Peugeot E-3008 GT long-term test: striking looks but troublesome tech
Second report: Peugeot’s big-screen player looks the part, but lacks star quality
Verdict
If you’re looking for comfortable and spacious family transport, the E-3008 has plenty to recommend it, but the touchscreen can be frustrating, and you shouldn’t come looking for thrills.
- Mileage: 9,345 miles
- Efficiency: 3.9 miles/kWh
We’re still enjoying the movie-star looks of the Peugeot E-3008, whether that be the chiselled exterior lines or the almost sci-fi vibe of its interior.
Beyond the glamour, the coupé-style SUV continues to serve us well as a family vehicle too, with a pleasant cabin ambience making it a comfortable travelling companion. It’s not as spacious as one might imagine though, and anyone with older teenagers or those who regularly travel with adults in the back should make sure they’ll actually fit.
The ride quality can feel unsophisticated on poorer surfaces, too, and there are a few other areas where the Peugeot’s appeal can appear relatively superficial. It’s not very engaging to drive, for starters. The steering feels vague and that tends to be compounded by the corners of the E-3008’s squared-off steering wheel interrupting the fluency of your steering inputs. While I can understand yoke-type steering in a racing car with only 180 degrees of steering lock, for me it doesn’t work in a big-ish SUV where an amount of wheel twirling is necessary.
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To make matters worse, digging into the car’s cabin technology and software features has exposed further frustrations. The multi-screen dashboard looks nice and has plenty of features, for example, but the touchscreen can be glitchy and unresponsive at times. Other peculiarities include a traffic sign-recognition feature prompting me to ‘OK’ cruise control speeds of 27mph and 81mph at various times on the motorways – surely Peugeot’s programmers know these limits never appear on UK traffic signs? We’ve also got touchscreen massage controls connected to the wrong front seats, and we’ve experienced frequent screen freezes, failures to respond to touches, and the occasional complete display blackout.
I’ve twice had to switch off and leave the car on its own for a while to think about its behaviour, which seems to do the trick. The Peugeot phone app, which promises various remote features, has so far resolutely refused to connect my Android phone to the car. Instead it repeatedly notifies me that “it takes several journeys, each of a minimum of 20 minutes, to activate the service”. Goodness knows how many “several” is, but I’ve lost interest in trying.
A “service required” message also popped up on the dash recently, because there’s a first-year inspection required before the 16,000-mile/two-year service interval kicks in. We’ve also been notified of a recall requiring that the steering ball joints be replaced, because some owners have had a partial detachment of the front wheels that has, er, ‘compromised’ the E-3008’s ability to steer. We’ve got our slot booked.
Slightly warmer weather has brought a bit of relief to our Peugeot E-3008’s energy consumption, with local runs returning 3.9mi/kWh, up from around 3.1mi/kWh when temperatures were colder. Higher temperatures also mean we’re being shown around 20 miles more projected range from a full charge with a preconditioned battery.
Not that we’re getting very close to that on the road. We started a recent 104-mile return trip to south London from Hampshire with 320 miles of range. The journey involved mostly 50mph-limited motorway and dual-carriageway, plus a bit of the congested South Circular in London, and we arrived home with 56 per cent charge and 140 miles remaining. I can’t vouch for any increase in the warmer weather rapid charging rate, because we’ve used only home or workplace slow charging.
Peugeot E-3008 long-term test: first fleetwatch
Our Peugeot E-3008 has been earning its keep as a refined and efficient commuter. Runs to the outskirts of London are knocked off in relaxing style for pennies, thanks to home charging. The electronics have been a little glitchy though, both with touchscreen ‘mini-meltdowns’ and once when we returned to a remotely locked car to find the boot open and half raised – very mysterious, but luckily on private land.
Peugeot E-3008 GT: first report
Tardy charging and poor range consigned our new Peugeot E-3008 to home in a family emergency
- Mileage: 5,344
- Efficiency: 3.1 miles/kWh
Electric cars are great, until they’re not, and a family emergency at the new year put our new Peugeot E-3008 on the spot.
It’s 160 miles from my house in Hampshire to my mum’s place in Devon, which should be a breeze for the car with a 327-mile maximum quoted range and a 73kWh battery. The key word there is ‘should’, because I used the Peugeot on the same route at Christmas, and it stumbled somewhat.
Starting out with a full battery and 300-plus miles showing on the dash, I arrived at the array of 350kW ultra-rapid chargers at Exeter’s Moto services (still 25 miles short of my destination) with only 30 per cent of charge left. It was 10pm on Christmas Eve, and I plugged in, expecting an ‘ultra-rapid’ charge that would see us on to Torbay and back to Hampshire in one hit.
Peugeot says the E-3008 has a maximum charge speed of 160kW, but the 350kW Gridserve charger peaked at 83kW, then dropped to 50kW after 10 minutes when the battery was 50 per cent charged. Then 40 minutes later, when the battery had crept up to 77 per cent, it was charging at just 41kW. At which point I’d had enough and left.
So mum and I spent 30 minutes at Moto Exeter early on Christmas morning, this time teasing a meagre 45kW out of the 350kW charger, a rate that quickly dropped to an insulting 30kW, and had only crept back to 39kW when I unplugged. We only managed to get charged from 60 to 76 per cent in half an hour. On the plus side, a 19kWh top-up that would have cost fifteen quid turned out to be a Christmas freebie – belated season’s greetings to you too, Gridserve.
As we left Moto Exeter, we had 234 miles of range showing from a three-quarters-charged battery, and arrived home in time for Christmas lunch 134 miles later, with a remaining range of 20 per cent, or 37 miles. This seems typical, because we use electrons at a rate that means the car ‘loses’ between a quarter and a third of the range that’s promised at the start of any given journey.
Not ideal, and when I had to repeat the Torbay run in a rush a week later, I made the return journey twice on a tank of diesel in my old Mercedes B-Class instead.
For day-to-day use though, there’s much to like about the E-3008. It’s eye-catching on the outside, and the interior is indulgently comfortable as well as good-looking. I’ll skip past the square steering wheel, because while I’m not convinced, increasing numbers of people seem to find them appealing. The expansive digital display panel is certainly impressive to look at, though.
However, the Peugeot is not an enthusiast’s car, in spite of our car’s ‘GT’ trim designation, with no feedback from that square steering wheel, and a ride that can be harsh around town or on a poor-quality B-road. Arguably, the car is at its best on a middle-distance motorway journey of 90 miles or so, where you can enjoy the relaxed cabin comforts.
From a family practicality perspective, the E-3008 is a winner, too, with plenty of legroom in the back and a huge boot under that sloping tailgate. The kids love it to bits, in fact, while the heated rear seats help to ensure they’re not always squabbling about ‘riding shotgun’.
A nail in a tyre has been another fly in the ointment, although conveniently it went flat just yards from the Chichester branch of ATS. Happily, it was repairable for £30, because a matching replacement wasn’t available until the next day.
| Rating: | 3.5 stars |
| Model: | Peugeot E-3008 GT |
| On fleet since: | November 2024 |
| Price new: | £49,330 |
| Powertrain: | 73kWh battery, 1 x e-motor, 210bhp |
| CO2/BIK: | 0g/km/2% |
| Options: | Ingaro Blue metallic paint (£750), Heat pump (£700), 360-deg Vision & Drive Assist pack (£600), Mistral Black Nappa leather (£1,600) |
| Insurance*: | Group: 33/Quote: £1,088 |
| Mileage: | 9,345 |
| Efficiency: | 3.9 miles/kWh |
| Any problems? | Loose trim, punctured tyre repair (£30); switch connected to wrong heated seat |
*Insurance quote from AA (0800 107 0680) for a 42-year-old in Banbury, Oxon, with three points.
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