1. Tesla vehicles (not including the Cybertruck) tend to weigh less. A model 3 weighs up to 4000 lbs, an Ionic 6 weighs up to 4600 lbs, a Polestar 2 weighs up to 4600 lbs, and an i4 weighs up to 5000 pounds.

2. Tesla lies about the range. They claim around 15% more than is realistic for most drivers.

Edit: Fixed a typo

It’s funny how they give American car manufacturers a $7500 leg up, and GM STILL can’t fucking deliver EVs

My experience with Tesla service was that it was good as long as you weren’t in a hurry. It took a long time (over a month usually) to get an appointment, but they didn’t BS like other brands once you were there and they already had a

Chevy was terrible with my Volt, but that was 10 years ago now so they may be better. Basically I had to go 90 minutes away for a dealership that was authorized to work on it.

At $25k in the US this would have been amazing. It reminded me of the Nissan Pike cars from the 90s. As it is, it just showed that Honda doesn’t understand EVs or EV buyers.

Good

From my experience, Geely is better than Ford in many of these things. I know my Chinese in-laws like Geely at least.

My Mini dealership was the same. The guy knew everything about the EVs they had available and was able to answer questions well. Overall a great experience. If the range was better, I would have gone home with it.

If only they could figure out the service part of it

Volvo seems to be the worst of the luxury brands when it comes to customer service. I was shocked at how useless they were when I went to test drive an XC-40 recharge. I asked about the wool seats and they laughed at me, telling me no one buys that from them. I said they might sell more if they actually had some to look at, but they blew me off. They couldn’t tell me anything about the car itself, including charge rate, battery size, efficiency, etc.

I went there expecting to order one, and ended up leaving with no intention of ever buying a Volvo again.

All of yours. The cheaper fuel and lower maintenance can be significant. I was paying over $350 in gas each month, now only $50 in electricity. That mixed with the cheaper maintenance means I could get a much nicer car for my money.

Plus, don’t underestimate convenience. If you can charge at home. You leave with a full charge every morning which is awesome. Auto preconditioning is amazing.

I genuinely don’t know why it’s a radical opinion that a BMW is better than a Tesla. Tesla isn’t a luxury brand, BMW is, and they’re now priced to reflect that.

The powertrain of a Tesla is good, but so is the powertrain of the i4. My subjective opinion is that the Model 3 is faster, but the i4 is more refined. I prefer the i4. Plus, the lack of blended braking in the Model 3 (something every non-Tesla EV has) is a non-starter for me since one-pedal driving makes my wife carsick.

I have driven many newer Model 3’s as Hertz rentals. Yes they have more features, but that doesn’t fix the build quality, NVH, or interior quality.

Again, I’m not saying that the Model 3 is bad. It’s a good car for the price. I personally will never buy a Tesla again because of the many suspension and HVAC issues I had, but I’ve talked to other people who had great experiences with theirs.

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I owned an '18 Model 3 that I bought new and traded in late last year. The pros I can think of are 1) a better charging network, and 2) faster 0-60. Literally everything else about my BMW i4 is better. The 5.8 second 0-60 in my i4 is fast enough, and the charging network has been good enough for the couple of times a year I use it.

The only real reason to buy a Model 3 now is price with the latest price drops. But you get what you pay for.

You know Tesla is opening up their charging network, right? And another network will be built soon. I like Robert Dunn a lot and sub to both of his channels, and I remember this video when it came out. I think he’s right in criticizing EA, but in my experience it hasn’t been that bad.

For me, a slightly longer charge time for the couple trips I take every year is more than offset by having a much better car with better NVH, better build quality, better reliability, and a gauge cluster.

What I would love to see is a small hatchback without all the “self driving” features, with a basic cloth interior, without an unnecessary amount of power, and with a reasonable amount of range (at least 250 miles). I’m sure the car reviewers would hate it, but if they can make that for $25k, it will sell millions of vehicles.

I believe Tesla COULD be the one to make this with the Model 2, but I fear Elon will have a hard time making a car without all the technology. I thought it would be Toyota, but I didn’t see it happening after the BZ4X POS disaster.

Don’t let anyone tell you that you “need” 40A charging or anything. My wife and I split a single 40A circuit (20A each) and it’s totally fine.

That said, the biggest potential cost is an upgrade to your panel. Honestly, you should steer away from a house without 200A service anyway, just because it will limit many future electric upgrades.

But that’s my point. The higher charging rate might give you some warm fuzzy feelings, but it doesn’t actually change your road trip. If I had the Ionic 5 yesterday, I would have saved at most 15 minutes in a 12 hour drive. And I am not exaggerating. I was surprised, but every time except once when I got back to my car it was ready to go.

But how often does this actually matter? I’m in the middle of a road trip in my i4, and out of five charging stops I was only waiting for the car once for 10 minutes. The other 4 times the car was at my target charge by the time I was ready to go. I think any if the cars above 150kW charging speed are probably fine, she probably the above 100 will by doable if you only road trip once it twice a year.

I’m not saying that Hyundai isn’t easy ahead in the charging system, I’m just saying that it probably isn’t a reason to buy the car on its own. I would choose the Ionic 5 over the id.4 for the quality (weirdly, but Hyundai is killing it and VW, bluntly, isn’t), styling, and ride quality, but the charging speed would be a bonus rather than a selling feature.