Inside line on new Range Rover Electric

Luxury EV will finally go on sale in 2026, a full year later than planned

- Phil McNamara [e-mail]

THERE'S a huge buzz about the Range Rover Electric, even though car fans have known it’s been coming for more than five years and 64,000 people are on the waiting list. That’s because there are no luxury electric SUVs with equal prestige or off-road ability, unless you consider Mercedes’ G580 with EQ Technology — which Range Rover engineers won't.

Britain's flagship e-SUV has two motors, delivering a total of 542bhp and a hefty 850Nm of torque. The Merc has four independent motors, so it can spin on its axis in a ‘tank turn’, but JLR’s senior off-road specialist Jason Walters dismisses this as a gimmick.

He also claims the Merc’s breakover angle is inferior and that the Range Rover's real-world range — which is expected to exceed 300 miles - will be superior. It’s all down to JLR’s engineers striving to find the sweet spot between weight, battery size, power, efficiency and off-road ability.

Mitigating trade-offs comes up repeatedly during our drive on Land Rover's off-road testing tracks around Eastnor Castle, Herefordshire. JLR designed the aluminium architecture to go fully electric from day one, determined to preserve the SUV's trademark comfort, practicality, cabin and boot space. “First and foremost this is a Range Rover: we're just offering a new propulsion system,” chief programme engineer Simon Fairbrother tells Auto Express.

Fairbrother won't confirm the EV’s weight, but says it’s not much higher than the short-wheelbase PHEV’s 2.7 tonnes. The huge 118kWh, 800-volt battery is housed between the wheels, slightly reducing the breakover angle (the point where the body grounds out as it traverses a peak) to 22 degrees.