VW's ID 4 is calm and competent, but not quite charming
Cars
The time has finally come, the good EVs are here.
Now, anyone looking for an electrified ride in their life has a real choice of options from real brands, they've actually heard of Companies like Ford Chevrolet Honda.
And yes, Volkswagen.
This is the new ID four and was not the first Evie that Volkswagen was brought here to the US.
It is the first one that's built from the ground up to be battery powered.
It's also the first Eevee from Volkswagen that they actually seem to want to sell Unlike the poor, unloved egolf.
Now with choices on the market matching most budgets, we can stop obsessing over how far these things go on a charge and start worrying about the more important questions.
Questions like are they any good?
Is this one any good?
Let's find out.
Together
All right, so I just don't we don't need to focus on the numbers so much anymore, but I know you so let's get the numbers out of the way.
This is the ID for first edition and it doesn't EPA rated A 250 miles on a charge, thanks to a net 77 kilowatt hour battery pack and rear wheel drive.
All wheel drive will be available later this year, a $3,700 option, but Volkswagen isn't saying what that'll do to range just yet.
And our testing with the rear wheel drive it for first edition, we scored exactly 250 miles from mixed driving.
Seriously, 250 on the nose.
How's that for truth in advertising?
That was driven mostly in moderate temperatures of between 50 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit.
The all wheel drive flavor we'll put down 302 horsepower while rear wheel drive does 201 horsepower.
Torque is a healthy 228 pound feet and given this is an EV you just know it's always there silently waiting for your Beck and call.
Now let's talk about what that's like to drive in just a minute.
But first, I wanna walk you through starting this thing because it's a little different than your average car.
Your first thought would be to reach for the Start Stop button, but there isn't one, at least not one that you need to use.
The car turns itself on.
That might feel a little weird.
If you're used to driving, say Just about anything other than a Tesla.
But in practice, it makes a lot of sense.
The car already knows when you're in and it knows when you're out.
There's no engine to keep running on a cold morning, and even remotely preconditioning all through the app.
So who needs a start button?
So then you might think, well, maybe I'll just shifted into drive and then we'll go from there, but there's no shifter either, at least not in the traditional sense.
Shifter is actually up here on the side of the gauge cluster.
And it's a lot like the one found in the BMW i eight.
You want to go forward he just told this thing forward to go into drive.
If you want to go backwards until the backward reverse symbol.
Turning the ID for off is just as easy.
Just click the P button here, and you get out, but we're not gonna get out.
We're gonna go driving.
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The shifter isn't the only thing that's distinctive here the interior overall is gonna have a nice fresh look to it, especially with these white highlights in this first edition model similar materials are a little bit harsh, but overall it's got kind of a cool fresh concept carbine which I really like is a gauge cluster we have a steering wheel which is a little bit on the small side but.
Please, we have one you get the typical stuff you'd expect speed and range and things like that displayed on here.
We'll also pull turn by turn navigation even if you're using Android Auto or Apple CarPlay.
Auto manufacturers won't do that.
It also gives you a look at which of your active safety systems are enabled.
And the only four is packed with that stuff.
You've got everything from adaptive cruise control to Automatic emergency braking with pedestrian detection and pretty much everything you can hope for making this a really nice safe car.
And a central system we either have a 10 or a 12 inch touchscreen, which is definitely been influenced by iPhone or iPad design.
There's a home button on the left and to go from say navigation to media, you tap the home button and then you pick the section that you wanna go to.
That makes it easy and intuitive to use, but it's also a little bit clumsy that I always had to jump back home and then jump to the next section that I want to get to whereas a lot of infotainment systems will let you jump easily from navigation directly to the media controls for example.
And that's doubly frustrating here because everything is so incredibly slow.
Watch as I slide from one page to the next.
You'll also notice that almost everything in here is a touch control.
Even the control for the shade of the panoramic glass roof is touch.
Thankfully, the window controls are not, but you'll notice there's only one set of them.
To control the rear windows.
You'll need to toggle that on and off.
Through yes yet another touch control a somewhat finicky one and that.
There are of course discreet controls in the rear seats for the passengers back there who also get their own HVAC vents and USB type C connections.
There's a ton Kind of headroom and plenty of leg room back here or fold those seeds down to expose 64.2 cubic feet of cargo space.
That's about the same as Volkswagen three road Tiguan SUV, despite the Tiguan being five inches longer and two inches taller
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So it's roomy, it's comfortable.
It's got a nice interior but what's the money for like to drive?
Pretty great I got to say but you got to come into it the right expectations.
There are certain other Evie manufacturers out there that are trying to build rocket ships.
This is not a rocket ship.
This is a comfortable calm car to drive.
Yes, there is a sport mode that I can enable here and it does sharpen up the throttle response to make it to the point where it is a quick car.
And this is not a particularly fast car and it's not trying to be a fast car.
Volkswagen is taking the time to engineer this to be a calm, comfortable, relaxing ride Very common quiet ride too.
But this is not a particularly fast car.
So if you're not expecting it to be, that's fine.
Then there are some other nice futuristic highlights too that remind you that you're in a bit of a car from the future.
The IB light being my favorite thing.
It's a row of LEDs that runs along the bottom of the windscreen here.
And when you get in the car greets you.
When you get out of the car lets you know to.
And if you're using the integrated navigation, it'll even prompt you to turn by flashing on the left or the right.
The only frustrating thing there is that doesn't actually work with Android Auto or Apple Carly.
And given how poor the integrated navigation is, you're probably going to want to use Android Auto or Apple Carly.
So overall, Volkswagen has created a really calm, really confident, really nice car to drive in.
But I really enjoy, but I can't help feeling that there's just something missing.
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[SOUND] So what's missing?
Character, personality.
The ID.4 is a fine car to drive and a fine car to look at but it's also a bit forgettable.
Outside of the funky dashboard and the silly play pause buttons on the pedals.
There's nothing truly charming or endearing here.
It's all awfully utilitarian.
And that's more than a little sad considering how fun Volkswagens ID concepts were.
There was the wild ID buggy and the ID buzz, a concept that everybody was talking about.
I got a chance to drive that thing and despite it being a very early prototype that threatened to rattle itself to pieces on every bug I couldn't stop grinning from behind the wheel, and everybody who saw it was smiling too.
The ID 4 meanwhile doesn't even come in any font colours, in fact, right now the base model doesn't come in any colours at all.
As we film this Volkswagen is only accepting orders in white, black, grey and silver for the base ID 4. He said they're 4,500 and step up to the progressive you want blue.
You want read another $2,000 and options to unlock that.
So the only four has enough room for all your stuff, enough range to get you where you going and enough comfort to make sure that you're refreshed when you get there.
if that weren't enough, I just want the world car awards Car of the Year.
So does that mean it's a good car?
It's a very good car.
As a matter of fact, it's a great car.
But I just wish it had a little bit more character.
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