FIRST DRIVES
LOTUS ELETRE S
NEW CARS TESTED AND RATED
Big, heavy, ultra-powerful, electric SUV seemingly violates every principle on which the Lotus legend was built. Does that matter?
TESTED 6.7.23, OSLO, NORWAY ON SALE AUGUST PRICE £105,805
Remember when Chinese car-making giant Geely bought Volvo? It went quiet for a few years, then came launch after launch. The same is now happening with Lotus, and its new generation starts with the Eletre – a big car in every sense.
They call it a hyper-SUV, because it’s a 4x4 with at least 603bhp. A coupé-ish saloon will follow, then a smaller SUV, all on the same platform and all made in China. Only after that will there be a two-door sports car built in Norfolk, electric like the rest. The Emira petrol sports car and Evija electric hypercar feel a bit incidental to what’s coming.
The Eletre’s Electric Premium Architecture, of which 47% is high-strength steel and 43% is aluminium, shares some basic ideas but “almost zero components” with anything used elsewhere in the Geely empire.
The Eletre has a length of 5.1 metres, a height of 1.6 metres, four or five seats and pricing that ranges from £90,805 to £121,305.
Between the base car and the R is the £105,805 S, tested here. It has the same 603bhp as the base car via two 302bhp motors, one at each end, with open differentials.