Geely EX5 review

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Chinese giant makes its first move in the UK: an SUV to rival the MG S5 EV

The Geely EX5 may be brand new to the European market, but most of us have heard of Geely by now. It’s clearly a force to be reckoned with, having bought up a significant slice of the European automotive industry. Volvo, Polestar, Lotus, LEVC (which makes the TX taxi) and Smart are all owned, at least in part, by the Chinese giant. Zeekr and Lynk&Co, both of which are sold in continental Europe and may come to the UK at some point, are also Geely brands.

But like some reclusive billionaire with fingers in many pies, the Geely brand itself has so far been invisible in Europe. But that’s now changing, because the Geely brand plans to launch a range of its own cars over the next few years.

The company says it’s here to stay and therefore it intends to be represented in all of the key segments. Next year, we’ll see a C-segment plug-in hybrid SUV, an electric supermini hatchback and a plug-in hybrid seven-seat SUV. But things kick off with the EX5, a car in one of the fastest-growing classes of all: C-segment electric SUVs. Also in this class are the Skoda Elroq, Kia EV3, Renault Scenic and numerous others.

The EX5 is going straight into a full road test to demonstrate what the mothership has to offer.

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DESIGN & STYLING

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We would normally dispute the popular assertion that all electric crossovers look the same, but the Geely EX5 is not helping to disprove that notion. It really does look incredibly generic. It provides all the default 2025 design cues, with a rear light bar that looks vaguely like a petrol Porsche Macan’s, flush door handles, bi-colour aero wheels and a smooth, grille-less front. It’s supposedly inspired by Song-dynasty porcelain, but we’re not seeing it. The upside of the featureless design is a creditably slippery drag coefficient of 0.27.

Given the corporate connection with Volvo, one might assume that the EX5 sits on a shared platform, but instead it uses Geely’s own, and presumably lower-cost, Global Intelligent New Energy Architecture, or GEA (yes, there do seem to be a few letters missing from that initialism). After all, Geely isn’t new to producing cars itself. It has been doing it since 1997 and sold more than two million Geely-branded cars in 2024.

The Flush door handles are similar to those found on Kias, hinging inwards and revealing a keyhole. They’re quite reliable at popping out when you approach the car with the key and they feel reasonably mechanical when you open the door.
Matt Saunders
Road test editor

The platform is suitable for electric, plug-in hybrid and range-extender powertrains, but the EX5 is being launched here with just one battery and motor combination: 214bhp and 60.2kWh (usable capacity). In China, there is also a 68.4kWh option, which Geely would do well to bring here at some point. The battery itself is of Geely’s own design and manufacture, though it seems similar in construction to BYD’s Blade battery, with a relatively small number of long, flat cells arranged into a pack under the floor.

In other markets, such as China and Australia, there is already a range-extender-style plug-in hybrid version called the Starray, which is likely to be destined for the UK next year.

INTERIOR

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With its vaguely octagonal steering wheel, flowing door cards and rising, asymmetric centre console, the EX5 holds a little more visual interest inside than the average new Chinese car, but not very much. On most trim levels, there is a choice between cream-coloured upholstery and the very dark blue of our test car.

In terms of their visual and tactile qualities, at least, the materials also seem at or above the class average. The centre console is topped with a fairly attractive matt line-pattern plastic and many other surfaces are soft to the touch. The door handles look straight out of a modern Honda and feel substantial enough. Like BYD, however, Geely makes liberal use of faux leather, which gives off a pervasive and deeply unpleasant vinyl smell.

EX5’s strength is its hidden storage. It has no frunk but there is a deep well under the boot floor, as well as this drawer beneath the back seats. Rear passengers have dedicated air vents, but there’s no separate zone for the climate control.
Illya Verpraet
Road Tester

Typically for a Chinese car, the EX5 is not short of equipment. Wireless charging, keyless entry and heating for the front seats and steering wheel are all standard and Max trim adds a panoramic sunroof that actually opens, a 16-speaker, 1000W sound system, ventilated massage seats and a head-up display.

Occupants are well catered for when it comes to storage, with fairly roomy door bins and cupholders, and a big space under the centre console. A drawer under the rear seats lets you hide even more stuff.

Seat comfort, however, isn’t so good. The EX5’s promotional materials boast of first-class comfort thanks to seats with 5+1-layer cushions and massage function. However, the seats are set far too high, lack cushion tilt adjustment and are overly soft and unsupportive, giving some testers backache on longer drives.

Arguably, the place to be is the second row, which has generous head room, adjustable backrest angle and an unusually good seating position for an EV, with a floor that doesn’t seem excessively raised. The benefit of those high-set front seats is that rear passengers have space to slot their feet beneath them. Boot space is slightly behind the rest of the class, at 410 litres (Kia EV3: 460 litres, MG S5: 453 litres), but it does offer a further 51 litres in a deep well under the floor.

Infotainment and multimedia

The EX5’s interior would be functional and well appointed if it wasn’t for the misconceived user interface and multimedia. It is quite typical in encompassing a large central touchscreen and a smaller driver display and it scores some points for offering a head-up display on the top trim. The controls for the mirrors are mercifully conventional.

However, physical controls are otherwise few. The buttons on the steering wheel are mostly unmarked, which is needlessly confusing. There’s a supposedly customisable button, but you can’t map any useful functions to it, and while the big rotary controller bodes well, it operates only a few functions (such as the media volume and the cabin temperature) and switching between them is unintuitive.

Then we get to the central touchscreen, which is very similar to what we have seen in BYDs and the Mazda 6e. Even though the display is enormous, the home screen doesn’t do anything useful like display a map or media controls. Instead, it lets you decide whether you would rather look at some puffins, a guinea pig or a cityscape. We would argue that you should be looking at the road instead.

Although some (but not all) of the climate controls are permanently accessible in a toolbar at the bottom, you have to hit the ‘buttons’ in precisely the right spot for them to work. In practice, dialling down the heated seats requires several presses. You can resort to the voice control, which works okay, but you shouldn’t have to. The built-in navigation isn’t particularly clear or very aware of traffic.

Generally, when you dive into the menus, information and buttons are thrown at you in a small font and with little sense of hierarchy. The saving grace is that there’s wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

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ENGINES & PERFORMANCE

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With 214bhp from its single front motor and a kerb weight of 1765kg, the EX5 has entirely average specifications. The claimed 0-62mph time of 7.1sec is not quite as quick as that of the MG S5 EV, but it’s perfectly adequate. However, the EX5 manages its modest power quite poorly.

The EX5 doesn’t particularly struggle with traction, like some front-wheel-drive electric cars do. However, this isn’t thanks to some sophisticated traction control system but because the power is released only gradually, even if you press the pedal fully. From around 30mph, the car is quick enough, but below that it feels quite sluggish. When you’re performing a hasty three-point turn with traffic rapidly approaching, waiting for the power to gently ramp up is a little nerve-racking.

This laggy delivery is borne out by our test data. Even when fully charged, the EX5 missed its claimed acceleration time by some margin. The wet conditions didn’t help, but equally most cars at this sort of power output are perfectly capable of achieving their performance benchmarks. The Mini Aceman SE, for instance, hit its claimed time exactly in similar conditions. The EX5 loses the best part of a further second at a low state of charge.

Deceleration is no more sophisticated. The brake pedal has a Comfort and a Sport mode, but even the more relaxed of the two is annoyingly sensitive. There’s no easy control over the off-throttle regen. Instead, it’s adjusted in a settings menu, which offers neither a one-pedal nor a freewheeling mode, and all except the gentlest setting are difficult to judge. Most EVs reserve a part of the accelerator travel to give you fine control over the regen, but in the EX5 there’s no such thing. Instead, when you lift off the accelerator, it automatically ramps up. To make things worse, the car usually remembers your preferred setting but will occasionally reset it to Medium, just to keep you on your toes.

Ultimate braking performance was satisfactory. The car recorded a stopping distance in damp conditions that was similar to the MG S5 EV in the dry and bettered it by a couple of metres in the wet.

RIDE & HANDLING

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Given Geely owns Volvo and Lotus, it should have access to a lot of expertise from both sides of the dynamic spectrum on how to tune a car for European roads and drivers. Indeed, Lotus allegedly had a small amount of involvement in the EX5. There’s no way of knowing how good or bad the starting point was, but the result is no high point.

Like a lot of Chinese cars, the EX5 is fairly softly sprung, giving it quite a gentle primary ride that irons out most big bumps, albeit one that can be a little under-damped and floaty. Meanwhile, thanks to the generous 50-profile tyres, corrugations are cushioned well too. Overall, it’s not the most sophisticated or European-feeling car, but the relaxed demeanour is preferable to any misguided sportiness. At a motorway cruise, the cabin proved about averagely hushed, according to our sound meter, and was similar to a Kia EV3 or Renault Scenic.

The handling is matched reasonably well, being mostly safe and steady. Geely has chosen to fit Goodyear tyres instead of some home-market alternative, so there’s no particular shortage of grip in either wet or dry conditions. Still, it’s not a car that feels like it was subject to any particularly careful tuning.

There’s plenty of body roll under hard cornering, as well as some torque steer when you try to power out. Throw some mid-corner bumps into the mix and you can even get some kickback from the steering. In fairness, it’s unlikely that many EX5s will ever be driven in a spirited manner and arguably its greatest vice in everyday motoring is the awkward shape of the steering wheel, which makes navigating tight junctions and car parks needlessly annoying.

Assisted driving

Euro NCAP awarded the EX5 five stars, scoring it at more than 80% in every category. While the electronic systems worked well in a lab test, however, we found them less effective in the real world.

Driving with the lane keeping assistance left on is quite an unsettling experience, as the systems tug at the steering if you deviate even slightly from the lane’s centre line. They seem to actively try to steer you around corners, but then give up halfway through. Go anywhere near a white line and a visual and an audible alarm will go off. Switching all of it off involves going into a sub-menu and pressing ‘off’ and ‘confirm’ on three separate functions.

The driver attention monitor will berate you even when you’re looking firmly at the road and will nag you constantly if you cover up the sensor. The overspeed warning is typically irritating and inaccurate. Turning these two off again requires you to go into a sub-menu and press ‘off’ and ‘confirm’ twice. The adaptive cruise control is at least relatively smooth, but while it’s not too susceptible to slowing down for ghosts, it will brake for the faintest curve.

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MPG & RUNNING COSTS

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Geely wisely isn’t aiming to offer a premium experience for a mainstream price. Instead, it’s trying to undercut the mainstream players, albeit in a slightly confusing way. There are list prices, but also an EV-grant-matching discount, plus a couple of other incentives. In real terms, the entry-level SE costs £29,690 and Max trim costs £33,240. That’s cheaper, though not by very much, than an MG S5 EV, and far less than a Skoda Elroq or Renault Scenic. Geely also throws in a free home charger, and if you trade in a petrol or diesel car, a further £1000 over that car’s normal trade-in value.

Its monthly PCP offer isn’t so competitive, however, at £100 more than the MG and not that far off a basic Scenic. Of course, one of the Geely’s main draws is its generous standard equipment, and to match it you would have to upgrade to a high-spec Scenic.

As with BYDs, the instrument cluster displays your economy for only the last 100 miles, and you need to go several menus deep into the touchscreen to find an overall figure that can be reset.
Matt Saunders
Road test editor

Like many of the other new Chinese brands, Geely is opting for a traditional dealer model, with 25 locations at its launch and a target of 100 by the end of 2026. Offering further peace of mind is the six-year, 100,000-mile warranty. There’s an additional two-year, 25,000-mile warranty, but this excludes a lot of things such as the screen and various sensors. It is also offering four years’ free roadside assistance and two years’ free maintenance.

In our testing, the EX5 proved less efficient than the Scenic in similar conditions, with its overall range dipping below 200 miles. It also failed to reach its advertised peak rapid- charging speed, topping out at 120kW on several different chargers. Overall, its weighted average charge speed was about the same as the MG S5 EV because the EX5 managed to maintain its charge rate a little better at higher states of charge.

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VERDICT

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It is appropriate that Geely’s logo looks a little like a spreadsheet, because the only reason you might buy an EX5 is if it stacks up on paper. With all of Geely’s incentives, it is the cheapest car in its class on list price, but not by enough of a margin to make it particularly recommendable.

Apart from price, there is nothing to mark it out. Its design is as bland as it comes, and the EX5 is at or below the class average in pretty much every way. Most rivals, not least the similarly bargain-priced MG S5, have more interior space, better drivability and a more sophisticated chassis. Few other cars have quite such infuriating ADAS tech.

Geely isn’t the first outsider to try to conquer the European market, but given all the local expertise at its fingertips, we expected it to have come up with a stronger first product to make its mark.

Illya Verpraet

Illya Verpraet Road Tester Autocar
Title: Road Tester

As a road tester, Illya drives everything from superminis to supercars, and writes reviews and comparison tests, while also managing the magazine’s Drives section. Much of his time is spent wrangling the data logger and wielding the tape measure to gather the data for Autocar’s in-depth instrumented road tests.

He loves cars that are fun and usable on the road – whether piston-powered or electric – or just cars that are very fit for purpose. When not in test cars, he drives an R53-generation Mini Cooper S.