Lotus Eletre vs Audi SQ8 E-tron _ Luxury £100k electric SUV shootout

A test drive of the new Lotus Aira, a luxury car that's quite unlike any other car they've ever made. I think it's more important to say that it's a credible luxury car than anything like an Audi. What does it have? It has a relatively compliant ride. We're on a pretty choppy road and it's not bad - the body control is the blend of body control and ride, quite good and the steering is you know evenly weighted, quite responsive and accurate.

It doesn't behave like a traditional Lotus because it can't. The physics are the physics, but to me, it rides a bit better than that Audi I know. It's handling as well as I expect a car like this to handle, I don't think it's you know I dare say when you get to the maybe the the r model or you add the the active roll bars and and the and the four-wheel steering, it probably does feel a bit more agile. Yeah, there's room for it maybe to do that but I'm you know I'm kind of I'm fine with it.

They are surely they are addressing somebody with this car who doesn't come with the baggage you know I know it's a Lotus but I'd love to know how many people they expect to take out of the existing pool of Aira ivora Elise owners and you just can't imagine somebody going yeah that's the lowest I've that's the one I've waited for.

Where are we? I like it. Yes, I think I think I'm quite I think I'm more disposed towards it than I thought I might be and I think I'm quite impressed with it objective what I come back to with it is um it really could be almost from any you know modern luxury car brand really you could put almost any badge on this. It seems to me um and say this is our next chapter you know.

And so it's a bit of a test of the lotus brand and what it means to people because when Porsche put a Porsche badge on a Ken it did something for that car the act of sticking a Porsche padge on it made it Greater and it still felt like a Porsche yeah bit. That's the thing they still you know it's still steers like a Tian steers like a 911 does in a way you know it's it it has that kind of level of that mix of body control and ride comfort and steering response and feel and this does not have that because there has never been a Lotus anything like this at all.

It's so far removed from anything else they've done. I know we obviously we got to we got to take the car as it is yeah but they could they could have decided to make something smaller and lighter and simpler if they wanted to I think they're probably making a statement sort of saying we can do Luxury we can do technology we can do sophistication we can do size and comfort and everything you want from from a luxury car we can do yeah with this test.

Which one are you going home in are driving for the next 12 months? Um, some of that is down to the you know neile stuff I you know this is the new car so it's interesting yeah um but I think this is probably a more appealing luxury car to me as well actually. Yeah, um but I'm not hung up particularly on the fact that it's a Lotus and you know I don't whether that's a Bigg a factor for I'm with you I'm with you yeah I'm with you.

I think this is the better car and as you say you know I think we could have actually in retrospect could have pitched it against something more expensive even again yeah and it would still have come out pretty well anyway.