By Eric Peters
For NMA
Most EVs cost tens of thousands more than otherwise similar (and even otherwise identical) gas-engined vehicles. There’s much less of a price to be paid – in the literal sense – when you buy BMW’s i4 rather than a 4-Series Gran Coupe with an engine.
As well as in another sense.
You get more power for (relatively speaking) only a little more money.
Of course, as is true across-the-board with EVs, you also pay a price in terms of how far you can go before you must stop – and how long you must wait before you can get going again.
What It Is
The i4 is a battery-powered version of BMW’s 4 Series Gran Coupe – which is actually a compact-sized fastback (and hatchback’d) sedan. It’s related to BMW’s 3 Series sedan, but the GC (and i4) are a little longer, lower and sleeker-looking. The price you pay for that is a little less head and legroom. As well as a higher price for the sleeker looking shape of the GC, which stickers for $48,300 to start vs. $44,500 for the 3 Series sedan.
But the battery-powered version of the GC – the i4 – only stickers for about $4k more – $52,200 for the base eDrive35 – than the Gran Coupe, which stickers for $48,300 to start.
This is atypical for an electric vehicle. Typically, the cost of a battery-powered version of the same thing with an engine is much higher than the engine-powered version.
And – in this case – it’s more than the same thing with a battery rather than an engine.
The i4 comes standard with more power than the 430i Gran Coupe, which comes standard with just 2.0 liters and 255 horses. The i4 may not have an engine – but it does have 282 horsepower.
What’s New For 2024
A dual motor (all-wheel-drive) i40 xDrive variant with 396 horsepower has been added to the lineup.
What’s Good
- Only marginally more expensive than a 4 Series Gran Coupe with an engine.
- More standard power than comes standard with the Gran Coupe with an engine.
- Doesn’t make a visual issue of being an electric vehicle.
What’s Not So Good
- As with every EV, it’s not so much the range that holds you back. It’s the time it takes to get it back.
- Loses range while parked – if you don’t remember to plug it in while it’s just sitting.
- Likely to depreciate faster because it’s an EV – because of the gradual/inevitable deterioration of the battery’s capacity to retain charge over time compounded by the extremely high cost of replacing any EV’s battery.
Under The Skin
The i4 comes standard with rear-wheel-drive and a 282 horsepower, 70.2 kWh battery pack and 276 miles of fully charged range. This is a significant power upgrade over the 430i Gran Coupe’s 2.0 liter four-cylinder engine that only makes 255 horsepower. But the price you pay for the additional power is less range – 276 miles overall vs. 390 miles in city driving and 530 miles on the highway for the 430i.
As well as more time.
BMW says it takes about 7 hours to recover a full charge at home via a “Level II” system that uses 240 volts; i.e., an electric stove/clothes dryer-type outlet – which you may have to have wired up by an electrician if your garage doesn’t already have a 240V outlet to plug into. And that is the fastest you can recover a full charge at home because private homes don’t generally have the power to charge an EV any faster.
You could reduce the time you’ll have to wait by driving to a commercial “fast” charger, which is faster-charging than charging at home. But you’ll still have to wait about half an hour to get a partial (80 percent of capacity) charge. This is the case with all EVs as a precautionary measure; fully charging the battery at a “fast” charger degrades the battery’s capacity to hold a full charge and also increases the risk of a fire, due to the heat generated. That’s why “fast” charging is limited to 80 percent of capacity. Which means 20 percent less capacity – which means you’ll be back on the road with about 220 miles of range (for the eDrive35) unless you have a lot more time to wait, while the remainder is recovered slowly.
If you’d like to go a little farther in between stops – and so have to stop less often – and have more power to go along with the ride – you can upgrade to the eDrive40 version of the i4. It comes standard with 335 horsepower and 301 miles of range.
This version of the i4 is also rear wheel drive.
New for this model year is the xDrive40, which has dual motors and so is all-wheel-drive. It also has 369 horsepower and about the same driving range (307 miles).
BMW also offers a high-performance “M” version of the i4 – the M50 – which also has the dual motor setup but offers a maximum of 536 horsepower using the “boost” button. This version of the i4 touts the least range (269 miles) as you’d expect given its focus on power/performance.
On The Road
The i4 accelerates immediately, powerfully – and silently. These being the main draws of battery-powered vehicles. The problem, of course, is that accelerating powerfully costs energy. This is no different when you accelerate a gas-engined vehicle forcefully. But the difference is that it only takes a few minutes to completely refill a gas-engined vehicle’s tank – as opposed to waiting 30 minutes for 80 percent of fully charged.
There’s another difference, too.
Your range – with an EV – will often vary. Often considerably. And even when you haven’t been driving it.
When they dropped off the i4 for me to test drive, the dashboard display said there were 269 miles of driving range available. After my first drive of about 30 miles, the indicator said I had about 241 miles of range remaining. In other words, according to the i4, I had only used up 28 miles of indicated range to travel 30 miles. I was impressed by this because it is typically the case that the range-you-can-drive estimate is off by about 20 percent – and not in your favor.
But when I went to drive the car again after leaving it parked for a day, the range remaining indicator had gone down to 196 miles – even though I hadn’t driven the i4 at all.
But I did leave it parked – and unplugged. The loss of charge (and so, range) probably being a consequence of the car using up charge to keep its battery from getting too cold or too hot, either of which can damage the battery or make it hard to charge the battery.
All EVs have thermal management systems to maintain the battery within its optimal temperature range – and so EVs are always using power, even when they are parked. Thus, if you don’t plug the EV in when you park it – to keep the battery topped off – when you need to drive it again, you will discover you won’t be able to drive it as far as you expected to be able to drive it.
Also, the range remaining indicators EVs have are not like the fuel-remaining indicators gas-engined vehicles have, which measure the volume of fuel you have remaining in the tank. The range-remaining indicators estimate the range you have left by calculating various variables, such as the outside temperature and also how you drove the vehicle last time you drove it. These are all variables – and so the actual range you have varies along with it.
You have to learn the car as it learns you. And – of course – you have to be more aware of how far you can realistically go, because of the time it takes to get going again.
Other than that, the i4 drives – and handles – very much like 4 Series Gran Coupe it is, sans the engine. The chief differences being that it accelerates more forcefully at first – because of the greater power (and instant torque delivery) of the electric motor(s). But its force wanes as speed builds because of the weight that those motors have to push. The rear-drive i4 eDrive35’s curb weight (4,553 lbs.) is 761 lbs. greater than that of the 430i (3,792 lbs.) and that slows the i4 down as it tries to go faster.
If you have a look at EV top speed numbers, you’ll discover that while most of them are very quick (0-60) they aren’t very fast, with top speeds for most in the 130 MPH range or less.
On the upside, the i4 feels more substantial than the compact-sized car it is. Because it is more substantial. Literally. The i4 weighs more than most full-size sedans that aren’t battery powered and that lends it a gravitas non-electric compact-sized cars lack.
At The Curb
The original Prius hybrid was polarizing because it made a point of looking like a hybrid – which was fine if you wanted to make a point about driving one. Many people just wanted to drive a high-mileage car. The i4 is styled for the person who just wants to drive an electric car.
It does not look like one. More finely, it does not look like a Tesla 3, which makes this BMW the EV for the person who prefers to just drive one and not make a big deal about it.
One of the handy things about it is the hatchback layout, which opens up the available space for whatever you need to carry considerably by opening up the entire interior of the car and by the much larger opening of the hatchback itself. The total cargo space claimed is 16.6 cubic feet but it’s functionally more than that because of the fact that more will fit in a pinch if you leave the rear liftgate open and fold forward the back seats. The interesting thing here is the i4 (and the 4 Series GC it’s based on) is both more practical and more stylish than the 3 Series sedan they’re based on.
You don’t even lose much in the way of head and legroom vs. the 3 sedan, which has 42 inches of legroom up front and 35.2 in the back vs. 41.5 in the i4 up front and 34.9 in the rear. Headroom in the i4 (and 4 Series GC) is also just a little bit less: 38.6 inches up front and 36.6 inches in the rear vs. 38.7 up front in the 3 Sedan and 37.6 in back. You wouldn’t think it to look at it.
Or – rather – them.
The 3 Sedan is an attractive sedan but the i4/GC are more so. The latter look lower and racier. The latter for real, the former just a visual effect of the sharper rake of the glass and the slinkier-looking fastback rear styling. In fact, all three – the 3 Sedan and the i4/GC – stand about the same 56.8 inches off the ground.
There are some differences inside.
The i4 has a single rectangular sheet LCD driver information cluster and – naturally – different information, such as a power/charge display in place of a tachometer. There’s also a range-remaining display that recalculates range remaining as you drive (and while the i4 is parked). You may find you have more indicated range remaining – or less than you thought you had – depending on the computer’s estimates.
The Rest
BMW equips all i4 trims with most of the same standard features. The main differences between trims being the output of the electric drivetrains, the driving range and the availability (or not) of some performance-enhancing equipment such as the M Sport package that includes an adaptive suspension system; the M Sport package is not available with the eDrive35 but is optional with the eDrive40 and sDrive40. The M50 comes standard with the M Sport stuff and can be ordered with larger 20 inch wheels and a Carbon trim package.
Be aware that choosing the taller tires (and heavier wheels) will reduce the vehicle’s driving range a little.
The Bottom Line
Here’s an EV that doesn’t look like one – or cost much more than one. At least in terms of what you pay for it vs. the car that looks just like it but isn’t one.
Eric Peters lives in Virginia and enjoys driving cars and motorcycles. In the past, Eric worked as a car journalist for many prominent mainstream media outlets. Currently, he focuses his time writing auto history books, reviewing cars, and blogging about cars+ for his website EricPetersAutos.com.
Editor’s Note: The thoughts and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of the National Motorists Association.
