The Renault 5 EV still looks like great fun

Why? Because we’ve still quite some way to go before we see this retro-futuristic little car hit Renault dealers. A launch is expected at the end of 2023, or in other words, just under 18 months from now. So we’re halfway there, in terms of the journey from initial reveal to the Renault 5 EV becoming production-ready.

​​Gallery: EVs aplenty at Electric Avenue

As above, the retro-modern Renault 5’s design hasn’t gone off even slightly and, while we’re impatient, it’s not bred a bit of bitterness. Especially in person, the proportions are just perfect, which is a tough game to play. Just ask Mini. The new 5 will obviously be a comparatively enormous car when sat next to the original from which it takes inspiration. Yet nothing looks out of place. The lights, wheels and accents are correctly sized and placed to give a sympathetic sense of scale. In short, they’ve done a cracking job of making ‘old’ into ‘new’, in spite of the associated challenges.

What Renault now needs to nail is pricing, practicality, range and handling. We don’t care whether it’s fast – charismatic French hatches often aren’t – but it needs to be practical, which should be easy given the CMF-B EV architecture on which it’ll ride. The range needs to be 300 miles or thereabouts and the handling needs to be bob on, which could be challenging given the associated weight of EVs. There needs to be as little feeling of ‘mass’ as possible. It needs to dance, as small French cars do. All of that can be as impressive as you like, but it’s all for nothing if they change the styling. Renault, we appeal to you directly now: do not change the styling.

Enough worrying about the future, what about the now? All we know is seeing the car in person at FOS has done nothing for our urge to have irresponsible discussions with our local Renault dealer’s finance department.

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Photography by Toby Whales.