Skoda Enyaq iV 80 Long Term review

Charge of the white brigade

Strangely enough, my week with KY23YWE coincided with a loan booking for an Enyaq Coupe (review here if you want to know what we thought). This gave me a bit of time to drive the two back-to-back to see if there are any obvious differences. The somewhat predictable findings of my mini test were that the two cars are, well, pretty identical in terms of how they drive. The only difference was in the efficiency: the Coupe, with its swoopier roofline and cleaner profile proved to be a little easier on its battery than the square-backed normal Enyaq. On an identical 50 mile-ish route in the same weather, the normal Enyaq returned 4.0 miles per kWh while the Coupe recorded an average of 4.2 miles per kWh. Which given that my Hyundai Ioniq 5 managed 3.8 miles per kWh the day before, suggests that Škoda has built a very efficient car. 

Problems? Well only one to date. While the infotainment software installed in the Enyaq is much improved over early incarnations, it still occasionally throws its toys out of the pram. This time, it was the CarPlay connection that didn’t want to play ball. Although Tom had connected without issues when the car was first delivered, getting it to connect with Ginny’s iPhone during a photoshoot sent the unit into a mild panic. For some reason, it only wanted to find Tom’s phone, and after much prodding and waiting the screen went blank… Thankfully, a quick online search revealed that this is a bit of a known issue, and that a reset of the unit (just press and hold the power button for 20 seconds to force quit) cures everything. And so it proved - all connected in a matter of moments. That said, the speed at which the system ‘wakes up’ and connects to CarPlay isn’t great. On a couple of occasions, I got into the car and was ready to drive off long before the system found my phone and fired up CarPlay. In my Ioniq 5, it’s all done in a matter of seconds. In the Enyaq, it takes quite a bit longer, which is little irritating when all your passengers are wondering why you’re staring blankly at the screen, waiting for the journey to start. Let’s hope a future update removes that lag.

Like all electric cars, the Enyaq has been loving the warm weather - especially when rapid charging. I only had to charge once during my week with the car, and it didn’t disappoint. Using my tried-and-tested 120kW Instavolt charger on the way to Heathrow (I say it’s mine, but I like to let others use it), I saw a peak of 110kW and a steady 80-90kW for the rest of the session. In fact, it went from 30-80% in less time that in took for me to order and drink a flat white. Lovely.

Sadly, my time with our Enyaq was pretty brief. Just as I'd found the perfect seating / steering wheel positions and set up the the infotainment shortcuts, it was time to hand over the keys to Ginny for a road trip to Cornwall. The next time I see KY23YWE, I suspect that there might well be a light dusting of Cornish sand on the carpets and a few pasty wrappers in the glovebox.