BMW i4 M50 review - quicker 0-60mph than an M3?

this is the new bmw i4 in fact it's the m50 version it is the first ever electric car worked on by bmw's m division and in this video i'm going to review it by driving it from here munich airport all the way to the bavarian mountains yeah it's a distance of about 200 kilometers but this car has a range of 500 kilometers however i think i'm going to take it by the auto barn and max it out and see what doing that does to the range also going to launch the car to how quick it is from north 60 miles an hour see if it's quicker than my bmw m3 it could be also after the journey i'm going to launch it again to see if using the battery actually reduces the performance anyway i'm at watson and you're watching car wow buying a new car then head to car wow and my team will help you find your next car at a fair price car wow your one-stop car buying comparison site okay now i'm leaving the airport of munchins and i've got 99 of the battery i've reset the trick computer and we have a claimed range of 377 kilometers which isn't quite the 500 i was hoping for that's obviously calculated based on how people have been driving this car and that's motoring journalists for you anyway the gates all right i'll aveda zayn enjoy your day yeah nice that was awkward anyway let's um let's launch it see if we can get that expected range down even further right i found an open stretch of road so i'm going to launch this car i'm going to put into sport boost mode which gives me full 544 horsepower and 795 newton meters of torque this thing's supposed to not 60 in 3.9 seconds however can it go quicker than the best time i've had out of a bmw m3 launching which is 3.6 seconds here we go what will the specialist timing gear say christ naught to 60 in 3.6 seconds so exactly the same as the m3 wow that is impressive now launch the car with the battery charge over 90 percent then you get full power once it goes below 90 the amount of power you get slowly starts to reduce i'm actually gonna do another launch later on in the video when i've got a lot less battery charge remaining to see how that affects the performance now we're on the autobahn it's de-restricted i've got 84 the battery we've done 48.7 kilometers 330 kilometers of range let's reduce that now so top speed of this car 225 kilometers an hour which is 140 miles an hour with restriction on that other bmw cars 155 miles an hour 250 kilometers an hour but there we go cruising along at 150. i've gone too far and my charge level is decreasing rather quickly it's a little bit rainy so i don't want to do sustained high speed really i just don't feel comfortable still i'll tell you what you notice zooming along the autobahn at high speed an electric car just how quiet it is in fact it's so quiet i'm really noticing the rain hitting the windscreen that's the only sound i'm getting really are the noise of the trucks that i'm overtaking right that's the d restrictions section over showing me how to do it in the wet i'm sure there's more to come later i just put the cruise control on the auto steering yes it's auto steering is he gonna recognize the reduced speed limit oh yeah yes that's good it just set me to the new low speed limit which is obviously for this tunnel in fact this is that thing that everyone does in a tunnel let's roll down the window and accelerate looks like that's one thing we won't all be doing in future one spectral cars abandoned there's no point in an electric car unless you want to hear slightly more tire noise oh my god what is that smell we shouldn't put the window down now it's like we've just driven through a load of cow neck let's talk about the design so i quite like the front of this car i'm getting used to bmw's kidney grills and they look quite good blanked in because obviously you don't need engine cooling and their houses sensors as well not sure about this though they're stuck on m badge it looks like someone with some basic diesel bmw found and then badge off someone else's car and stuck it on their car to pretend that they got the performance model don't know why they've done that just looks a bit odd this being the m50 has a sportier lower bumper than the standard i4 moving down the sides we start off with seven for whom the belt holes you start off with 17 inch alloy wheels thankfully these are the top of the range 20s you're going to need 20s once again m50 model gets blue sporty brake calipers got air breather here it's not fake another end badge though this doesn't look fake the m50 also gets fistable m-style door mirrors sorry about that side skirts on this m50 model to make it look more sporty i'm liking the flush door handles they're nice and the swooping roof line that kind of coupe a design looks cool but what does it do for practicality we'll find out later i quite like the back of this you've got sculptured tail lights a little bit of a bootlet spoiler rather than having fake exhaust pipes on this m50 version you have a diffuser i'm not sure if that's fake it's a bit odd though weirdly i kind of like the look of the rear of this car in terms of pricing the i-4 starts from 52 000 pounds the m50 though that starts from 64 000 pounds now if you want to make sure you're paying a fair price for your next new car click on the pop-out banner up there to get a car while follow the link in the description you can also sell your car through car wow now we'll make sure you get a fair price for that as well alternative if you wanted that after the video simply google help me car wow and my team and i will sort you out so we've done 110 kilometers and we've got 65 battery remaining we've come off the autobahn but we'll be rejoining it again shortly but i want to show you something first it's the acceleration that you get from this car it's as brutal as i've felt in any electric car i'm going to illustrate it with jack so just relax jack ready now i'm going to floor it and shock jack actually before that let's put it into sport boost ready no just relax actually don't be ready don't be ready we're not going to do it what's that like it's okay when i'm expecting it but not so much okay so i actually think that it's probably not worth us doing it anymore i'm going to show people now the hand zimmer noises so this is really interesting so what i'm going to do is put the car in two you knew that was coming didn't you yeah yeah damn it anyway you might be able to hear this i've got what's known as iconic sound set on this car so you got this weird noise when you accelerate and decelerate which has been created by hans zimmer and it's different depending on if you're in sports mode or comfort mode so this is in sports mode [Music] and then when you break it what do you think of that jack it sounds happy and then sad okay we're gonna put it into comfort mode it's the same but quieter right happy then sir happy and sad it's almost like he's just blowing down some kind of tube and he's just changed the length of the tube for comfort compared to spore and if you have in eco pro mode silent does that mean that the noise actually uses energy maybe insightful right let's get back on the autobahn thanks for your help here jack it's been really really useful if you're wondering why i'm now sat in the back of the car it's because i made jack feel sick with all this sudden accelerating so he said the only way to get over that was to drive so let him drive and i'm taking the opportunity to see what this car is like in the back seats so knee room is okay and jack's quite a tall guy it's over six foot headroom in the back is okay for me because i'm under six foot but i think a taller person might struggle a little bit it's because the car's got a sloping roofline one thing that's interesting about this is the unlike something like a tesla model 3 it's not based on a pure ev platform it shares its underpinnings with the 3 series and as a result you have this lump in the floor there which is designed for a prop shaft and all exhaust and stuff like that which you get with an internal combustion engine car so you don't have a flat floor which means that if i can do it while it's driving sit in the middle seat i have to go legs akimbo darling yeah so it's not so confident carrying three in the back probably as a tesla model three well i can't fault those this look you have through loading there it's good and then you have an armrest here and bmw do bother to cover up the cupholders so you don't put your arm in them when you're resting on them you've also got handy flip up ice fix anchor cover so you won't lose those when you decide to fit a baby seat in the car which i would have to and now i'm doing all the looking about myself and just going around the corners it's like he's getting his revenge because i'm starting to feel sick i think electric cars are slightly more sickness inducing because they're just silent near that sudden surge of acceleration anyway i'm going to continue so this car's got climate control in the back and two usbc ports for charging phones decent-sized door bins and quality back here is actually pretty good click up there if you want to see a full in-depth video review of the tesla model 3 jack and i have decided to pull over the side of the road to try and let the sickness pass so if you see some cars going past that's why anyway i'm going to use this as an opportunity to talk you through the interior of this new i4 and it has a very similar feel to a normal four series it is only slightly different it's not quite as showy as an audi or a mercedes but the quality is better and it has a sporty feel so being a bmw sit nice and low steering wheels in the perfect position obviously there's plenty of adjustment in it as well and in the seating position which you can get high if you need it to be however you've also got blue on the steering wheel more blue here you've got blue stitching blue on the gear selector and a blue stop start button which signifies this car is indeed electric you're also separated from your front passenger by this large center console here which is nice and this car is the m50 so you do have sporty upgrades like these um seat belts and the m steering wheel i think that stands out though this huge screen and it's curved and the detail on them is incredible it's as good as my phone and it's super responsive as well runs bmw's latest idrive now there's lots you can do with it there's loads of different features apps and menus and blah blah blah which will probably take an age to learn one thing they have definitely improved is the digital driver's display the layout sort of the same as before but there's way more information on it so you can scroll through different views you can display various types of information that you want i much prefer it still not my favorite system but i like it much more than the system that i have in my m3 however there's one thing i prefer the m3 and it's the physical climate control buttons they're now just on the screen they're like not ideal but still better than that weird sliding thing you have in volkswagen's latest cars which quite frankly there's also voice commands do they work hey bmw set temperature to 25 degrees hey bmw set temperature to 25 degrees i found several destinations which one shall i select they still need to do some work on that i think brilliant anyway let's talk about storage because that's embarrassing so you've got some storage under here usbc you have some storage under here with your cup holders big wireless charging pad where you can fit your galaxy fold hashtag now out there's also a decent sized glove box there there's big door bins fit a bottle in there a um bmw launch lanyard there and then some things that you need to carry in the car for german regulations it's all good all practical on fairly nice good news jack and i aren't feeling quite so sick anymore the bad news is we've encountered a twisty road so i'm compelled to do my job and test this car's handling so we might start feeling sick again very soon the first thing to notice is the steering it's precise plus the car exactly where you want it to go but there's not much feel through the wheel the next thing is the performance haha response you get from the dual motors is incredible it really rockets you out the corners and because you've got four wheel drive grip even though it's fairly slippery it's doing a decent job of putting the power down though eventually oh the tires do start to break traction you get the stability control just raining in the power whoa i do know it's good it really does stay nice and flat when you're going around the bend so that's impressive but you do notice when you start going really quickly into a corner maybe a little bit too quick you start to see that this car is quite heavy it disguises its weight really well most of the time but then when you're really pushing it hard it just doesn't have the outright agility of something like an m3 or even an m340i so it's fun for an electric car but not as fun as a proper petrol m car one of the great things about the i4 is that look it is a hatchback so the boot capacity is 470 liters which is pretty large it may be 10 liters less than the bmw 3 series but the hatchback tailgate really does improve the practicality and it's quite easy to load look so i've got a selection of stuff that i can illustrate that with so the load lip isn't too big so it's easy to lift heavy things like a camera case out and jack's tatty rock sack my posh rucksack burberry hashtag no ad again oh look we've got number you don't know about that you've got some hooks to hang things off you've got 12 volt socket there's places to store stuff in those nets there's no room under there really apart from your charging cables which is okay if you need to fold down the seats unfortunately you do have to bucker it go around but first i've done that you can just about reach it from here if you want to and look there there's your space in fact i'm going to do the lot so you can see what it's like with the seats folded out it's harder to do this way around see relatively flat low blade very very practical the usable battery capacity on the bmw i4m50 is 80 kilowatt hours and it's going to take you 13 hours to charge it using a basic 7 kilowatt war charger at home however if you can use a dc charger if you charge it at 50 kilowatts you can go from 10 to 80 full in 71 minutes and if you find a 150 kilowatt charger you can charge it the same in just 30 minutes find yourself a 150 kilowatt charge all right i've decided to leave the sweeping country roads because they're as smooth as a baby's bottom and i want to see what this car is like when you drive it on some porous surfaces and i found some in this residential area so i'm going to put the cars systems into comfort mode and that's slackened off the suspension now this m50 has actually stiffer suspension than standard i-4 you've got stiff springs at the front and you've got air suspension at the back but in comfort mode even though this is a sporty model it deals with bumps really well i'm actually seeking out poor surfaces and manhole covers and stuff like to drive over and even then this car is not phased it is comfortable and when you have it in comfort mode the steering goes lighter so it's easier to do necessary maneuvers when you're reaching a dead end like this go around many roundabouts and uh yeah go back on yourself embarrassing i hope no one's watching me i probably think i'm casing the joint anyhow i'm going to put this car into b mode and then you get extra regenerative braking so when you lift off the accelerator the car slows even more than normal in fact you can drive on one pedal alone because you can bring it to a complete stop by lifting off the accelerator i'll show you now so i'm doing 30 kilometers an hour lifting off and you can see how quickly i come to a halt easily and then i can drive away again if there is one minor complaint i have about this car it's the forward visibility you see the bonnet is really quite high and long so if you want something where you can get a better view forwards you probably want to check out an electric suv and i've picked one of my favorite ones up there so if you click on that pop-up banner you can check out what it is there's also a link in the description okay i'm finally arriving at my destination look there's all the bmw guys here so i've been driving for 185 kilometers i've got 37 of the battery remaining which means if i do the maths a full battery should take me 293 miles based on how i've been driving which is way off what bmw claims i have been driving quickly on the autobahn launching the car and hooning it up the mountain now what i'll do is see what happens when i launch it from to 60 miles an hour with battery only at 37 will i get a slower time will it reduce the power and how much buy i just need to find a straight road where i can launch the car around here but i think i've planned this rather badly because i'm looking at the map here and it's all a bunch of twisty roads because surprise surprise that's how the roads are in the alps i'm sorry guys this wasn't supposed to be clickbait i really wanted to do it i just haven't thought this through particularly well at all i'd have to drive another 200 kilometers that way and i don't think i've got the range for that anymore sorry [Music] so then what's my final verdict on the new bmw i4 m50 should you avoid it should you consider it should you shortlist it or should you just go right ahead and buy it well i reckon you should shortlist the i4 m50 it's a really nice electric car that does so many things very well and it's fun to drive just not quite as fun as an internal combustion engine car i hope you enjoyed the video if you did give it a like let me know in the comments whether you agree with my final verdict if you click on those windows there you can watch some more videos and if you click on that box there you can get a special prize it's not a special prize but i'm not going to tell you what it is click

Channel: carwow

Views: 1,545,053

Keywords: carwow, mat watson, car review, car review 2021, new car review, bmw, bmw i, bmw i4, bmw i4 m50, i4 m50, bmw m i4, electric bmw, electric bmw m, electric bmw m50, bmw i4 review, bmw i4 m50 review, bmw i4 m50 review 2021, bmw i4 m50 review 2022, new bmw, new bmw i4, new bmw i4 m50, new electric bmw, new ev bmw, ev bmw, ev bmw i4, best electric car, best ev, best electric performance car, electric performance car, best electric bmw, electric bmw 2021, electric bmw 2022

Id: 8PPnuy0AYZ8

Length: 18min 43sec (1123 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 13 2021