Volvo plans for 2025 with its new Tesla Model S rival

USA Today

19-02-2025

Volvo plans for 2025 with its new Tesla Model S rival
Volvo had a record sales year in 2024, gaining 8 percent more volume to deliver more than 763,000 new cars and SUVs across the globe. However, it doesn't expect 2025 to be so smooth, despite plans to introduce fresh products including a fresh Tesla Model S–rivaling electrified sedan dubbed the Volvo ES90. Here's more on that and what else we can expect from Volvo this year.
The new year will start for Volvo with the EX30 Cross Country, a more capable (or capable-looking) version of the EX30 compact electric SUV, which will launch next week. Two other Volvo models will get refreshed, though it's not listed out which cars just yet. The XC90 SUV just got a refresh and the similarly sized EX90 electric SUV just launched, and the brand still offers the S60 and V60 midsize sedan and wagon, the S90 and V90 full-size sedan and wagon, and XC40 and XC60 SUVs; we'd wager the compact XC60 SUV is a shoe-in for an update, and maybe the internal-combustion-powered S90 gets refreshed to look like the new electrified ES90 (tracking the XC90 and EX90), which will also launch later in 2025.
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The new ES90 electric sedan will take on competition like the Tesla Model S with Volvo's SPA2 vehicle platform that already underpins the EX90 electric SUV (and the sorta-related Polestar 3 SUV), likely to get the same 111 kWh battery pack. The EX90 SUV is capable of more than 300 miles of EPA estimated range on a full charge, and packs more than 500 horsepower, so we hope to see those figures carry over, if not improve with the likely more aerodynamic sedan. Additionally, we expect the ES90 to come equipped from the start with the North American Charging Standard (NACS) port that Tesla innovated.
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By comparison, the Tesla Model S currently comes in only two flavors: (dual-motor) all-wheel drive and Plaid (which is tri-motor AWD). They get from between 300 and 400 miles of estimated range, offering 670 hp in regular guise or over 1,000 from the Plaid model. We wager the Volvo ES90 would likely be a little softer than both of those, targeting the same estimated range but offering closer to around 500 hp in its most powerful configuration. The Tesla Model S is priced from just under $80,000 to up to around $95,000; the EX90 is priced at around $80,000, so we figure the ES90 will also land somewhere in the ballpark of $80 to $100 grand.
Beyond the EX30 Cross Country and ES90 sedan, and updates to two of its current models, Volvo also plans to launch a new PHEV in China this year. Beyond 2025, the brand has already walked back a promise to go fully electric by the end of the decade, instead now keeping gas models around for as long "as possible." However, plug-in electrified vehicles accounted for 54 percent of the brand's sales in 2024, so it probably has nothing to worry about considering the positioning of its existing and future electrified portfolio. According to Motor1, Volvo also has the door open to mild hybrid models in the future, but for now, expect to see an onslaught of updated and all-new PHEVs and EVs. That includes an EX60 electric SUV that should begin prototype testing in 2025, with a possible reveal by the end of the year.
Photos by MotorTrend and manufacturer