery size and handling, being able to put a large long battery along the frame and evenly distribute the weight of the vehicle to the front more than the Maloo's suggestion of anything resembling weight on the rear. Is there a niche in the market for a vehicle like this? Would you buy one?

I’m not talking about a spirited weekend drive through the hills, or pretending every commute is a Top Gear episode.

I mean the boring stuff.

The mind-numbing commute. Traffic. School runs. Back streets. Suburban driving. Stop-start nonsense where most of us actually spend 95% of our time.

I’m asking because EVs are getting a bit ridiculous now. The Zeekr X is apparently 365kW for around $58k. That is insane money-for-power compared with where cars were not that long ago. At the same time, cars are getting more tech-heavy, more assisted, more insulated, and arguably making us more part of the ride than part of the drive.

I’m personally still on the fence. I still enjoy the odd flick around a tight roundabout, and I’ve always liked the idea of a slow car driven quickly rather than a fast car barely being used. But with speed limits getting lower, roads getting busier, and performance becoming almost meaningless in day-to-day driving, I’m starting to wonder what actually matters most in a modern commuter car.

So for those who made the switch mainly because the numbers made sense:

Did you miss ICE more than expected?

Did the EV feel soulless, or did the instant torque and quietness win you over?

Has the novelty worn off?

Would you go back to ice if the ev discount was removed?

And as EVs get faster and more tech-heavy, what do you actually care about most now: range, comfort, charging speed, tech, cost, handling, or something else?

I don't think I even stop for a drink or snack anymore.

I was filling up my other car (an old ute) and watched a guy pull up in a Zeekr 7x. He walked over to the 1st bowser and then to the second, very suspiciously, he was looking for a squeegee. He then proceeded to walk back to the parking spot and clean his windscreen lol. He looked so guilty doing it. It was quite funny.

Don't get me wrong I've done it before too. I suppose there's air for your tyres too. Where else could you get air etc on the road?

I feel that servos only ever offered this stuff as a courtesy for paying customers (like toilets) and will probably soon start to get cranky about ev owners using them for free.

I don't understand why petrol stations haven't started to offer charging. It just makes sense to tap in on the new market. I would definitely buy a drink or snacks etc when stopping on a road trip.

I've mentioned in other posts that I'm in the process of upgrading an Atto 3 to a Zeekr 7X. The number of EVs available in both segments has absolutely exploded since we bought the Atto 3 back in 2024.

I chose the 7X so quickly I missed out on all the fun of test driving, so I've been going around and doing a lot of tyre kicking anyway, looking mostly at models that are competitors to either the Atto 3 or the 7X.

(With the caveat this is curiosity driven, so I'm just hitting up the cars I can try out in a lunch hour)

Tried out the IM6 recently. If I was buying this (which I'm not), I'd go for the Platinum (long range, single motor) with optioned air suspension.

For the test drive they put me in a Performance since that was the only one they had available for test drives but pointed out the interior, inclusions and suspension setup was identical.

The sales consultant came in the car with me but (unlike J5 earlier) let me choose my own route and drive around for ~30 minutes.

Sharing my unfiltered thoughts and keen to hear from anyone else whose ruled one of these in or out, or knows something I'm missing.

The good

• The air suspension is so comfy. Most of my test drive was through backroads over speed bumps and around tight roundabouts. The long range 7X doesn't come with air suspension. The 7X was tuned better than my Atto 3 but the IM6 with air suspension was better yet again. I haven't owned many cars but I've test driven a lot of EVs now and the IM6 was hands down the best one I've tried for suspension. The ability to option air suspension onto the single motor version is probably the biggest positive for me and the main reason to consider an IM6 over alternatives.
• Throttle tuning is excellent. They put me in the Performance model but the drive was really smooth. The sales consult told me a story about another customer trying out launch control and puking.
• Interior looks nice and clean, seats are comfy.
• No beeps and boops. I asked the sales assistant whether he'd done anything to make it quiet and he said "yes, I dialled it down to low sensitivity".
• I couldn't really test out cornering and handling in more spirited conditions, but my test drive closely mimicked what I'd actually be doing with a car day to day. Just really comfortable.

Not so good

• Touch your thumb and index finger together on your left hand to make a pinching gesture and keep them together. Now do the same thing on your right hand. Now bring the tips of your pinched fingers on both hands together so you make small diamond shape between your those four fingers. Stand in the middle of the road, turn around, hold the finger-diamond up to your eyeball and squint through it at the traffic coming up behind you. That is the rear view you have in the IM6. The space between the head rests is tiny, the mirror is tiny. Put a tall teenager into the back seat and the view would be even further compromised. At this point why bother? I haven't tried a Polestar 4 but I can understand now why they just went with a digital mirror. There's a button to bring up the rear view camera but I'd rather have a digital mirror than retrain my brain to check the dashboard camera.
• The arm rest doesn't have a handle for you to hold when you're pulling the door closed. You have to kind of wrap your hand around the whole arm rest and grip on to pull it shut. Perhaps if you have bigger hands it's not a problem, or maybe I'm just being dumb. But this seems like a really silly design. It just felt really awkward to pull the door closed.
• No HUD in any trim! If I'm paying $70K for a car I want a HUD.
• While most of the drive was free from ADAS intervention I did have it beep at me once, quite urgently, and flash up a message saying "collision imminent". I was alone on a road with no other cars in any direction except parked alongside. Not sure what triggered that.
• The boot is meant to be larger than a 7X but I think they probably copy Tesla and measure to the roof. There's a false floor but it's less useable than the 7X LR because half of it is taken up with machinery. (The sales guy said it was the battery but I don't think that's right. I googled online and I think that was the air suspension gear I was seeing)
• No accessories included. Not even a charger. You have to add that all in at sale time. The dealer said if I was buying off the lot they'd throw in some stuff, and if I was ordering a new build there was a special to get $500 worth of accessories. But the granny charger alone was $425. That doesn't leave me enough left to add in a manual sun shade.

In summary

I'm not sure who would buy one of these. I don't mean that in a disparaging way, I'm just not seeing the value proposition myself. It was really lovely to just sit in and drive, but I think not enough so that most people wouldn't go with a Sealion 7. Alternatively, if you did want to spend the extra money - the 7X is right there, with slightly better specs, more thoughtfully packaged, and with a HUD and a motorised blind.

Perhaps if you were really sold on air suspension but didn't want to lose any range going up to the performance? Or if you were nervous about Zeekrs' brand presence and servicing?

hey all

im at the last stage of getting a new EV im tossing up between the Geely Ex5 Vs Aion V.

price wise they are the same. any recommendation for what i should be looking for ?

does anyone have any experience with the Aion V? im not a big fan of the door handles do you get used to it?

Very happy with it so far! We had been driving a Mazda 3 Sedan for 13 years and it was getting pretty tight for 3 kids in the back. All in all, very impressed so far.

We decided to go PHEV rather than BEV as we only have on street parking and rarely get to park outside our house. So unlikely we can charge at home even though I do have solar and a battery.

My one gripe is the lack of chargers (I’m in Leichhardt) around the streets. There’s a few dotted around the streets and 4 at Marketplace but they always seem to be occupied! So I’m glad we went with PHEV, as we charge when we can but aren’t totally reliant on it.

Do you think it’s better to have a fast EV charger at home or will normal charging do?