Porsche Taycan – the best electric performance car on the market

My electric car review from a weekend test drive

Last weekend I took a Porsche Taycan for a test drive. The Taycan is the first fully electric car of Porsche and was released end of 2019. I drove approximately 250 km starting from Hamburg, Germany. Find below my review that I structured into five areas: intro, design, driving experience, charging, range and driver assistance systems. 

Introduction

In the segment of electric performance cars there are only two real contenders. The Porsche Taycan and the Tesla Models S Performance. I drove different versions of the Model S in the past and will reference to that experience. For this weekend test drive I rented a Porsche Taycan 4S, with the larger battery option, from a Porsche dealer in Hamburg.

Before sharing some of my test drive experiences two opening remarks to put context.

Performance sport cars, no matter if gasoline or electric, make no sense both from an economical perspective and for the environment. Your first question should be if you really need to own a car and for most of my life I decided: No. If your answer is yes there are many arguments to go for an electric car. Considering value for money best options are e.g. a Renault Zoe, Hyundai Kona or Skoda Enyaq. These cost around one-third of the Tesla Model S or Porsche Taycan and provide everything you really need.

I am a renewable energy enthusiast and read basically every electric car review out there. Especially Tesla as a company fascinates me. One can argue about the market valuation of Tesla and the eccentric behavior of Elon Musk. However, the success of Tesla triggered a huge push of innovation in the automotive industry. Without Tesla, legacy automakers would not have started transitioning their portfolio to electric cars and invest heavily into autonomous driving. Last year Tesla surpassed Porsche in annual sales and once Tesla’s new factories in Shanghai, Berlin and Austin are fully ramped-up, output will reach 3 million cars per year. Just 20 years after foundation of the company Tesla could overtake BMW, Audi and Mercedes in worldwide sales. A remarkable achievement.

Design and image: different but both appealing

A big factor why people buy sports cars is the brand value. So let’s start with that.

The Taycan design follows classic Porsche design language with dominant wings and it even hints air intake ducts. “Hints” because an electric car has no need for air intake ducts. The Taycan headlights are more square compared to classic 911 design and by that accentuate the ambition to be a performance car. Personally, I love the Porsche Taycan design and it stands out more compared to a Tesla everyday sedan style. With a Taycan you defiantly get the attention.

The brand images of Porsche and Tesla are very different. What people typically associate with Tesla are attributes like: disruptive, techy, nerdy, make an impossible vision possible. On the other hand what people associate with Porsche are attributes like: luxury, iconic design, classy, heritage and car racing.

If I had to choose purely based on design I would go for a Porsche. But perception is something very personal and both brands have positive associations with overlapping but slightly different target groups: So equal score in this area 1:1

The car: Porsche offers the best driving experience  

Due to the low center of gravity, electric cars typically have good road grip. In this field Porsche can build on its extensive experience in building chassis. And the handling of the Porsche Taycan is simply exceptional. Also, when driving at high speed you can clearly hear and feel the difference. While a Tesla gets wobbly and noise level goes up, the Porsche Taycan stays rock solid on the street. Complete silence even at 200km/h in the Taycan. But you can also chose to play ambient engine sound in the Sport+ mode, which increases the fun factor of the car.   

Both cars have incredible acceleration and a special mode for traffic light kickstarts. Tesla calls this “ludicrous mode” while Porsche calls it “launch control”. And indeed, your head bangs back and your body is pushed into the seat like in a roller coaster. Before the car next to you at the traffic light even started to move, you are 300 m away in your Taycan. While both Tesla and Porsche have this advantage over gasoline cars there is a big difference between them. While a Tesla can only accelerate 2-3 times in a row, in a Taycan you can repeat full acceleration as often as you want. I read in reviews that Porsche put huge focus on battery management to achieve this.

The Porsche also shows superior workmanship, attention to details and sophisticated materials used for the interior. Everything you touch is build to perfect luxury standards. A second area where Porsche clearly differentiates against Tesla. Tesla improved quality levels recently. While the Tesla Model 3 is now on par with competition for the segment of 100+ kEUR cars the Model S must step up.

For driving experience and the car itself Porsche is the clear winner: 1:0

Charging experience: speed vs. network size

We tested charging of the Taycan at home and at a public supercharger of the Ionity network. A nice feature is that the Taycan has charging plugs both at the left and right front which makes it flexible how to park. The flap on the Taycan charging plug was automatically opening and closing as another cool gimmick. 

The Ionity network has 300 charging stalls around Europe with plans to extend this number to 400 within the next year. Starting from Hamburg basically in each direction one finds an Ionity supercharger after approximately 50 km. Typically, each stall has a handful charging points with super high charging power up to 350 KW and when we arrived 4 spot where free. The Tesla supercharger network is larger with more than 500 stalls in Europe and the stalls have more charging points. Another advantage is that Tesla superchargers are for exclusive use of Tesla owners. A downside of the Tesla superchargers is that most of them are old generations with 90 or 125 KW and only recently Tesla started to upgrade to a 3rd generation version with 250 KW.

There are several supercharger networks available and the whole topic is expanding rapidly. We found a 50 KW charging station from EnBW just opposite of the Ionity station, but it is clear that charging stations with less than 250 KW are dead horses at highway stations. Why should anyone accept waiting 1.5 hours if you can also charge your car in 20 min?

Usability was as easy as it gets. We swiped the chip card and plugged the Ionity cable. The charging speed at our Taycan went up to 260 KW and after about 10 min down to 100 KW. Porsche uses 800 V battery technology to enable best in class charging speed. After 22 min we had recharged the battery from 14% to 72% which makes approximately 50 kwh. Just enough time to get a cappuccino and eat a croissant. 

If in a few years from now every highway stop hosts superchargers, long distance travel with electric cars will be no issue any longer. But keep in mind just Germany has 400 highway gas stations and another 1500 highway parking locations… a comprehensive network needs 10.000 high power charging points just for Germany.

Porsche and Ionity win charging speed but Tesla offers the bigger supercharger network and users an exclusive access to the Tesla network.

With both having pro / con – I score again 1:1 (now 3:2 total)

Range and energy consumption

During the weekend test drive I experienced an energy consumption of 35-40 kwh per 100km, which is significantly higher vs. the official rating of 27 kwh per 100km Porsche states. To be fair my driving pattern did not really reflect day to day use and basically I only used the sport+ mode of the car. When driving the car more natural I ended up with an energy consumption of 30 kwh per 100km which I consider the actual every day value for the Taycan. In Germany this means 9-12 EUR cost per 100km, depending on the tariff of your electricity provider. With that consumption a real-life range of 300km on one charge is possible. While the charging speed at a super charger is impressive the range is not. Assuming you would always keep a buffer of 50km range the Taycan can only go 250km at one leg of your journey. In my view the sweet spot of range is around 500km. Considering value for money and the environment, electrical cars should target that sweet spot. Lower range is not sufficient for longer journeys, but significantly higher range means unnecessary weight and cost of the battery. With 500km of real-world range and enough superchargers (>250KW) the discussion on long-distance travel is solved.

In this areas Tesla has an edge. The battery capacity of a Tesla Model S is slightly higher vs. the Taycan while at the same time the energy consumption is lower. In my test drives with a Tesla the energy consumption was around 25 kwh per 100km. With the larger battery and lower energy consumption the real-life range of a Tesla Model S Performance gets to a just above 500km. Hopefully Porsche will increase the range of the next generation Porsche Taycan to get into the range sweet spot. Tesla should not increase range further but rather utilize the foreseen advancements in battery performance and cost reductions to lower weight and price of its cars.

Talking range and energy consumption Tesla is the clear winner: 0:1

Electronics and driver assistance systems

If you follow the news this area is where people expect Tesla to be in the prime spot. Surprisingly, the Porsche Taycan impressed in this area. The cockpit with a curved display is perfectly aligned to the driver vision and can be customized to show different views. In the middle, the Taycan shows multiple large touch screens. The assistant systems are on par with what you get in a Tesla. Two examples: when parking, one can fly around the car 360 degrees to show the view from all angles in computer rendered perspectives, impressive even if 90% of the time you will only use the back camera. Or you can put a geo tag where your Taycan should lift the suspension system, so every time you come to your garage it will automatically lift the car. The Taycan also comes with a smartphone app where you can access all kind of car data or make settings, like you put a timer for heating of the car. All features the Tesla community would celebrate in social media.

While I love watching YouTube videos of the latest beta versions of Tesla full self-driving (FSD), the functionality that is available today is like what the Porsche Taycan also offers. The electronics in the Taycan are more driver centric and user-friendly while Tesla is probably 2-3 years ahead in the development of features to come. With “to come” as a key word.

While intuitively I want to score Tesla the winner in this category with the experience I rate them on the same level: 1:1 (total scoring 4:4)

Takeaway

Overall I had a fantastic test drive experience in the Porsche Taycan. The car shows the full potential of electric cars and driver assistance systems. As a technology enthusiast it was an exciting journey.

Counting my scoring in the different categories, the overall result between the Porsche Taycan and Telsa Model S Performance is a draw. Still in my summary there is a clear winner. After all, one buys a performance car for the driving experience and in this category, Porsche is clearly the winner.

The Porsche Taycan is the best electric performance car you can buy on the market today.