BYD Atto 2 (2025 - ) review

Choose from the cheaper Boost or the more expensive Comfort, which comes with a bigger battery, and will set you back about another £30 a month on a finance deal. For context BYD was quoting £339 a month, with matching deposit, for Boost at launch at the time of writing but these rates change all the time. While Chinese car brands have a reputation for being cheaper the truth is a little less clear-cut, given many European brands have dropped their prices in response while BYD has held firm with its mid-field position. But some Chinese models definitely offer fantastic value for money when you see how much technology is included, both in terms of safety systems and infotainment. The Atto 2 drives home its BYD advantage here, with lots of tech packed into a small footprint. And, of course, running costs for this electric car are tiny if you have a home charger and an off-peak energy tariff, this combination potentially seeing battery top-ups costing less than a fiver a go. But, and it’s a big but, there are better-looking, better-driving, more fun small electric SUVs out there. And the deal would have to be pretty sweet to tempt us away from the likes of the Skoda Elroq, Kia EV3, Renault 4 or others like them.

There are far fewer moving parts to go wrong in an electric car than a petrol one, so expect better reliability. This is further helped by BYD’s innovative Blade technology, which packs the battery cells together within the frame of the car in a way that protects them well in a crash, and can detect fire in one cell supremely quickly, isolating it from the rest. We need more consumer data to assess fully the reliability of BYD cars, though, given it’s only been selling cars in the UK since 2023. Its cars are covered by an impressive six-year/94,000-mile warranty, though.

We await a rating from independent test body Euro NCAP but BYD works with Thatcham in the UK to determine risk and hopefully drive down insurance premiums in the long term, so we expect five stars. In the meantime, the list of standard safety features is very impressive for the price, and includes adaptive cruise control, rear cross traffic alert and blind spot detection, all useful for drivers. Not so lane-departure warning systems, drowsiness detection and speed alerts, but you can turn it all off. Or we assume you can - the stupid drowsiness detection bonged at us for the entire test drive and we couldn’t shut it up.

For whatever reason even minor bumps in the road like those ridges where sections of tarmac join elicit a horrid, pressurised thud in the cabin, even at town speeds. It’s like that helicopter-esque juddering you get when one of the kids opens a rear window and you have to yell at them to close it, and just as annoying. Furthermore, the cabin is sparse, and dull. There are no chic touches like you get in a Peugeot, none of the fun fabrics and finishes of a Mini and a very obvious lack of the design flair seen in recent Renaults. There’s just play-it-safe, mass-manufactured blandness. You could be anywhere, at any time, in any anonymous vehicle. Surely, we’ve proved that the thing that sells small cars is their sense of personality, and you can inject that at relatively low cost? You do get two cup holders up front, a handy lower storage tray, and a fairly big boot, so there's that.

We still don’t like the BYD graphics on the touch-screen, which aren’t big or clear enough to be helpful while driving, and DAB is still a struggle to get in the UK, which is very annoying. But we do like the fact that the screen rotates, and that you get wireless charging and connections for your phones, plus a surround parking camera, large glass roof and front and rear parking sensors even on the basic Boost model.

See ‘Comfort’ but the Atto 2 thuds over ridges, has vague steering and, boy-oh-boy, does it love a bit of body sway around corners. We were hanging off the steering wheel round one roundabout. Also, for the money drivers are now entitled to expect more than 210 miles of range, the real-world reality likely even less than that. That doesn’t strike us as good enough, especially when you consider that the smaller battery in the Boost version doesn’t charge especially quickly either. But BYD has put a little heat pump in, which it says should mean you hold on to up to 20 per cent of the energy that might otherwise be used to warm the car on winter days. We’re reaching for positives here, but the point is you don’t need to search for one, because there are plenty of better cars out there for the same money. It’s surprising, because the BYD Seal is a very good car, and the Dolphin Surf isn’t bad either. Just forget the Atto 2.