BMW iX M60 review

Given its flagship status, the M60 variant’s price probably won’t come as a surprise. It starts at £124,605, mortgage territory for many, and we expect the majority that find a home in the UK to be run through the First Year Allowance, the government’s electric car tax relief scheme that allows businesses to offset 100 per cent of the cost against pre-tax profits.

That price is a far cry from the car that started modern-era BMW on the road to electrification, the i3 (which cost £30,680 when sales began a decade back), and proved an important learning curve when it came to tackling the weight of electric cars. Sadly such enlightened thinking appears to have gone out of the window in the making of the iX. It comprises nearly 2.7 tonnes of steel, aluminium and carbon fibre reinforced plastic, making it almost the heaviest BMW to date (it’s trumped by a few kilos by the i7) and over double, yes, double the weight of the original i3 which, incidentally, was at the time the lightest BMW on sale. Add into the mix a full complement of five people and luggage and there’ll be three tonnes to manage on the move.

Doing the managing are electric motors at either end providing all-wheel drive, supplied by the same 111kWh lithium-ion battery used by the i7, and capable of charging at up to 195kW. Impressive for a car using 400V architecture, but still not close to the numbers seen by owners of 800V cars like the Hyundai Ioniq 5 and Kia EV6… Tying things down is the usual recipe of double wishbones at the front, a multi-link rear end, air springs and adaptive dampers. There’s also a rear-wheel steering system that gives this big car real high-speed agility and low-speed manoeuvrability.

And boy is it quick. There may be faster EVs, but as one young passenger put it, the moment you give it the full beans in Sport mode, you’ll be pulling faces like Tom Cruise hitting afterburner in a F18 Super Hornet.

For all its capability in Sport mode, and ability to carry vast amounts of speed across even the lumpiest of roads, there’s a simple, inescapable fact: a 2.23-metre wide car fills B- and even A-roads so much that you’re left with millimetres to spare. All too often the passenger door mirror is brushing the foliage. So when, on a wet road, the car starts to show off and wiggle its tail under power you become uncomfortably aware that there is no margin for error, and slow down again.

Which leads you to try the other driving modes, like Expressive or Relax – the pair accompanied by eerie, horror-esque soundtracks from Hans Zimmer, the German composer better known for scoring the likes of The Lion King, Gladiator and Dunkirk. Or more likely than not, you’ll choose Efficient, which will deliver the greatest range. It’s claimed to do around 340 miles on a change but you’ll be lucky to get 290, so will be looking to replenish the battery after around 250.

Whether wafting or driving hard, you’ll appreciate the interior comfort, perceived build quality and design details. It feels like a luxury product for the EV age. The seat comfort is outstanding, the level of digital information as detailed or minimal as you choose. Energy regeneration can be set between one of three modes or left in automatic, where it figures everything out for you.

There are a few practical irritations to bear in mind. The touch panel around the rotary iDrive controller isn’t the most responsive, requiring a firm push of the finger to command, and the absence of buttons for the climate control is as irritating as it is distracting. When parking, the take-up as you ease the throttle to get things moving is abrupt, making it a bit alarming when getting in or out of a tight spot. Both A- and B-pillars are predictably thick, obscuring vision in places, although the view out of the wide windscreen is nicely panoramic. And you have to stretch across the deep back bumper to access the 500-litre boot (which has a false floor with a decent amount of stowage space beneath), while the sloped tailgate and intrusive internal hinges mean a dog crate that would easily fit in my old Mercedes E-Class estate wouldn’t cram into the iX.

As impressive as the M60 version of the iX is, I’d be inclined to save the money and take a look first at a less potent version of the iX and enjoy similar levels of comfort and range, if not the get up and go; alternatively opt for the less potent i5 M60 Touring, which is only a little less powerful, almost a quarter of a tonne lighter and will therefore be both quicker and better to drive.

Credit where it’s due: it’s impressive that a car this heavy and tall can steer, ride and handle as well as the iX M60 does. But like similar ultra-powerful, dynamically accomplished EVs their novelty soon wears off. It’s like a ferry captain demonstrating a J-turn in the middle of the Channel; yes, it may be technically possible, but once you’d experienced it, you’d probably not rush to do so again.

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