Suzuki e Vitara review

Our opinion on the Suzuki e Vitara

With genuine off-road ability in dual-motor trim, the Suzuki e Vitara offers something a little different in the increasingly congested electric crossover market. Unfortunately for Suzuki, it’s a segment with very strong competition and the e Vitara’s range and charging performance let it down in that company, as does its cheap-feeling cabin. It’s a good thing that Suzuki has kept the e Vitara looking attractive with some tempting offers.

About the Suzuki e Vitara

That little ‘e’ designation for the Vitara is pretty significant for Suzuki. It signifies that the car is fully electric, making this the brand’s first pure electric car. Being a similar size to the existing Vitara Hybrid,which remains on sale alongside, the e Vitara has plenty of rivals, ranging from the Renault 4, Kia EV3 and Ford Puma Gen-E to our Car of the Year, the Skoda Elroq. 

The e Vitara also has Toyota’s Urban Cruiser to contend with, which is actually its sister model. It’s the latest in a series of joint ventures between the brands, which has resulted in the Suzuki Swace and Across sharing platforms with the Corolla and RAV4. Unlike with those two cars, however, Suzuki took the lead role in developing the e Vitara. As a result, it beats the Urban Cruiser to the UK market by around six months. 

Used - available now

2020 Suzuki

Vitara

27,374 milesManualPetrol1.4L

Cash £13,999

View Vitara

2020 Suzuki

Vitara

28,250 milesManualPetrol1.4L

Cash £14,099

View Vitara

2022 Suzuki

Vitara

11,508 milesAutomaticPetrol1.5L

Cash £19,349

View Vitara

2016 Suzuki

Vitara

45,458 milesManualPetrol1.4L

Cash £10,350

View Vitara

Suzuki hasn’t just used a shrunken version of the Toyota bZ4X’s e-TNGA platform for the e Vitara, either. Instead the car gets the all-new ‘Heartect-e’ architecture. Made specifically for electric cars, Heartect-e caters to single- and dual-motor configurations, ensuring Suzuki’s AllGRIP four-wheel drive technology lives on into the electric era.

Suzuki e Vitara prices and latest deals

With batteries coming from China’s BYD and the e Vitara being built in India, Suzuki hasn’t managed to secure the government-backed Electric Car Grant for its compact SUV. In August 2025, however, it introduced its own ‘Suzuki Granted’ discount of £3,750, which runs until the end of 2025. 

With that in place, the e Vitara starts at just over £26,000 for the smaller battery model, around £29,000 for the single-motor 61kWh version and close to £31,000 for the dual-motor. All three are available through the Auto Express Buy A Car service and come in Motion trim with a better-equipped Ultra adding £2,800 to the price of the 61kWh cars.

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Suzuki hasn’t forgotten the Vitara’s roots with the new EV. Instead of going after the nimble Ford Puma Gen-E or the pacey Volvo EX30, the mild-mannered e Vitara covers similar bases to the Vitara Hybrid - whether that’s on or off-road. It’s comfortable and capable but not quick by modern EV standards and offers little flair in its driving experience.

Performance, 0-60mph acceleration and top speed

Two battery capacities are offered with the e Vitara - 49kWh and 61kWh. Both are compact ‘blade’ batteries and are sourced from BYD. The smaller unit comes with a 142bhp electric motor and a 9.6-second 0-62mph time, while the 61kWh unit comes with either a single 172bhp electric motor for an 8.7-second 0-62mph time or a dual-motor four-wheel drive set-up with 181bhp, dropping the sprint to 7.4 seconds. 

We didn’t have a problem with the straight-line performance of the single motor e Vitara, even with its modest power output and only 193Nm of torque. 

Switching to the dual-motor, which raises torque to 307Nm, we found that the e Vitara still doesn’t deliver the kind of ‘shock and awe’ acceleration that some family-oriented EVs are bestowed with these days. In day-to-day driving that’s perfectly fine, possibly even preferable. 

There are three driving modes - Eco, Normal and Sport. The biggest change you'll notice is to throttle pedal feel in Sport mode, which makes it our preferred choice for a more responsive drive.

Town driving, visibility and parking

Suzuki took the lead with development of the e Vitara’s chassis, but despite the need to engineer some off-road ability (we’ll come to this later), the on-road manners are pretty good around town. 

You sit quite high up, too. We had the driver’s seat all the way down and could easily see the front of the bonnet, meaning forward visibility is great. Despite a fairly long wheelbase of 2,700mm, which is 200mm longer than the Vitara Hybrid, the e Vitara’s turning circle is no different at 10.4 metres. It’s a doddle to guide around tight urban areas as a result. 

What doesn’t help is the rear-view camera. It’s a standard feature, but the picture quality is horrendous. 

Country road driving and handling

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Get out on the open road and the ride is on the soft side, but despite our 61kWh battery car’s 1,799kg kerbweight (the 49kWh car is 100kg less and the dual-motor 100kg more), the e Vitara feels surprisingly light and bouncy on country roads with a noticeable amount of lean in tighter corners. This means that big road imperfections like potholes, speedbumps and drain covers are dealt with easily. 

We like the feel of the e Vitara’s main driving controls overall. You can change the brake regeneration between three levels but you have to delve into the touchscreen menus to do this, and it’s a bit of a faff. Other cars do it with steering wheel paddles.  

Where dual-motor AllGrip-e really shines is off-road – we managed to take the e Vitara through a pretty challenging 4x4 course with no issue, all on standard road tyres. In the AllGrip-e’s bespoke ‘Trail’ mode, the Suzuki monitors wheel slip and can distribute power between both axles. We reckon with a set of knobbly off-road tyres the e Vitara might show up some much larger and more expensive 4x4s on the rough stuff.

Motorway driving and long-distance comfort 

The e Vitara’s ride often feels quite busy – even on the motorway. That seemed to be the case on the Motion spec’s 18-inch wheels and the Ultra’s 19-inch ones. We also experienced a fair bit of wind noise at higher speeds, though road noise was well suppressed. 

In Sport mode at least, the immediacy of torque delivery means overtaking is a snip in the e Vitara and the light steering does stiffen-up at higher speed to help the Suzuki’s ability to cruise along in a controlled manner.

“It’s quite refreshing to get into a dual-motor EV that hasn’t been set up to slingshot you to the horizon at the touch of the throttle. There’s also decent off-road prowess for the AllGrip-e, which should please a lot of traditional Vitara owners.” - Alastair Crooks, Senior News Reporter 

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The batteries may be from BYD but the range and charging performance of the e Vitara are off the pace set by the class leaders. Insurance costs are reasonable but depreciation may provide a sting in the tail for owners.  

Electric range, battery life and charge time

While the 49kWh e Vitara gets that headline low price tag, it also has a rather meagre 214-mile range on the official WLTP tests. Its close rival, the Ford Puma Gen-E offers 234 miles of range from an even smaller 43kWh battery. 

We suspect more buyers will be tempted by the larger battery e Vitaras. During our drive of the single-motor 61kWh model, we couldn’t quite reach the claimed 264-mile range, with a mix of driving conditions seeing us average an efficiency of 3.5 miles per kWh - which would’ve given us 213 miles. 

We didn’t have as much time behind the wheel of the dual-motor, but hard off-roading didn’t seem to impact range too badly. It’s worth pointing out that all models come with a heat pump as standard, so you shouldn’t see a big drop in range during winter months when the heating needs to be on. 

The e Vitara’s charging isn’t exactly class-leading either. It has an impressive 150kW maximum charging speed (Stellantis’ Jeep Avenger and Vauxhall Mokka Electric top out at 100kW), but it’ll take 45 minutes to recharge from 10 to 80 per cent, whether you’re in the small or large battery model. Suzuki does say it has the ability to improve the e Vitara charging speeds in future via over-the-air updates, however. 

Insurance groups 

Compared to the Ford Puma Gen-E’s insurance group of 18, the Suzuki looks a little pricey to insure. The Renault 4 and Skoda Elroq will be about the same price to cover as the e Vitara, however, and buyers will pay a lot less than they would to insure the group 30 Kia EV3. Sitting five groups higher than the two-wheel drive model, insurance is another reason to avoid the AllGrip-e unless you can really make use of the added off-road ability. 

Tax 

Even the best-equipped e Vitara sits well below the £40,000 luxury car threshold so there’s no worries there. You will still have to pay the standard rate of annual vehicle excise duty (VED), as EVs are no longer exempt from it.

Depreciation

Our residual value experts reckon the e Vitara will hold on to 43.7 per cent of its value after three years and 36,000 miles. That’s significantly worse than the Ford Puma Gen-E and Renault 4, which keep around half their value over the same time frame. Depreciation is pretty evenly spread through the e Vitara’s range as well and the EV holds its value better than the Vitara Hybrid, which works out at around 40 per cent. 

To get an accurate valuation for a specific model, check out our free car valuation tool...

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We first saw the Suzuki e Vitara as the EVX concept back in 2023. The exterior of production car sticks close to the eVX’s chunky design, though inside things are a little more bland. We’d suggest going for the black and tan interior (even though it’s only an option paired with the basic silver or the green metallic paint), just to bring some colour inside the drab cabin. For the same reason, the fixed sunroof that’s standard on the Ultra spec cars is a good idea. 

Interior and dashboard design 

The Suzuki e Vitara’s interior design aims to mirror the exterior’s utilitarian look with chunky air vents, hard-wearing but scratchy plastics, plus blocky pieces of trim throughout. Away from the dreary all-black cabin, the tan leather bits you can choose as an option bring some upmarket appeal.

The layout of the switchgear feels sensible enough, most elements are where you’d expect them to be. Slightly odd is the positioning of the central screen in relation to the air vents and centre console - it’s all out of line and a bit awkward-looking. 

Materials and build quality

As for build quality, which is an important element when it comes to retaining existing Vitara buyers, the e Vitara seemed sturdy enough. It’s just that the cabin didn’t feel particularly premium and we noticed some large panel gaps in the exterior bodywork. 

We counted no less than seven different materials on the doors, plus a large section of hard scratchy plastic on the top of the dash. The centre console, mainly made of piano-black plastic, also seems ripe to pick-up scratches during hard use. During our bumpy drive off-road we didn’t notice any trim (outside or in) rattle or get damaged. 

Infotainment, sat-nav and stereo 

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The two screens on the dash operate a Toyota-based infotainment system. While it’s simple to understand, it looks a little dated compared to the software in rivals. The 10.25-inch driver’s display relays all the key information clearly, with scope to customise the outer sections with radio, map or EV data. We also like the fact that no matter how you position the steering wheel, the display is always fully in view. We’re less keen on the massive blanked-off section of screen that Suzuki has retained to keep it level with the central touchscreen. 

The 10.1-inch central screen is also pretty straightforward to use, although we experienced a little bit of lag when moving between the menus. Proper physical controls for climate and trip computer information on the steering wheel in the e Vitara are refreshing features that we like. 

 “Design and quality of materials feels like a step forward over the existing Vitara Hybrid. The seats are good too - with a combination of side support and comfort.” - Alastair Crooks, senior news reporter

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The Suzuki e Vitara is around the same size as its key rivals, but a long wheelbase makes for decent legroom that beats most of them. Boot space isn’t great, however. 

Dimensions and size 

The Suzuki e Vitara matches up closely to rivals like the Ford Puma Gen-E and Renault 4 on size. It’s taller than both, however, befitting its more off-road oriented focus, and it also has a usefully longer wheelbase - the benefits of which can be felt in the cabin.  

Seats & passenger space

Space is generally good up front and so long as you don’t slide the rear bench forward there’s ample room for rear passengers too.  The door bins can hold large water bottles and if you fold the middle rear seat down you’ll get an extra two cup-holders. The two outer rear seats have a set of Isofix child seat mounting points for fixing child seats. 

The front seats are perfectly comfortable, especially in top-spec Ultra trim which adds 10-way power adjustment for the driver. The passenger has to make do without height adjustment, though. Rear seats aren’t the best, the backs are upright and there’s not much under thigh support - you do get a flat floor and good legroom, though. 

Boot space 

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The rear seats slide on a 40:60 split and fold in a 40:20:40 split so there’s a decent amount of adjustability in the back of the Suzuki e Vitara. If you slide them all the way forward, you lose a lot of rear legroom, but boot space goes from 244 litres to 310 litres. The capacity doesn’t look great on paper but in reality it’s a useful, square space that does the job. Ultra-spec cars have a slightly smaller boot due to the encroachment of the uprated sound system. 

Towing

Even though you can get all-wheel drive on the e Vitara, every version comes with a fairly limited 750kg towing weight restriction. 

“The Suzuki e Vitara might come with a small boot, but the existing Vitara Hybrid only has 289 litres so buyers looking to make the switch won’t feel especially hard done by.” - Alastair Crooks, senior news reporter

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The e Vitara didn’t score a full five stars from Euro NCAP, though its scores are fairly good across the board with no drastically poor areas of performance. Safety assist was the worst scoring part of the tests, though as standard the e Vitara gets blind spot monitoring, rear cross traffic alert, lane keep assist and lane departure prevention, which works in gentle fashion and isn’t intrusive.

The industry standard EV battery warranty seems to be eight years, but Suzuki offers a service-activated warranty for up to 10 years or 100,000 miles, which includes the battery. 

Owners seem to be pleased with their Suzukis too. The e Vitara is too new to be rated on the Driver Power survey, but owners of other Suzuki models have praised ride and handling, safety systems and overall road manners. 

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• Best buy: Suzuki e Vitara AllGrip-e Ultra

The main reason you’d go for the Suzuki over its rivals is its rather unique use of dual-motor technology, which really helps off-road. On the road it’s not the best in this class, so the single-motor versions actually make less sense compared to the competition. We’d definitely recommend getting the tan interior too, which is only offered on top-spec Ultra trim.

Suzuki e Vitara alternatives 

The small electric SUV market is a highly competitive one. The Renault 4 has an edge due to its spacious interior, particularly for rear-seat passengers, eye-catching design and efficient powertrain. 

Ford’s Puma Gen-E is based on the petrol car, helping to make it the best to drive in the segment. This also has a negative impact on interior space, however, and the Ford’s range isn’t the best either.

Strong contenders from the Stellantis group include the Vauxhall Mokka Electric, Peugeot e-2008, Jeep Avenger, and Alfa Romeo Junior. For those seeking a sportier option, the MINI Aceman is available, alongside the stylish Volvo EX30, practical Hyundai Kona Electric, and the Kia EV3 which is an excellent all-rounder.