BMW iX3 prototype review: 'an emphatic leap more intuitive, rewarding, precise and involving' Reviews 2025
In short, this is a revolution for BMW, one of the world's great car companies. This new iX3 will launch next year, but its real significance is to be the first out of the traps for a new generation of electric vehicles. And we mean completely new, from ground to cloud. More about the tech, background and scope of the related cars here. BMW is calling them the New Class, or Neue Klasse.
So while we wouldn't usually get frothed-up about a disguised prototype of yet another electric crossover, this one moves the dial.
It's about the same size as the combustion X3, and will sell alongside so BMW gives you a drivetrain choice – the iX3 is electric only, because the underlying Neue Klasse structure is designed to take max advantage of electric packaging.
If your sole EV yardstick is range, the iX3's 500-mile WLTP figure thrashes all-comers. It's up against the new Audi Q6 e-tron and Porsche Macan electric and Lexus RZ, and by the time it arrives there will be the Alfa Stelvio electric and Volvo EX60 too. For the Americas, Cadillac has the bigger Lyriq. For the globe, there's the heavily revised Tesla Model Y. BMW's local rival Mercedes has had the GLC, but EV years are dog years and it shows. So next year there will be a replacement, called GLC EV.
Anyway, the well-packaged battery means that although it's combustion-X3 sized, it has X5 space, especially in the flat-floor back bench. So obviously ground-up new means new electrics? How does it go?
The one we're driving is the iX3 50 xDrive. It has 407bhp between its front and rear motors, and a total of 442lb ft. That's good for a sub-5.0 second 0-62mph time, says BMW. The WLTP efficiency is 4.1m/kWh.
Energy comes from new cells in a new battery structure. It runs at 800 volts to save more weight, and charge faster. The motors and inverters are new. Everything's optimised for efficiency, and the result is that 500 mile WLTP figure, or 400 in the more realistic US EPA test.
Charge times are pretty staggering: I watched as it picked up 200 miles of that in just 10 minutes, the first part of it at 400kW. There are few of the necessary 800V charge posts yet in Britain, but even on our lower-power posts it'll do 10-80 per cent in half an hour, which is an addition of 350 miles WLTP.
You want comparisons? A Porsche Macan 4 Electric has the same power, takes 5.2s for the sprint, but it's far less efficient, only getting about 3.3 miles for every kWh input (WLTP measures charger-to-wheel, not the more frugal battery-to-wheel figure on your trip computer). Its charging time on the fastest posts is similar, but the less efficient Porsche adds 250 miles in a 10-80 per cent charge. Hmm, clever but hidden. Isn't there anything I can show off with?
See the dash up above? BMW calls it Panoramic iDrive. Its first wow is a shallow display running the entire way across the base of the windscreen just above the dash (it's actually a reflected image in the blacked-out strip of the glass that hides the parked wipers). That contains useful configurable widgets, plus the driver's display itself – speed, navigation arrows, battery percent, warning lights etc.
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