New MG4 EV full review - the cheapest 300 mile electric family car

MG is now the best part of a hundred years old. For older people it signifies roadsters and enjoyable coupes that didn't break the bank. For younger people, leery coloured hot hatches and maybe some V8s. Today really it's less of a British icon from Longbridge and more a value brand from the Far East. But dismiss MG at your peril because the last few years have brought out a couple of competitive, successful, good value electric cars. And in this episode of The Late Brake Show, I'm focusing on this, the new MG4. The first ground-up EV that's a family hatchback. I'm Jonny Smith, welcome to The Late Brake Show. Before we delve into the MG4, let's remind ourselves what MG have been up to recently. The MG5 EV is the only electric estate car on sale. It's supposed to be really good and it's about to be refreshed. I will be in the seat of that car imminently. And then they've got the recently refreshed MG ZS EV which has already scooped several awards. So what can we expect from this? This car promises to be a near 300 mile EV that's almost the same dimensions as the Volkswagen ID.3 and the Cupra Born. In fact, that is the car that this is aiming to try and conquer. Difference is, this starts at £26,000. It's pretty cheap for an electric car, but is it any good? MG's made a point of saying they want to keep the range simple and well-specced. So you can get the SE or you can get the SE Long Range, which is what this is, or you can get the range-topping trophy. I've focused on this car because I think this car in terms of price and realistic spec is the one that I would want to go for. It's two and a half thousand pounds more to go from standard battery size to long range battery size and I think it's well worth it. But we'll talk a bit more about that in a minute. Let's come on to design. First up, all MG's come with adaptive LED headlights, just like this. And I think this frontal styling really apes the Cupra Born, which is the brother of the VW ID.3. The VW ID.3, which is almost the same dimensionally as this car, just looks a little bit frumpy, I think. Cupra Born looks cooler. This has a bit of that going on and maybe a bit of Lamborghini Urus, albeit this is a useful car. One other thing that the Long Range gets, these are active grilles, so these will shut down at certain speeds to make it more aerodynamic. There's a really cool kind of indentation in the bonnet and a very proud large MG Octagon badge. It shows that it wants to proclaim what it is rather than kind of shy away from that, which is interesting to me. I always like to see what's actually under the bonnet of these things. Why do you say, Jonny, why is that? I'll tell you why. Because the MG4 is rear motor, rear wheel drive, just like the ID.3. Although there is going to be a dual motor version because this is built upon MG's first bespoke platform, modular scalable platform system. And this car, the underpinnings of this, will be on a couple of new generation MG EVs coming out shortly. What can we see down there? Electric steering rack. It's just a big piece of plastic. That's got to be the HVAC, hasn't it? I'll poke this camera in and show you. It's not that impressive. 12 volt battery there. Obviously, coolant for the battery packs and the motors and screen wash there. It's all at the back. Obviously, I'm going to crawl under the back in a minute. First thing that really interests me with the MG4 behind the wheel is you've got lots of different modes. You've got five driving modes and you've got four regen braking modes. And I was feeling on the steering wheel for paddles, but they're not there. They're in this menu here. So I've got the energy recovery on high at the moment, which is supposed to simulate an almost one pedal drive like in something like the Nissan Leaf or BMW i3 has quite aggressive regen. And then driving mode, snow, eco, normal, sport or customization mode, which is impressive. And then you go into the, this is the display which will show you all of the energy you're using, how efficient you're being, where the energy is being transferred from and your charts and things. Kia and Hyundai are always good at throwing lots of charts at you if you want to know the facts. So the two power levels of car come from the two different battery sizes. Your 51 kilowatt hour battery pack, which is your standard range, and your 64 kilowatt hour battery pack, which is your longer range. You can only buy the trophy top line car in the long range battery, but because of the aerodynamic pack and stuff that it's got on it, and a bit of extra luxury like it's got electric seats and stuff, it hasn't got as good a range as this one. It's about 11 miles less of range. I've just noticed it's got intelligent battery heating. So again, it's the liquid cool battery pack, it's got a lot of kit on it for what it is. Normally you can see where a manufacturer has cheapened a car in key areas like when you open the boot and you look inside the door shuts and the carpet inside the boot, and when you pop the bonnet like I did with this one earlier, and you look at the paint finish where it normally just turns into primer on the inner wings and the chassis, and this is body coloured, like quite a good finish. So actually the finish is probably better in those sorts of places than the Renault Zoe. This is almost what Kia and Hyundai did four years ago, five years ago, and at the same time companies like Volkswagen I think have cheapened their trim and cheapened their cars and it starts to show. So they're moving to a point of convergence. VWs don't feel as special at the moment to me, certainly electric ones. So 98% charge, 258 miles, but I have put air conditioning on because we have to keep the windows shut so you can hear me. The other thing is the air conditioning is actually quite vocal in this car, even on low setting you can hear it. Phil, the videographer, said it sounded like it was slightly broken. I don't know what this car is going to be like long term. I don't know whether it will hold together for 10 years. It's really hard to know. What I do know is obviously it comes with that amazing warranty. Most EVs have an eight year warranty with their high voltage side and this is a seven year warranty for the whole car. Really impressive. So it speeds like 55, 60 miles an hour. I don't feel like it's really any louder than the Zoe or the Kia Soul that I've had and in fact the Kia Soul, and I drove the Kia Soul for nearly a year, I'll put a long-term test report in the link above my head now, but that car was interesting because it had a similar size boot to this and it had a similar range to this, 275, 280 mile range. But it's 34,000 pounds, this is 28. I've stuck it in sport and so we're going to do a 0-62 run. Now the bigger battery car does it 62 sprint in 7.9, the smaller battery pack, lighter car I guess, gets to 62 in 7.7 seconds. So neither of them are slow, neither of them are Tesla Insanema, but I think a 7 second to 62 car is decent, decent. I wasn't expecting the MG4 to be so together and to deliver so much. I had a hunch that it would be decent but it seems to so far have exceeded my expectations and they are not paying me to say that. I'm being serious, I think the way that it turns, the way that it grips, the feeling of the steering, I'm not going to review a car like this and say hey £26,000 is really cheap. It's not really cheap but you've got to look at it compared to its rivals and compared to its rivals it is significantly cheaper spec for spec certainly. There's a load of pheasants in the road, not just one or two, a load. I'm really glad I didn't come round there at 50 miles an hour. Which brings me on, while we are doing this let's do a 0-62. Oh interesting, it paused and then came back on song again like it had a gear and there's more pheasants in the road. So that was a 0-60 to kind of 7 miles an hour. I think if you can fast charge at well over 100 kilowatts, which this can, and you've got a real world range well over 250 miles, that is such a tipping point for ease of driving an electric car day to day and I speak from experience. Now that MSP platform that I was talking about earlier, what's interesting about that is MG have told us that in time that will be able to support switchable battery packs. So you'll be able to take one out and put one in. It will also mean that it's compatible with 800 volt updates and over the air updates so there's an awful lot going on in terms of future proofing with the MG4. Profile design, let's talk profile design. What differentiates this the SE from the Trophy are several things, one of which is the two-tone roof that's available on the Trophy which looks like this. A sort of double kind of WRC-style rear spoiler which this one doesn't have, the Trophy does. It looks like like this. Almost forgot to say this light bar which I'll come on to, it's a full width light bar on the Trophy car but not on the SE. But you've still got in profile, really interesting I think in profile actually, you've got this crease which comes off the back door and into this almost ducktail spoiler you can see from that angle here which on the Trophy model this is a full width rear light, on this model it's just the corners and a nice little lip that's finished in black with a tinted rear glass. I don't mind not having the roof spoiler, not having that roof spoiler means this car does about 10 more miles WLTP so this is the highest range car, 281 miles WLTP, 450 kilometers and that's a combination of the aero and that bigger battery pack, 64 kilowatt hours. This is the charger just here and I really like the quality of the bung, I know it's a minor issue but the quality of the bung is excellent and it's lit all the way around. All MG4s come as standard with vehicle to load ability so in other words you can allow the car to discharge into an appliance and use it as a mobile battery which is amazing given the price point of the car. Stats wise, right, 35 minutes from 10 to 80 percent rapid charge up to 135 kilowatts I believe, 39 minutes for the smaller battery. Again it's one of those things, 51 kilowatt hour battery is seven, eight hours from a wall box, a 7 kilowatt wall box, 10 hours from the wall box for the 64 kilowatt hour battery which is what this one is and as I said before I think for two and a half grand extra the 64 kilowatt hour long range car in SE spec is the one to have. That's a £28,000 car that'll do 281 miles, rapid charge at over 130 kilowatts and vehicle to load and it's still got tons of kit as standard, incredible. 17 inch wheels with plastic aero add-ons. Now I don't know if behind here is a steel wheel or an alloy, it's an alloy. I'm Captain America, let me tell you about the 17 inch wheels which are covered with aero discs. Bring around to the back of the MG4, there's that sort of lack of spoiler that I was telling you about for this model but the bigger spoiler juts out more. This does jut out really well, there's no rear wiper which will pee a lot of people off especially with British weather but I happen to think that this maybe this sort of extended ducktail will keep all of the dust and dirt from getting on there, who knows. That's the third brake light and then down here you've got this huge kind of swept up diffuser. I think overall it's a solid piece of design especially compared to what's out there at the moment. I'm not enamored by the ID.3, I think the Cupra Bourne looks better than the ID.3, this does take some of those those designs from it. And what else does it compare with? Well I suppose things like the Renault Zoe, that's one of the competitors, Peugeot e208, Vauxhall e-corsa, those are the kind of cars. Yet you've got, and you can't see it in there but there's a sticker there, the one that Kia prides itself on and has done for years, seven year warranty. I think it could be the envy of a lot car companies right now. Anyway boot space, a very important element to any family hatchback. Yes a black carpeted area called a boot. Now I looked at the stats on this because it interested me, 363 litres of boot space in the MG4, that's 22 litres less than the ID.3 and the Cupra Bourne, of which neither of those are class leading. But I've had a Renault Zoe for six months on test and I did a video about it, I'll put the link above my head, because that's an arch rival of this. The Zoe's got a 338 litre boot, this is 363 and I found the Zoe boot to be really quite capacious. So I think this is probably going to be pretty good. There's a lip here, so obviously it's not a flat entry, there's a little bit of an elasticated net in this corner and this is an easy to remove, just fairly bogo cardboardy parcel shelf. 60-40 split and actually when you drop the 60-40 rear seats it's 1177 litres of space. There is nothing under here and the reason for that is, apart from a compressor and a can of tyre foam, is because of course this is rear wheel drive rear motor. I'm gonna have a quick look, see if I can see it because I'm curious. It's a flat floor car, it's all flat with under trays for aero, but I can see it's independent rear suspension. I will take a little action camera and have a nosy, just for you, because that's what we do on the label. Now a lot of rear wheel drive EVs like the Honda e, which I reviewed a long while ago, one of my most successful videos of all time, and the ID.3 as I mentioned before, their rear motor, rear wheel drive, or the Transit van is as well, they don't often feel very real rear wheel drive and that's because traction control, you can't really turn it off. You can put it in snow mode which will allow for a bit more slippage on slippery conditions but that's about it. Get it from a value point of view and look at it like actually it's just a good car. Unless you're a brand snob it's something maybe you should be considering, especially at a time when a lot of legacy brands, brands that are kind of deep rooted in piston stuff, they can't change their product lineup quickly enough. So because of that battery pack and this new platform, the MG4 has a 50-50 weight distribution and it does feel very well balanced, probably helped by the fact that it's fully independent suspension. And that was an MG on someone's front garden there, an MGF. You see the MGF was the last model that most people remember from MG and it's a model which maybe cruelly I've got no interest in whatsoever. I'd rather own this. That's probably one of the arch rivals, and it's charging at the moment, of this car, the Kia e-Niro and it's a great car. We reviewed the new one quite recently, I'll put the link above my head, however much more expensive, much more expensive, like £7,000 more expensive, maybe more than that. Doesn't that sound like, that sounds like a grandfather clock that my nana used to have, doesn't it? I can imagine her eating my soup as a kid in the 80s and then nana comes in and asks me if I want a biscuit. Yeah, I think it's got, I'll have to find out because I don't know, it feels like it's got a two-speed gearbox. About 45 miles an hour when you're really towing down on the throttle, it feels like it pauses and steps up again. How odd. So 250 newton meters of torque maximum this has and a 150 kilowatt motor for this more powerful car, 125 kilowatt motor for the the shorter range battery pack, the smaller battery pack. I think it's about 201 horsepower this equates to which is the same as the Kia Soul and the e-Niro and the Kona. Adaptive cruise control is standard, you've got blind spot assist, there's lots of assistance systems that come as standard but then the trophy model adds a few more on. So I'm going over some, I'm going over some pretty potholed back lanes now just to see if I can sense any fidget in the suspension. The damping is, is probably softer rather than firmer but not in a bad way. It feels like it controls itself very well, it's comfortable, helped by the squishy seats I think. Visibility is really good in the MG4 too. These extra little quarter lights, I like those and the fact that the the side mirrors are set back, they look quite pointed and aero but yeah I feel like the pillars aren't too thick. It'd be nice to have this with the sunroof but I honestly believe that a car like an MG4 like this, because it's a value car, I wouldn't want to be loading it up with options and I certainly wouldn't want to be buying the range-topping car because I just, if you, if you want to do stuff like that why don't you just buy a more premium car. This is not low spec. Okay inside the back of the MG4, remember we talked about that MSP, modular scalable platform, this new skateboard that MG have developed for EVs, well they say they've got very very thin cells, 110 millimetre high battery pack and that and this platform allows you to have better seating at the back here. This is three abreast, it's a five-seat car, there's almost a flat floor going on there so that's good to know. The other thing is it's mostly black in here and it's it's all fabric, little bit of blue stitching. First thing I notice when I sit in it, it is very soft, very squidgy seats and headrests and I don't mean that in a negative way, it actually feels quite cosy like you're sinking into a soft bed. There's not a great deal of design flair going on here but at the same time like when I touch the plastics and the trims they don't feel as cheap as I would expect them to which is impressive really and there's not a very intrusive centre console for the people at the back, there's a little bit of a dugout there and one USB and I've just noticed there's no oh ---- handles, there's none, no oh ---- handles at all. There is not one handle in the room at all but there is a lot of headroom which is a good thing. Let's go to the front. I've been a motoring journalist for 20 odd years and it amazes me now what the entry level amount of equipment and luxury you can get on a car is. Not only that is there's not really a bad car out there anymore, not bad bad, I'm sitting in the MG4 cabin here look and you've got this wonderful little semi-floating plinth with the rotary drive knob and the electric handbrake. On the trophy model, the top spec car, that pad there is a wireless charging pad but there's a little genius pair of cutouts for cables so they don't flap around in front of your legs, they're down here and here. Down here you've got a pair of cup holders and then a little drawer blind and then a tiny little elasticated shelf for my MG badge with my key fob. Now these plastics here they're not great but they're not as bad as what I was expecting and I think the design is the sort of linear simple uncluttered vent. The driver binnacle here, this is a seven inch digital display, that there is 10.25 inch touch screen. It comes as standard with this, it comes as standard all models with CarPlay, Android Auto, that sort of stuff. There's some physical volume buttons down here and the heating. Top spec cars like the trophy get a heated steering wheel and heated seats at the front but I mean I'm looking at this going, you've got parking sensors as standard, you've obviously got your adaptive LED headlights which I showed you outside, you've got your adaptive cruise control, driver attention alert, lane keep assist, all from 26 grand. And then this one here, this is the long range SE, 99% charge, 277 miles so on paper this will do 281 miles or for two and a half thousand pounds less, 218 miles with the lower battery power. I like it in here. What do you think of this design? I've always favoured I think with EVs a more open plan look, like the sort of Ioniq 5 type of thing and maybe the VW Buzz, rather than the big clunky centre console traditional approach like the Polestar 2. But actually talking of the Polestar 2, this doesn't have an on button like Teslas and Polestars, you get in it and it's immediately ready. You put your foot on the brake and stick it into drive or reverse and you're off. The fact that you've got those options of four different brake regen options is really cool. I normally like having the paddles on the steering wheel like something like the Kia Soul, so you can go up to a corner and maybe tap it a little harder, regen, go round. But it's on the screen but I'm okay with that. I'm looking very much forward to the MG5 EV, the Estate, the new one that's coming out imminently. I think that's going to become a cult car all in itself soon, a bit like the high-end Ioniq, the original Ioniq, the one that looks like a woodlouse or the wind knife as it's called. So then MG4, what's your opinion? Would you drive a new MG? Is it more important to have lots of kit and a seven-year warranty rather than a brand name which is highly regarded? In other words, would you rather have like, I don't know, a base model ID.3 and pay an extra few hundred quid a month for one to lease one or would you rather have a high spec one of these? Let me know in the comments. I have actually reviewed an electric MG on this channel before, the RBW Roadster, which uses a classic MG body shell but with modern continental EV underpinnings. That's worth having a look at, I'll put that video above my head. I can't remember the last time that I reviewed a car and there wasn't really anything that I deeply disliked about it, which is odd. It's really odd. I think when you put it up against what it's trying to rival, ID.3, Zoe, Cooper Bourne, E208, Corsa, this is a serious contender. We're at an interesting point now, aren't we, in the EV world of value EVs. We've got a lot of Chinese manufacturers coming in, pushing the boundaries of what's possible, throwing lots of kit on board. It is kind of what the Japanese did in the 70s when they were trying to break the UK and American markets. The Koreans have done the same in the last decade. Now it's time for the Chinese brands to do that. Look at the Aura Cat, for example. Can't wait to spend a bit more time in that. It's really good, much better than I was expecting. I quite like the way it looks. It feels comfortable. It drives with some level of flair and response. When I say some, that's actually being harsh. A good level of. Any car, any EV that you buy for under £30,000 that can rapid charge well over 100 kilowatts, that can take you to nearly 300 miles in the real world, that's impressive. That's impressive. And 7.9 seconds, 7.7 seconds to 62 is absolutely fine. And you've got the big warranty as well. Crumbs. In a world where I think a lot of us, especially in Britain, we do get carried away with grand snobbery, we'd almost rather buy a base model Audi than a top spec Kia. But is that changing? I feel like it is. Like many of you, I looked down my nose at MG cars when they returned 12 years ago, whenever it was, and had no interest in them at all. Didn't even see the point of the badge being on such a vehicle. I'm eating my word stood here now because this car in particular, the MG4 is a fine piece of work in many ways. On the one hand, you could look at it as a copycat of an ID3. On the other hand, you could look at it as just a fantastic electric car that ticks an awful lot of boxes and that's aiming to get people out of piston cars that are priced around the £25,000 mark. They want a real long range EV with a really long warranty. Apart from a couple of scratchy light fittings and plastics, of which there aren't many, I think this car has taken me by surprise in a good way. Hope you've enjoyed this late break show EV review. There's many, I'll put a list, in fact I'll put the playlist of my EVs on the screen now. 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