FIRST DRIVE Polestar 3 Swede s luxe SUV targets BMW iX

It's the Polestar 3, Polestar's third model and its largest. It's an all-electric SUV with seating for five and a possible 390 miles of WLTP range. It is yours for £75,900 of your finest English pounds and you can think of it as competition for something like BMW's X5, Porsche's Cayenne or Audi's Q8 e-tron, except with more sort of Scandinavian vibes and a bit less German. I was just thinking like what I want to do is like I could ask a question and then answer myself by appearing like it'll just be, I'll say like is it a Volvo and then I'll answer the question with the car, do you know what I mean? No, yes, well kind of sort of. Now a lot of these cars are based on the same building blocks, the architectures, and Polestar is actually owned by a Chinese company called Geely which owns a load of other brands like Lotus and Volvo and this car is based on a basically a Volvo architecture called the SPA or sustainable product architecture that's the underpinnings of Volvo's big EX90. So the Polestar 3 is essentially the funky cousin of Volvo's big seven seater. So I want to show that it's not, it's actually not that massive, look, look where the roof line is, that doesn't feel like an SUV so I want to sort of say is it huge? You would think so but when you're standing next to it, it's quite a bit smaller than you imagine. It's not a small car but the low nose and low roof line make it feel kind of shrink-wrapped. There are some big numbers attached to it though, it comes with a 111 kilowatt hour battery of which 107 are usable and a 390 mile range which is quite a lot when you think about it. Does it look like a Polestar? I mean you be the judge but now that we're getting more used to Polestar's overall design vibes, I would say yes. There's still hints of Volvo in there but it's kind of more shrink-wrapped and less blocky. So we've got these signature twin-bladed sort of daylight running lights and headlights in the front here and then there's this smart zone here which houses some of the advanced driver assistance systems. Now Polestar says that it wants to make a feature of this being an electric car so instead of a grill where air goes into an engine, it's changing from breathing to seeing. And if you look at the nose itself you can see that it's actually one big spoiler here, it's one big huge aero trick to try and convince a bit more aero efficiency and therefore more range from the battery. Wheels are 21s with a 22-inch option, these are the 22s and then if you look down the side of the car it's got this kind of contrast plastic body cladding which makes it look like an SUV albeit a very low one. I like the way they've used contrasting colours to keep this car looking a certain way and as you move down the car I've always liked Polestar's frameless rear-view mirrors because they just look really sweet and they help for efficiency. There's a flush glass, the door handles fold in, again good for aerodynamics, but the bit I really like is you see how the window line goes all the way back here and then there's this kick in the c-pillar, you can really see that this bit of this line of black here makes the roof look like it's one big sweeping floating shape and this has got loads of texture in it so there's a line that comes around here and then it goes down the square sides of the body. It looks a bit like a transformer as you get around the back of the car it's kind of aping the front in that this big spoiler here and the top of this full-width light bar are kind of one big aerodynamic device then you've got the air blades down here which kind of lengthen the profile of the car make it a little bit more aerodynamic and again you've got the contrast plastic with the body colour. I think it is a little bit colour sensitive though so if you get a dark colour you lose some of the really nice shapes so go bold. So does it look like a Polestar? I'm going to say yes, it's handsome, it's interesting, not too jazzy. So what are the choices? Well initially there's really only a couple of options, the long-range dual motor and the same car with a performance pack power up for an extra £5,600, both being special high-spec launch editions. The standard car gets 483bhp, the performance pack 510 and about 50lb-ft more torque. The performance pack gets both the performance bump and what Polestar says is performance optimised air suspension, as well as special 22-inch forged alloys and the usual Polestar Swedish gold bits like brake calipers, seat belts and valve caps. There'll be cheaper versions later, the launch editions both come with a couple of the options packs, Pilot and Plus included. What's a weird fact? It's actually got the same centre of gravity as the Polestar 1, despite this being an SUV and the one a low-slung saloon. It's also got soft closed doors. What about the electric bits? Both models get that 111kWh battery and both get air suspension and dual motors, up to 390 miles of range for the standard car, a bit less at 348 for the more power-hungry performance pack car. There's a standard heat pump, vehicle-to-grid ability, so you can power your house if you want to, battery pre-conditioning and over-the-air updates, plus the usual apps and ADAS, of which there are a lot because it carries over all the good stuff from the Volvo parent and Volvos like a bit of safety. They'll also charge very nicely, 11kW AC is fine and 250kW DC with an average of 150kW 10-80% is pretty good, so you're looking about half an hour for 273 miles of added range. Why are there so many cameras? They're not all cameras. As standard, the Polestar 3 features five radar modules, five external cameras and 12 extra ultrasonic sensors, mainly to deal with the advanced driver assistance systems and to future-proof it for autonomous driving functions. There's also a closed loop so it doesn't send the images anywhere else, driver camera that's in the centre here, which will detect whether you're distracted or tired and then tell you off. And not only that, but from 2025, you will be able to order a 3 with a proper LiDAR pod on the roof from a company called Luminar, which will help the 3 completely map its environment and take it one step closer to actually driving itself. If you go the other side, we'll film through the interior and then I can sort of describe the dash and you'll be able to see it all. Polestars do tend to have quite classy interiors and the 3 is no different. I really like the way it looks. It's kind of calm and clean and quite crisp in its shapes. I also love the materials. Now, I really like the knitted stuff that's made from recycled bottles, the recycled carpets. This one's got the Animal Welfare secured Bridge of Weir Nappa leather in it, which I don't think suits Polestar's brand quite so much as some of the other stuff. They have this kind of tweedy kind of knit material, which I think is a lot nicer and also a micro tech kind of technical fabric, which I think suits the car a bit more. Other than that, it's got this big 14 and a half inch tablet in the middle. I'm not a huge fan of having big iPad style things bolted to the dash, but this sort of portrait one works really well. It's got Android Automated, which brings with it Google baked in. So you get Google Assistant, Google Maps. You can set things on your phone and when you arrive at the car, it's already loaded in. I like some of the functionality. I like looking at my range and my trips and looking through all my different stats. And this has got plenty, gives you all of your consumption figures and all that kind of stuff, which I really like. You can put all sorts of apps on it. It's got over the air updates, all that kind of stuff. Then there's a driver's display in front of you, which just houses the information you need when you're driving. Although one thing, this driver's display, the way the stitching on the dash and the way the dash sort of curves that way, it makes the driver's display not look straight. And that will bother you eventually. Practicality wise, there's plenty of places to put stuff. There's a big thing underneath the floating centre console. This kind of juts out like a bridge, cup holders. This is a really big bin, so you could hide a child in there. Ergonomics are really good as well. And also, as standard, this massive full-length glass roof, which means that the back is actually quite airy and nice. Generally, I think it's absolutely lovely. Has been a little bit of lag on the screen, but these are slightly pre-production cars, so maybe we'll see what they're like in production. One thing I do want to give a big shout out to, though, is that the launch edition cars of the Passat R3 come with a standard Bowers & Wilkins 25-speaker stereo, and it is absolutely awesome. And I think we overlooked that in electric vehicles. They are very quiet, they are very refined, so it makes them a really good place to listen to music. There's also loads of space in the back. It's got slightly tiered seating, so you've got a really good view. And also, pillows. Meanwhile, there's a 484-litre boot, which is about 1,400 litres with the seats down, and a 32-litre frunk, which is useful. Bonus feature. It's actually quite good at towing. Two tonnes. What's it like to drive? So, is it any good to drive? I have to say yes. I think this is a really impressive car. A standard long-length dual motor has 483 brake horsepower and about 620 pounds-feet of torque, and the Performance Pack version gets 510 brake horsepower and about 50-51 pounds-feet more of torque. So, the standard car will get from zero to 62 miles an hour in five seconds dead, which is plenty for something of this size. And then the Performance Pack one does it 4.7, so it's not an awful lot quicker, but that 50 pounds-feet of torque, it will feel more perky all of the time. There's some interesting stuff going on with this car, though. When you're on the motorway and you've got everything set in soft and comfort and everything's full of squidge, the car is very quiet, very easy to drive, the steering's very light, and also it's got a clutch pack which will disconnect the rear drive motor to make it just front-wheel drive, so it becomes that little bit more efficient. Interestingly, the rear motor is slightly more powerful than the front, so it's naturally got a kind of slight rear bias, so it should feel slightly more rear drive than all-wheel drive or front-wheel drive, and as soon as you put your foot on the accelerator, obviously, that clutch connects again and it's four-wheel drive. Everything does feel quite light, like the steering. I've got this currently set in firm and it's still very light, you know, there's not much knowledge of what's going on with the front tyres, but it's a very easy car to operate. And one thing I keep thinking is, it feels a lot smaller than it actually is. This is a long car, but it doesn't feel like an SUV. I think this feels more like a fast wagon than a full-fat SUV luxury car, so almost RS60 or, you know, Subaru Forester STI, if you can remember what they are, it's got that tall sort of wagon feel rather than being like upright and over like you are in an SUV. If it had a little bit more feel, I'd actually say it almost feels sporty. All of these EVs that do 0-60 in like 2.8 seconds, it's a party trick, you'll probably do once and then never do again. I think we need to row back slightly on making EVs really good at 0-62 and not very good at going round corners, because performance isn't just about drag racing, it's about how the car handles bumps, about how it goes around a corner, and EVs need to do better at both of those things rather than just more speed 0-62. But this is plenty faster than that. I also think it's remarkably sort of dynamic when you get around a corner. It's got a torque vectoring system on the rear axle and it's true torque vectoring, so some torque vectoring systems essentially will brake an inside wheel, depending on which way you're turning, to make the car turn in a bit more nimble. And this one overspeeds the outside rear wheel, so it makes the car faster rather than it's slowing it down around a corner. And it feels it, you know, this car feels really nimble. This is a big heavy electric SUV. I think some of that is because the steering is very light, so because the steering is quite light and direct and the car's got good body control, it feels lighter than it is essentially. The torque vectoring diff allows you to turn it in and it feels like the car wants to turn into a corner light if we go into this quite quickly. And also it's not bouncing around everywhere, so sporty doesn't have to mean hard. Sporty isn't like crashing through all the bumps and even though I've got this set in the firmest setting, this car is still riding the bumps. Because the tyres are in contact with the road, it's gripping, it means it's actually quite good fun. Is it a sports car? No, I don't think it is. Is it deeply impressive for being an SUV? Absolutely. I think it's really good. I'm not sure my dog can kick, but you know, it's quite chilled but rapid. No drama. I think that's what I like about Polestar. It's dynamic without the drama. It's wise to point out here that the slightly pre-production Polestar 3 we had to test had a couple of issues. There were some strange thumps in the rear suspension and a couple of electrical gremlins. We're assuming that they'll be sorted for the production cars, but worth noting. Also, if you use the car as intended, the brakes can get a bit hot. They never faded in our care, but it reminds you that no matter how nimble the 3 might feel, it's still a big heavy EV. I think this thing is a really, really attractive proposition. There's loads of space. I could see it fitting into everyone's life. It is the best car that Polestar currently makes.