Citroen e-C3 Hatchback (2024 - ) Electric review

When it launched the ë-C3 was one of the of the most significant electric cars we’d tested for a long time. It is now eligibile for the £1,500 Electric Car Grant (ECG) which along with the introduction of an even cheaper Urban Range version has helped to make it more accessible still. While more sub-£25,000 electric cars like the Volkswagen ID. Polo and Skoda Epiq are due to arrive soon, the ë-C3 provides a strong benchmark for a budget-friendly EV. Though, as with any electric car, the total cost of ownership will depend on your circumstances. For those with a driveway who can top-up at home, running costs could be considerably lower than relying on the public network. Meanwhile company drivers will be able to take advantage of reduced Benefit In Kind.

Our first experience of the Citroën ë-C3 was a pre-production car which still needed some final software tweaks. However, the finished car we drove more recently seemed to have ironed out the little quirks we originally encountered. As part of the wider Stellantis powerhouse the ë-C3 shares its foundations with the Vauxhall Frontera and Fiat Grande Panda which should give some reassurance that parts have been tried and tested. All Citroëns come with a three-year manufacturer warranty for defective parts which can be extended at an additional cost for added peace of mind. Like most electric cars there is a separate eight-year cover for the battery and with fewer moving parts than a petrol or diesel car there should be less to go wrong with the ë-C3.

The ë-C3 comes with all the safety gadgetry you’d expect including lane departure warnings, driver attention alerting, hill start assistance, a speed limiter and cruise control, speed limit detection, and emergency braking. Apart from the speed limit warning which doesn’t always read the road signs correctly, none of the systems were too overbearing. All ë-C3s have six airbags and LED front headlights and the physical temperature controls are much easier to use than a touch-screen. On MAX trim you’ll also get a reversing camera and front fog lights. There’s no option for blind spot monitoring, but the shape of the ë-C3 offers good visibility all round so you won’t miss it too much. However, the ë-C3 ’s doors do have a tinny quality which is less confidence inspiring than larger and more expensive cars.

The ë-C3 is very comfortable and impressively refined for a small car. While the little tags on the inside of the doors instructing you to ‘be cool’, ‘have fun’, ‘feel good’ and ‘be happy’ are perhaps a little twee, there’s appealing joie de vivre about the ë-C3’s interior. Money has been spent where it counts and, yes, some of the plastics feel rather flimsy, but the textured fabric on the dashboard and contrast seating materials create a light and airy atmosphere. Being electric, there’s no engine noise in the ë-C3 and very little road or wind noise makes its way into the cabin. The boxy shape allows for extra space and a higher roofline gives decent amounts of headroom for both front and rear passengers. It retains an almost identical footprint to the previous model and feels compact out on the road. The Advanced Comfort seats are just the right amount of squidgy and supportive while the Advanced Comfort suspension cushions you from imperfections in the road. The boot offers a space easily capable of swallowing up the weekly shop or a handful of small suitcases. It does however have a very large lip making it tricky to load and unload heavier items or for four-legged friends to jump in and out, though.

The entry-level PLUS trim comes with parking sensors, alloy wheels, a 10.25-inch central touchscreen with wireless Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, and a choice of paint colours with customisable clips adding a streak of colour to the front and side of the car. There’s no fancy colourful drivers display, instead all the information is shown on a thin digital strip in front of the driver. While Citroën calls this a head-up display, it’s not projected onto the windscreen the way you might expect it to be, but it is in your eyeline making it functional if not futuristic. Moving up to MAX trim gains satnav, wireless phone charging, climate control, privacy glass in the back, heated front seats, heated steering wheel and a heated windscreen. Refreshingly both trim levels have physical temperature controls. We like the thoughtful finishing touches including the pocket for your phone in the back of the front seats and the graphic of iconic Citroëns in glove compartment adding to the fun factor. Possibly the only thing you might miss is a keyless entry and start function, however overall, the ë-C3 strikes a good balance between features and cost, achieving that appealing low asking price without forgoing the essentials.

The ë-C3 is set up for maximum efficiency by default, so selecting Drive will initiate the maximum regeneration setting and you’ll need to press the Comfort mode button to turn it off. Citroën has calibrated the regeneration perfectly. It’s not too grabby allowing for very smooth effortless driving and while it doesn’t give you one pedal driving, the brake pedal gives you the right amount of feel when you need it to come to a gentle stop. We did try Comfort mode, but we preferred the regeneration of the default mode, even on the motorway. The ë-C3 doesn’t offer the supercar-like acceleration of the MG4 XPower, getting up to speed doesn’t feel as laborious as the numbers suggest on paper and the ë-C3 will happily whizz around town or cruise along the motorway. Both the Urban Range and Standard Range models have the same amount of power, though two different battery sizes result in official ranges of 130 miles and 202 miles respectively. The Urban Range ë-C3 is designed for those who generally remain within city limits and while it just as refined as the standard version at motorway speeds, to use public charging you’ll need to pay extra for DC charging compatibility and even then, expect topping up from 20 to 80 per cent to take over half an hour. For this reason, most buyers will benefit from upgrading to the Standard Range car which provides the flexibility of more range and quicker charging speeds.