2027 BMW 3-Series Review, First Drive: A New Level of Perfection

Once upon a time, the 3 Series was BMW. Now, it's not quite as important to the brand as it used to be with a slate of different SUVs and crossovers in the lineup, and they're certainly topping in sales right now. But really, when it comes down to it, no vehicle sort of signifies what the BMW brand is more than the 3 Series. So I'm very excited to be here in Provence, France, to be To be driving this brand new 3 Series, so let's hop in. But before I do hop in, there's something I wanted to clarify. The new 3 Series is both a gasoline vehicle and an electric vehicle. You can have it either or, although I should point out that the gasoline model is actually a hybrid. So you wouldn't guess just by looking at them but these two vehicles the electric one right here and the gasoline red one behind me there further are dramatically different and I'm not just talking about the obvious you know the power plant or you know the battery pack that sits under the floor. For starters I'll say that the new 3 Series is larger in every dimension so we'll get that out of the way but what makes this really interesting is that the dimensions of both the electric The electric version and the gasoline version are also different in every respect, different height, Different length, different weight, pretty much everything about these two vehicles is very unique. They even have different track widths, which is quite surprising. On top of all that, you'll notice that, or maybe you won't notice, that actually the wheelbase of the electric model is actually a little bit longer. That's to make up for the battery pack that sits between. And then the hood length of the gasoline version is actually a little bit longer as well, making up for the engine, obviously. So there's some pretty big differences there. Actually quite amazing when you think about they're such totally different vehicles in a way and yet BMW sort of melded them into this one sort of symbiotic package. Pretty impressive. I have to say that BMW's somewhat controversial modern era of styling just really works here on the new 3 Series. The sort of shark-nosed front end of the vehicle, it's aggressive, exactly what you want in a sports sedan, so that's a nice feature. This iconic glow, the light surround on the grille and headlights, it kind of brings it all together in one package. It's optional, but a really nice design element looks fabulous at night, so that's super cool. Cool. On top of that, There are the M yellow lights, which you can see right here. Those are also on M Performance models or on the M Performance package. I have to think that every BMW tuner in the world is going to be rolling out a version of this, so you can add it to your regular 3 Series by next Tuesday because they look so cool and everyone is going to want to look just like this. Okay, let's talk specs here for just a few minutes. Now, the top-of-the-line gasoline model is this, the M350x drive. Now, that is taking a six-cylinder gasoline engine, mating it with a hybrid powertrain as well. It makes 437 horsepower and 428 pound-feet of torque. BMW says it'll do 0 to 60 in 3.9 seconds, or that's 4.1 seconds in 0 to 100 kilometers. There's also the 330 and 330X. X-Drive with a turbo 4-hybrid making 255 horsepower and 295 foot-pounds of torque with a 5.9 second 0-60 time. The all-wheel drive version will be exclusively in Canada versus in the States you'll get both the all-wheel drive and the rear-wheel drive models. Moving on to the electric side, the i350 X-Drive tops the gas model with 469 horsepower and 475 pound-feet of torque but surprisingly has a lower We're zero to 60 time. Inside the car here, it's hard to know where to start. The press release that BMW gave me was 73 pages long. A lot of it dealt with things in here. So let's dive in. To start, let's talk about what's not in here, and that is gauge clusters. There is no central gauge cluster behind the steering wheel. Instead, there's what BMW calls panoramic vision, which is this nice bar that runs sort of right below the windshield, right at the very top of the dash. It kind of looks like a heads-up display, but it's not. You can actually also get an optional heads-up display if you want it. The good news is that this system, it doesn't matter if you have polarized glasses or not, it works just fine. There's also this massive 17.9-inch display screen right in the center. And what you can actually do is you can go into your panoramic vision display, and you can select different widgets that you want to see up. on the top of the dash. Now the thing for the driver things like speed that all stays the same but you can change the other ones to show different horsepower outputs, fuel economy, all kinds of different cool things. As you expect in a brand new car there's AI in here as well. BMW has updated the BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant with Amazon Alexa Plus AI which means you can give voice commands in natural language and actually just talk to the car. There's also a huge list of interior options in this car and trim levels I couldn't possibly name them all. Importantly there's a vegan entry level interior which is pretty nice and then you can move up to sort of a vegan mix with another interior option and then finally there's the merino leather which is what this car has which is very nice. Something interesting I noticed in the spec sheets for this vehicle is that you can get ventilated seats but only in the gas-powered cars, and then you can get massaging seats but only in the electric cars. I assume that has something to do with either packaging or how vehicles use electricity. Either way, good to know. Okay, I know what you're thinking. Call them. I've been watching this video for a long time, and you've yet to talk about how the car Let's see what this car actually drives. Here goes, but maybe I'll start with a little story and just tell you that the very first BMW I ever drove, like probably a lot of people, was a 3 Series. If I recall correctly, it was a 325is, a nice dark green with tan leather interior. Spectacular. It kind of opened my eyes to what driving was really all about, and this absolutely lives up to that fun and precision. So let me start off by saying that I'm driving the i3 right now, but yesterday I was in the regular gas-powered 3 Series and it was a riot, not that this isn't, and I think one of the important things, one of the BMW executives was telling us that one of their goals for the 3 Series always is that it would be the most sort of engaging, sportiest car in this segment, and I don't think they have anything to worry about here. So I gave you the stats earlier, so obviously power is of no concern at all in this vehicle. It makes loads of it. It just, you know, it rockets forward. Drop it into the M Sport or M Sport Plus modes and wow, I mean, it just gets super aggressive. It really just, you know, drops the downshifts when you're coming out of corners. It's just exactly where you want the transmission to be all the time, which is, it's just beautiful. The other drive modes are almost too toned down by comparison. The most normal setting is comfort, but you can also personalize your own settings, and it's tied to your digital key, so that will be your default setting every time you drive. Models like the M350 come with an adaptive suspension, and what I really like about that is that while it actually improves the handling performance of the car, it doesn't actually take away from the ride quality. Overall, I mean, the car is just dialed in. It does everything you want it to do. The steering is so precise. It feels, you know, fabulous. In the end, the car does what you want. The car has gained a few hundred pounds, which is never a good thing. But typical BMW engineering, you don't feel it in this car. It feels, you know, light to the touch. You just kind of dance it around the corners. The steering is just so precise. This car is pretty fabulous. Okay, so let's move on to this, the i3. Now, do you remember the original i3 with its funky shape and its little bicycle tires? That car did not have some BMW traits, but it was not sort of a 3 Series in the sense. This, in fact, it's different, but it is definitely still a 3 Series. This car drives exceptionally well. The steering is still sharp and precise. You know you can dance it around corners just like any other 3 Series which is lovely. I will say that when you get out on a nice wide open stretch of road that it can almost sort of lull you to sleep you know the nice sort of hum of the you know automated electric motor sounds anyway. My passenger for a while here was was nodding off after a little bit out on the freeway so that can happen but then oh you go to pass somebody put your foot down Thing just rockets forward and it wakes you right up. So probably the big question with this car to answer is about the weight because it weighs about 800 pounds more than the regular 3 Series, which we discussed also has put a few pounds on. So do you feel that in the corners? Yeah, you feel it a little bit, especially when you get into the tighter ones. You just kind of feel the weight move a bit. But I think maybe the thing that impacts me more is that the second I got into this car and I could be losing my mind here, but immediately. I know the dimensions of the vehicle are different, but I felt like I was sitting up higher than in the regular 3 Series. I feel like the seats don't go as low, and that's probably true because of the battery pack in the car. So you're sitting a little bit higher. I feel like I'm kind of up near the A-pillar here. And I think because you're riding on top of it a little bit more, you both maybe lose a little bit of sporty edge. But maybe, which is a good thing, you actually gain a little bit of sort of luxurious feeling. So the question is not, is this a good car? I mean, the new 3 Series is spectacular. It's kind of a dumb question. The question also isn't, is this, the i3, an affront to the 3 Series? No, it is certainly not. In fact, it's everything an electric BMW 3 Series should be and should have always been. So bravo, BMW. The question really is, which one should you buy? To answer that for yourself, you'll want to look at pricing. Surprisingly, a comparable gasoline version is more expensive than the EV. The M350 xDrive is $69,600 US or $78,500 in Canada. Compare that to $61,500 US or $74,900 Canadian for the electric i3. That said, you can opt for the significantly more affordable Four-cylinder gasoline hybrid 330 xDrive $51,900 or $61,500 Canadian. So look, I like this i3 a lot more than I thought I would. I'm a practical guy, so I feel like when it comes to driving range, range anxiety, time it takes to recharge a battery, that's not really for me generally. I will say here that because of the tremendous range that this vehicle gets, at least one of those things is no longer a problem. But at the end of the day, personally, I'd be going for the gasoline-powered 3 Series. I just love the feeling when it downshifts in a corner and you start accelerating out. The sound of it, it's just a special, special machine. Combine that in a package that includes luxury and technology, and I think most importantly, puts a smile on your face, and you really have something unique here. And the best news is, if you think I'm an idiot and you think I'm wrong, Well, BMW makes the very lovely i3 and... They've got a car for you either way.