► We list the best small EVs available
► Good blend of style and affordability
► One has a range of more than 300 miles
EVs are steadily falling into the reach of the average consumer. Now, some of the best electric cars on sale are small, affordable, city-scything hatchbacks. That’s a good thing, because EVs are at their best around town.
Shop small and you’ll get all the benefits of an electric car while limiting the drawbacks. You get the same instant acceleration and quiet interior as a large EV but, because small EVs are designed to spend most of their time in a city (surrounded by charging points), range anxiety is less of a concern.
However, we appreciate that not everyone’s lifestyle will suit a small EV. Families, for example, will probably be better served by one of our best electric SUVs, as most of the cars here are quite impractical. But if you’re shopping as a couple trapped inside an emissions-controlled zone, you might find the cure to your commuter’s headache on this list. Scroll down for our pick of the market.
Fiat 500 Electric
- Price: from £28,195
- Range: up to 199 miles (WLTP)
The new Fiat 500 shares the same retro-chic styling as the old car, but it’s completely different under the skin. The previous model’s small displacement petrol engines have been banished, replaced by a 42kWh battery pack and a 116bhp electric motor. The powertrain gives the 500 a 0–62mph time of nine seconds and a top speed of 93mph, but it feels much quicker than those figures suggest.
Mercifully, Fiat hasn’t sterilised the 500’s driving experience in the switch to electric power. It’s still great fun to drive, even without the old car’s soundtrack of the valves battering the underside of the bonnet as you scream between gears. The 500 EV’s instant torque is always addictive and, because the mass of its battery is concentrated under the floor, it’ll blast through roundabouts with aplomb.
Read our Fiat 500 Electric review
Peugeot e-208
- Price: from £31,345
- Range: up to 224 miles (WLTP)
The Peugeot e-208 has four doors, which means it’s a bit more practical than the Fiat 500. It also has a slightly longer range and stylish interior that’s loaded with high-quality materials. Perhaps most importantly, it doesn’t shout about its eco-piety. The pure-electric 208 looks identical to the petrol-powered model. The only way to tell the two apart is by the green streak on the EV’s number plate.
The e-208 is powered by a 134bhp electric motor and a 50kWh battery pack. That’s enough for a 0–62mph time of 8.1 seconds, which is half a second quicker than the fastest petrol 208. The EV also supports 100kW DC rapid charging, which can shove six miles of range into the battery every minute.
Read our Peugeot e-208 review
Vauxhall Corsa Electric
- Price: from £29,305
- Range: up to 222 miles (WLTP)
But what if you don’t like the Peugeot? Several of our road testers couldn’t live with the 208’s unusual driving position – and if you share the same opinion, we’d like to direct you to the Vauxhall Corsa Electric. It features the same battery pack, electric motor and chassis as the e-208, but it’s £2,000 cheaper which is money you could put towards having a wallbox charger installed at home.
Yes, the Vauxhall isn’t as stylish as the Peugeot and its interior is a little less premium, but you can’t argue with the sales figures. The Corsa was the UK’s second-best selling car in 2022, outstripping the family favourite Ford Fiesta by almost 10,000 units by the end of the year. That many buyers can’t be wrong.
Read our Vauxhall Corsa review
Honda e
- Price: from £37,395
- Range: up to 137 miles (WLTP)
The Honda e is an interesting conundrum. Its small footprint, cute face, tech-heavy cabin and engaging handling are all very appealing – but it’s ultimately a compromised car. It only has a 35.5kWh battery pack which, despite Honda’s claims, will struggle to achieve 100 miles of range in the real world. Expect less if you regularly take advantage of the motor’s performance.
Then there’s the price. When it was launched (and the government’s plug-in car grant was still around), you could pick one up for less than £30,000. But the EV incentives have dried up and Honda has steadily ratcheted the price towards £40,000, which is a lot of money to pay for an accessory – especially when you consider you can now get a Tesla Model 3 for similar money.
Read our Honda e review
Mercedes EQA
- Price: from £52,010
- Range: up to 324 miles (WLTP)
Premiumisation. That’s the name of the game these days – and Mercedes has cornered the small EV market with the EQA. It’s the cheapest option in the brand’s aggressively expanding range of electric cars and, although it doesn’t have the Honda e’s cheeky looks or the Fiat 500 Electric’s fun handling, it’s statistically better all the other cars on this list.
Buy the entry-level Mercedes EQA 250+ model and you’ll have a small electric SUV with a maximum range of 324 miles, which is more than you get from the supposedly long-legged Audi e-tron GT. It’s no slouch, either. The EQA 350 4MATIC produces 288bhp and has a 0–62mph time of six seconds dead.
It is quite expensive, though. Mercedes has bumped up the EQA’s starting price by more than £6,000 since it was launched – and £50,000 seems like an awful lot of money to spend on a jacked-up hatchback.
Read our Mercedes EQA review
MINI Electric
- Price: from £32,550
- Range: up to 143 miles (WLTP)
The MINI Electric wasn’t even in the product plan when the F56-generation car was launched in 2014, but here we are. Thankfully, MINI approached the problem intelligently and built an EV that’s almost indistinguishable from the petrol model in terms of both its looks and driving experience.
It shares the same equipment, it’s similarly brisk in a straight line and it’ll scream around corners with the same amount of competence. It’s perfect if you want an electric MINI – but its high starting price, limited practicality and real-world range of less than 100 miles mean that, if you just want a good small electric car, you’ll be better served by one of its rivals.
Read our MINI Electric review
Renault Zoe
- Price: from £29,995
- Range: up to 239 miles (WLTP)
The Renault Zoe is a great small electric car that’s been ruined by a poor Euro NCAP rating. When the second-generation model was crash tested in 2021, the wreckage was trailered away with a zero-star safety score. That’s a real shame because the Zoe has a long range, quick charge times and a punchy 134bhp electric motor.
If you can look past the safety score, the Zoe is brilliant – and it’s been getting better with every update Renault has treated it to. The latest Zoe’s powertrain provides a welcome injection of performance and its cabin is much improved over the old car’s, thanks to better quality materials and a brilliant 9.3-inch infotainment system. Just don’t crash it.
Read our Renault Zoe review
The pros and cons of small electric cars
Small electric cars have three main benefits. They’re little (which means they’re easy to park and manoeuvre in tight city streets), they’re amongst the cheapest electric cars on sale and they allow free passage into emissions-controlled areas. As an added benefit, they’re much quieter than small petrol cars, which should make your morning commute a little more relaxing.
Bear in mind that you’ll need to make a couple of sacrifices with a small electric car, though. Because of their petite size, most only have dinky battery packs with limited maximum ranges. This isn’t such a problem if you’re just pottering around town, averaging around 30 miles a day, but it’ll seriously impede your mobility if you regularly need to drive long distances.
Then there’s the issue of price. Small EVs are cheap where electric cars are concerned, but they’re still much more expensive than their petrol-powered counterparts. Consider the Vauxhall Corsa. The most basic petrol model is around £10,000 cheaper than the most basic electric model. That means, for the price of one Corsa Electric, you could have a petrol-powered Corsa and seven years’ worth of fuel.
Charging is fraught with problems, too. The UK’s EV charging infrastructure can’t currently deal with the number of electric cars on the road – and the laws of supply and demand have driven up the cost of public charging. That means, if you can only charge your small electric car at a public charger, you could end up paying more in electricity than you would in petrol.
The only reliable method of reducing your running costs with an EV is if you have an off-street parking space on which you can install your own charging point. And that’s a financial impossibility for the average motorist living in the middle of a crowded city like London or Manchester.