Toyota bZ4X SUV (2022 - 2025) Electric review

Electric cars have traditionally cost more than equivalent petrol, diesel or hybrid models but the market is increasingly competitive and the bZ4X costs similar money to the plug-in version of the RAV4. It also looks good value against rivals like the VW ID.4, Skoda Enyaq, Kia EV6 and Hyundai Ioniq 5. In terms of costs even with rising energy costs there are potential savings running an electric car like the bZ4X compared with petrol or diesel, especially if you have facility to plug in at home. Toyota also offers different ways into the bZ4X, including a flexible, all-inclusive leasing option through its Kinto partner where all costs are covered in a single monthly payment. More conventional finance packages are also available, including one geared to business users, but the goal of creating more accessible ways for drivers to go electric is laudable.

Toyota’s traditionally high standing in reliability tables has taken a slight knock, and the bZ4X got off to a (literally) wobbly start with a recall for the wheels coming loose. It even paused production to sort the issue out, which was done before any were actually delivered to owners so, while you may hear it mentioned, we’d be confident it’s nothing to worry about on any cars you may be considering new or used. Meanwhile Toyota’s standard three-year warranty is now extendable to a whole 10 years (or 100,000 miles, whichever comes first) if you commit to servicing at a dealership. This may cost a little more but could be worth it for the peace of mind.

The bZ4X comes with a formidable array of systems designed to keep you and those around you safe. Highlights include a sophisticated automatic emergency braking system that intervenes if it thinks you’re about to turn across oncoming traffic or into a side road with unseen cyclists or pedestrians. Best of all the tech seems generally unobtrusive, with the exception of the nagging driver attention alert that scolds you for as much as glancing down to adjust the climate control. Reason enough to choose the basic Pure trim level for the fact it doesn’t have this system, though it also loses more useful aids like blind spot monitoring, alerts if you fail to spot crossing traffic when reversing out of a parking space and rear parking bleepers, the latter two definitely valuable given the limited rear visibility common to tall crossovers of this type. An update for the 2024 model year also added a feature that automatically flashes the rear hazard lights at any fast-approaching wannabe tailgaters on the motorway, which we like the idea of! A pity this likewise isn’t included on base-trim Pure models, though.

Given electric SUVs are still a new thing it’s amazing how quickly the industry has settled on a common format, the bZ4X give or take similarly proportioned to its rivals here. We appreciated the lower bonnet, which reduces the height of the dashboard for improved forward visibility, driver and front seat passenger have plenty of space and those in the back get loads of legroom. The flat floor means anyone sitting in the middle has space for their feet, though headroom with the panoramic roof is a little limited. While the boot isn’t as big as that of an ID.4, Enyaq or Ioniq 5 it does at least have a handily low loading lip and useful stash space under the boot floor for your charging cables. Interestingly while we praised the ride comfort on the original launch event having spent some more time in the bZ4X on lumpy British roads we’ll caveat that and say it can get a little jiggly, which can be a bit unsettling in combination with the oddly twitchy (and surprisingly heavy) steering. It’s a strangely nervy set-up for an otherwise chilled family crossover, and subsequent experience of the comparable Nissan Ariya suggests it does a better job of ride comfort and refinement. There’s also a bit of tyre noise on the motorway, the absence of engine sound perhaps accentuating that.

If perhaps a little monotone compared with some of the funkier interior options offered by the likes of VW and Skoda we liked the interior styling, the fabric top to the dashboard lifting the ambience while the big storage box between the front seats has plenty of options for stashing your bits and bobs. Like Peugeot, Toyota puts the instrument cluster above a tiny steering wheel, which we had to have in our lap to see the speedo. A big central screen meanwhile takes care of your infotainment needs, the sharp graphics and commendably simple menus a huge improvement on equivalent systems in other Toyotas. The basic Pure trim doesn’t get this, and also misses out on quite a lot of the convenience and assistance functions found on the rest of the range so we’d advise going up at least one grade to Motion to do your bZ4X justice. Saying that, the fact Pure doesn’t get the nagging driver monitoring system could yet convince us that less is more!

There’s something of a horsepower arms race in some corners of the EV world but we rather admire Toyota’s decision not to play along, concentrating instead on maximising range and offering enough performance to be getting on with rather than more than you can realistically use. You can get the bZ4X in single-motor front-wheel drive or twin-motor all-wheel drive forms, the latter with a modest sounding 218 horsepower. On the road this feels more than healthy enough, with effortless acceleration and commendably smooth throttle response and integration with regenerative braking. Where others like Kia offer a confusing array of modes for this Toyota has a simple on/off switch that leaves the car to figure it out for itself. And it does a good job, charging when you lift off the accelerator for junctions or corners, even if it’s not a true one-pedal system. After some previous criticisms for the indicated range and lack of a percentage of remaining battery readout Toyota has also tweaked the control systems, adding that battery info and clawing back less of the ‘hidden’ reserve range so you get a more accurate sense of how far you can go before your next charge. This also seems to have improved the displayed efficiency, and on a warm summer day we got nearly four miles for every kWh in the battery. This may be mumbo-jumbo for those raised on mpg as a measure of efficiency but we’d consider anything over three miles per kWh decent real-world performance on the motorway and be confident in getting close to the best case 286 miles claimed for the twin-motor model, the front-wheel drive one claiming just over 300 miles. Oh, and for the true EV geeks if you’d caught wind of slow AC charging rates on early bZ4Xs rest assured all the versions now sold in the UK can suck in the power at 11kW. It’s obviously considerably faster on the DC rapid chargers you’ll now find in most motorway service stations as well.