Best four-wheel drive electric cars 2024

One of the great things about the way electric cars work is that it’s quite easy to make them four-wheel drive: one electric motor can drive the front wheels, and another the rears. That alone doesn’t make a car a ‘proper’ off-roader, of course, but it does significantly improve traction, meaning the car feels more planted and ‘confident’ on the road – especially during hard acceleration, or if the road surface is wet. They can be excellent for towing, too.
It's changing the way we all think about what a 4x4 is. Thanks to compact electric motors, electric cars of all shapes and sizes can have a four-wheel drive setup now, whereas before it was largely limited to bigger SUVs. Click here for our pick of the best electric cars with an SUV body style. Here are our 10 favourite electric cars with four-wheel drive, of various shapes and sizes.

The Polestar 2 arrived back in 2020 as only the second Polestar car, following Volvo’s decision to turn its high-performance brand into a standalone electric car company. But thanks to Volvo’s know-how (and lots of XC40 parts), the 2 has the feel of a car with heritage. It’s high-quality, refined, quick, and by virtue of its tall body, very unusual. It was updated recently, getting more power and improved battery range. Single-motor versions cover the longest single-charge distance (400 miles-plus), but you’ll still get up to 368 miles from the (very quick) dual-motor, four-wheel drive model.
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The Skoda Enyaq is arguably the best pound-for-pound electric car that the entire Volkswagen Group does. It just feels altogether higher quality and more luxurious than a VW ID.4. You’ll have to go quite high up the range for four-wheel drive, but for less than £50,000, a Sportline Plus model with a 77kWh battery gets 300-plus miles of range, is beautiful to drive, is practical, and is packed with kit.
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Kia had produced electric cars before the EV6, but this was its first standalone EV. It doesn’t play by the standard Kia rulebook, really: it’s not that cheap, and it’s styled to stand out rather than be the most practical thing on the market. The formula has worked though, because it’s truly unique, great to drive, and still very easy to live with thanks to a big boot and sizeable battery. You’ll need a GT-Line car for four-wheel drive, which tips it beyond the £50,000 mark, but somehow it still feels worth it.
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BMW’s range-topping electric SUV is an SUV like no other. Built more to be a massive lounge-on-wheels than an off-roader – it’s not an off-roader in any sense, in fact – the result is one of the most unusual and futuristic cars on sale. All versions are four-wheel drive, all have a huge 112kWh battery for a 300-mile range, and all provide the sort of high-riding comfort that makes for a phenomenal family car. Albeit at a price.
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The Volvo C40 Recharge is basically an XC40 with a more/less stylish boot - delete as you see fit. We’re in the former camp, mainly because the C40 wears its sloping backside better than most of these “SUV-coupe” style cars – stuff like the BMW X4 and Renault Arkana. You do lose about 50 litres of boot space in a C40, compared to an XC40, but the 400-litre cargo area is big enough. It’ll cost you around £5,000 above a single-motor car for a dual-motor, four-wheel drive one, but it does make the C40 lightning quick with 0-62mph in 4.7 seconds.
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The i-Pace isn’t going to be around for much longer, with Jaguar announcing that it’s being discontinued in 2025 as the brand reportedly focuses on moving even further upmarket. For now though, inside and out the i-Pace feels as fresh today as it did when it landed in 2018 – its charging technology aside, perhaps. Rapid charging speed is about the same as a Vauxhall Corsa-e’s these days. Still, it’s a brilliant thing to drive: quick, grippy, and with a driving position that simultaneously sinks you into the cockpit while giving you a high-set view of the road.
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It’s hard to put the Hyundai Ioniq 5 into a particular box, because although it’s styled a bit like an old school hatchback – albeit with some very futuristic detailing – it’s actually massive. More the size of a Nissan Qashqai than a Volkswagen Golf. That means it’s unusually spacious in the cabin; there’s loads of legroom in the back of a 5. It has a similarly dichotomous driving experience, because while the twin-motor, four-wheel drive version will speed off the line to a 5.1-second 0-62mph time, the ride quality is soft and spongy, like a luxury car’s. One of the best all-round family cars on sale, electric or otherwise.
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It’s probably a stretch to call this one of the ‘best’ four-wheel drive electric cars on the market, but it is one of the most striking. Not because of the way it looks, but more because it offers barely believable straight-line performance for a barely believable price. Yep, for just £36,000, here’s a 435 horsepower EV with four-wheel drive that gets past 62mph in 3.8 seconds. And here’s a lazy analogy for you: that’s quicker than a Porsche 911. The fun comes more from that sense of speed rather than its handling, mind.
Read our full review of the MG4 XPower here

In stark contrast to the MG4 XPower, the Porsche Taycan is built primarily for exceptional handling. Speed comes second, although there’s obviously plenty of that too. As per every Porsche, there are myriad versions of the Taycan, starting with the base model and rising to the stupidly quick 751 horsepower Taycan Turbo S. The most impressive thing about the Taycan, though, is that it beautifully balances a sense of quiet comfort with proper driver appeal: stacks of grip, lovely steering feel and a proper ‘bum-on-the-road’ driving position.
Watch our video review of the Porsche Taycan Sport Turismo here

Whatever you think about Tesla, the Model Y was a bit of a master stroke: take the massively popular Model 3, make it taller, give it two extra seats, give it a massive hatchback, and don’t charge that much more for it; the Y basically removes the compromises of the Model 3 and becomes the much better car for it. Standard Tesla qualities still apply though. It’s absolutely rapid, has some of the most fun tech features of any car. And the Long Range model will do up to 331 miles per charge. All this for Skoda Enyaq vRS money.
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