2018 Smart EQ ForTwo Quick Review

[@alan-overthenet]

I've had a Smart ForTwo EQ for a couple of months and I absolutely love it. I got it new for £18,600 (JCT600 Sheffield). I have a VW Transporter 2.5 diesel. It hasn't been off the drive since I bought the Smart - so practical and makes driving fun.

[@cjmillsnun]

Kate was right first time. Speedometer for speed. Odometer shows mileage.

[@box.10]

James trying to be too clever?

[@JonathanPorterfield]

Mr and Mrs Coates are back ! Great to see the good cop / bad cop routeen again !

[@johnnorth9355]

If you live in congestion charge / emission controlled London (with London wages) then £23K is no big deal as is the range as long as you can charge at home. Definitely a second around town car - me I would still want a Model S 100D :-) . Good to see you back and on top reporting form !

[@charlesholland-keen2222]

Very interesting to see your takes on the Smart EV. We owned a 2015 1 litre auto for 2 years and thought it a fun car and very convenient. No range constraints being ICE and comfortably doing 360 miles Leeds to Aberdeenshire in a day. Fuel consumption Aberdeenshire and return 68 mpg. Average over 24 months approx. 50 mpg. Wind and tyre noise, steamed up windows but £10K cheaper with all the extras. Exchanged it for an Ionic Hybrid and no regrets. Looking to go Ioniq EV next and hoping it's battery is upgraded to give C 200 miles. The usual highly detailed blue chip review. Thanks.

[@stevenlawrie7819]

Thanks for that. I have a 2016 cabrio same colour (petrol) JBL sound system is cracking on it 8 speakers including a removeable subwoofer in the boot. As others have said no probs with steaming up with aircon on. I drove to the factory in June this year for Smartimes 2018 and with a factory tour, 280 cars a day and 30% electric being built. One EQ driven from northern Norway.

[@bertie1989]

Another brilliant video as always and an honest review. You both make a great team. The steaming up issue could have been because the climate controls were set to recirculation mode and also the A/c was switched off. Just a small point Kate, please check ur mirrors more often, passing parked cars on your right without a glance at the mirror is dangerous.

[@quicksilver40]

She was right speedometer, odometer is to read the mileage.

[@jcfallows]

Another good review you two and Kate I love the way you say Yes under acceleration.

[@PlanetCypher_]

Nice, had not realised it has renault components. Smart eq has just flown under my radar to a certain extent.

[@smartelectriccar]

22:11 Road noise in my Smart ED is Ok. You might have a bad set of tires? Wind noise at 100 km/h is poor, but very quit at city speed.

[@EVRevolution]

Great job as always. Nice drone footage! I have to practice more.

[@Jamesandkate]

Cheers Ken, although it did end up in the bush on one occasion 😕

[@BobCarterMidAtlanticEngineer]

Hello from the USA! I love listening to your accent! :-) I have a 2013 Smart ED...I love my little car! There was talk of the road noise in your Smart. I have to agree, it boils down to the tires. My Smart is no where near as noisy as your car. Often the type of tire and making sure the tires are properly inflated will make a difference in the noise. Find a different tire that is available to you there and see what happens. Mine is quiet enough where I can hear the whine of the electric motor......so, there is hope for a quiet ride. By the way, the range of our 2013 Smart ED is still around 94 to 112 km, all depending on driving conditions and the weather.

[@BobCarterMidAtlanticEngineer]

By the way, I bought my car used here in the states for only just over 6500 USD. I have to agree that the price for a new Smart is a bit steep, but it is in my opinion, an upper class type of commuter car. You are paying for not only the name but the technology to make this car what it is....but still, the price could come down to make it more appealing for consumers. I was fortunate to find mine on a used car lot and now.... My car is paid for! The electric usage and cost to keep the car charged at home and on the go is still far cheaper than buying fuel for my ICE vehicle. I can easily get groceries for a family of 6 and fit everything in the back with some room to spare. This is even with the addition of a spare tire...yes I bought a tire for mine as a spare. I have a small crank up jack and tool for the smaller lug nuts. The jack and tool for the lug nuts are kept on the floor, under the passenger seat. I do not know what Smart was thinking when they did not include a spare tire. Spare tires in most cars are smaller anyways. It has not detracted from usable space for doing the things that I do with my car. The added weight of tire has not affected the drivable range either. Even though the range is shorter compared to larger electric cars, there are many positives about the Smart.

[@garyallsopp6369]

Replaced our 2015 Zoe with 2017 ForFour ED a year ago - (Same as this just 4 seats in Black & Green). Our's is only 7kW charge as the 22kW wasn't available at the time. On the whole we love it, but that demist issue is really annoying - fogs up badly if you don't have the aircon on and distribution is one sided (maybe designed for LHD). Agree tyres are noisy at speed too after the Zoe's EV tyres. Regarding the price (£22,500 for ours) - I did the sums before we bought it and over 4 years on PCP inc. Fuel, servicing, etc. and it was cheaper than a petrol one... cheaper than a lesser equipped Aygo too! Never even test drove it either! Fun review!

[@smartelectriccar]

Agree with review. My 2018 Smart ED is a great commuter car. Perfect second car for us as our Tesla is the big long range car. Disappointed Daimler didn’t get the tech and fine points like regenerative braking top notch...they had 6 years of Smart ED experience to get this right. Nissan improved the Leaf better than Smart did on their EV. Sigh. Still love my Smart.

[@rossmc40]

Funky looking little car. We actually considered the old model before getting the Zoe as our 2nd EV. It would be brilliant as a town runabout but it needs the price to reflect it, far to expensive for what you get.

[@philgalpin9284]

Bought our 2015 Smart FourTwo for 8400 Euro's last year and have done 7K kms since. Charge two or three times each week (on cheap rate) and don't need for long journeys (use ICE). Superb for two pensioners for everyday and shopping. Range 150 kms in spring and autumn, 110 in cold winter (rare here) and hot summer ( absolutely guaranteed). Annoying point, 65 Euro's a month for battery 'insurance'.

[@MrConor159]

Surely CCS wouldn't be that expensive to add even as an option. Hopefully when the Zoe gets it the refreshed smart gets it as well.

[@Smartsparky]

Enjoyed that guys. Cheers. I have a test drive next week. And would you have guessed it’s 20mins. Lol

[@thesmallrougeone]

Noisy (now that you mention it). Too pricey though, like you said I'd buy a 30kWh Leaf instead 😁 Or even a 40kWh! But thanks for the detailed review 👌

[@enyaq_gorm]

I bought a 40kw leaf tekna for £24k, this is overpriced

[@jaguar4659]

Too small to cost so much !

[@davidwebb4904]

Even when you criticise something, its said in such a nice way..... You are too sweet Kate!!! Suggest you go watch some of the early Top Gear episodes and take a page out of Clarksons book. Have to learn to be snarky when snarkyness is warranted. And snarkyness with this car is definitely due....

[@salipander6570]

There must be something wrong that causes the noise. Other reviews say the Smart eq is pretty quiet. Can you find out what might be wrong?

[@nosoupforyou425]

'19's in us did not have the DC charge option.... 😒 still like mine

[@craigevans6156]

Words of the week: Heatness & Gocartness! Another great video guys but no room for Florence?

[@Jamesandkate]

She can make up some good lyrics :-)))

[@christill]

You can cycle through the digital dash with the up and down buttons on the wheel to get to the digital speed and other stuff. And also to turn the radar regen off which I found made the car so much more enjoyable for me to drive. Regen feels significantly stronger than the Zoe in Eco or in Normal with radar off. That might just be down to the car being lighter. Not too sure. I tend to put it in neutral if I want to coast for a long period and then back to D as I approach a light or roundabout to get the full regen. It’s pretty fun to play around like that. The 22kw charging is a must and considering how little they’re charging for it, it’s a no brainer. Interesting this one came with a 3 pin plug cable and an umbrella. Not that I care about the umbrella. But I was told the granny cable was an extra. As far as the heated seats, it is frustrating that they are just super hot or nothing. You can’t really use them properly until it gets really cold. But anyway, I’m enjoying mine a lot overall. I think it drives better than the Zoe I had before and it’s really fun at low to medium speed cornering.

[@garethbrooks2750]

Chris Till the brochure listed the granny cable as a standard equipment for the eq at the time I ordered. To buy the granny cable is nearly £650 I believe. I love it so cheap to run and pcp price is stupidly cheap. It’s used mainly as a commuter car but did do Cornell and back which took ..... a while!

[@christill]

Gareth Brooks I wouldn’t say my monthly pcp was stupidly cheap, but considering what my colleagues tell me they pay monthly on fuel it definitely makes it look stupidly cheap by comparison. And it does seem as if they changed the standard charging cable after I bought mine. They also don’t give you a free Chargemaster honecharger as Renault did for me. So for me it didn’t matter but for someone else that would have been a headache. For people who are buying this as a first EV and don’t want to or can’t purchase a 7kw home charger then I guess the 3 pin plug works. But I would still recommend paying for a 7kw one if you have somewhere to install it.

[@garethbrooks2750]

Chris Till my pcp is £115 a month I had to pay for home charger 7kw, I went with a Zappi based on James and Kate recommendation and am having solar installed this week so was the best idea for charger tbh. So far done 2200 miles and it’s not cost £50 yet

[@christill]

Gareth Brooks Wow, that’s like half my monthly cost. I don’t want to get into length of agreement or deposit or whatever. There may be a difference but there’s no point going into detail here. And also I don’t know what spec yours is. Mine has most of the added options so that may make a significant difference.

[@ramblerandy2397]

Great little review. From a road impact perspective the Smart has always made an awful lot of sense, and in a BEV it should be pretty much the perfect vehicle. Essentially, it is the golf cart that can! But yeah, £23K is way too much. But they will come down. I, myself am looking at a Zoe, but I wouldn't turn my nose up at a secondhand Smart ED, even with a small charging rate.

[@anastigmatix4119]

Charging off the cable in North America is 4 times slower, so overnight rather than a few hours in U.K. Just a heads-up.

[@kelvynbettridge]

Have I got it wrong or was there a recent announcement that this parts sharing deal was coming to an end... ie all Smarts?

[@Jamesandkate]

Possibly, they'd do well to head back over to Tesla!!

[@barriejenner3132]

The Fortwo loses some parking practicality due to the width of its doors making access and exit tricky in tight parking bay situations. IMO the Forfour is far better in this respect with its narrower doors plus of course it has enhanced practicality. Surely the recirculation was on with that degree of window misting?

[@midwestslim]

Looking forward to a model 3 review. Does the govt. offer a rebate for driving an EV?

[@RWBHere]

Thanks James and Kate. Nice try, but we still need convincing about the desirability of driving a Smart. Someone once tried selling us a low-mileage one. The girly pink colour wasn’t the only reason why we declined the bargain offer. The first owner had lost interest in driving it within months of purchase, as did the next owner. Incidentally, when was the requirement to carry a spare wheel at all times dropped from the Highway Code? It seems that a spare isn’t even an option with a number of cars nowadays.

[@MarkGaudie]

There was a black and green Smart ForFour EV on eBay for £16k. It was only 6 months old and the bigger version to this. That is more my price range for this type of car.

[@jtchivers]

Agree. Too little car with too much noise for too high a price in this case. I'd go with a second-hand LEAF or Zoe at that cost, unless the smallness was a factor in my decision.

[@EVPuzzle]

Great review. Burn setting sounded worrying

[@J500ANT]

as far as I know these (at time of typing this) qualify for the UK ev grant. The configurator says £20565 before any options are added, and grant taken away, so £17k. For that it still comes with fake leather and the satnav. Not really sure where the £23k comes in.

[@Jamesandkate]

This is the top spec model and that was the purchase price so from the owner.

[@garethbrooks2750]

List price is £23,015, however ended up paying £15,007 with government discount and dealer discount. I agree £23k is way to much for it And I’d never of paid it.

[@smartelectriccar]

The feature is the size of the car. Just like smart phones, the smaller and more dense the packaging, the more expensive.

[@olaskabo5346]

Good review of the car, have basically the same model and super happy with it

[@VegasX900]

Nice view of the trunk @0:48

[@SteveMorton]

The windscreen steaming up like that, I wonder if it was designed for LHD only! Or was the heating on recirculation?

[@Jamesandkate]

We'd been driving for well over two hours and then it occurred suddenly so we were at a loss to what happened TBH

[@dlittlester]

Funny that. We used to have demist problems on my wife's side of the car too. It wasn't a Smart though.

[@engasser]

This makes me want to go and explore those lanes! When we get a snoozy little man of a mid-afternoon weekend, we sometimes head up around there for a drive. Presumably around Shenton or thereabouts? Also was that a rusty rear axle? :)

[@Jamesandkate]

It's our favourite place, we got married there :-)

[@engasser]

James and Kate nice with the steam added in. Congratulations. May have to steal that idea as we need to get hitched also. 😇

[@davejohnson9632]

Great video. Like you both said, not for £23k

[@garethbrooks2750]

Dave Johnson List price is £23k, however ended up paying £15k with government discount and dealer discount. I agree £23k is way to much for it And I’d never of paid it.

[@bumbleo8993]

Charismatic little car but just too expensive. Excellent review as always.

[@ronaldmillsopp3802]

Expensive small car! Did you guys buy a Renault Zoe? If you have, is it the battery lease type? Thanks.

[@Jamesandkate]

We did, it is on battery lease

[@ronaldmillsopp3802]

@@Jamesandkate I have heard so much negative feedback from leasing the battery scheme. Do you think it makes financial sense? Be good to have a vlog on it? Thanks

[@Jamesandkate]

@@ronaldmillsopp3802 Yes we do. It was purchased purely as a commuter vehicle which, it does very well. The battery lease is relatively small in comparison to the fuel costs in an ICE over the mileage we are covering. Also, we only intended to keep the Zoe for around a year so the initial purchase cost plus a year of lease was far lower than buying an equivalent EV with the battery included. And last but not least, EV residuals are on the increase so it will likely be worth more when we sell it than we originally paid :-)

[@garyallsopp6369]

@@Jamesandkate Had our Battery lease Zoe on 2 year PCP - GFV was originally £8300 - Value was £4500 when we gave it back - Made no difference to us, but a replacement was nearly twice the monthly cost; almost went back in time to an ICE, but in the end we went for the Smart ED. Like you say though - residuals are picking up...

[@ronaldmillsopp3802]

Kate excellent! Yes I believe the residual value of EV's has increased, particularly the Zoe! Many thanks for your answer.

[@michaelowen7694]

Great review as always. Price eye watering. When will the day come that we get an EV that competes on purchase price with an ICE? On another matter, have you done a video on your Zoe or have I missed it?

[@Jamesandkate]

Thanks for the comments. We haven't done a Vlog on the Zoe as yet, bit busy with other things sadly

[@michaelowen7694]

@@Jamesandkate Look forward to it in due course. Keep up the good work.

[@macfast71]

Another honest review 👍.

[@robsmith1a]

The list is £23K but is it like a Zoe where you can get £6K off if you ask? Having said that I wouldn't pay more than £10K for one. Thought it looked great until you mentioned the price. I hate to say it but the petrol ones are better.

[@Jamesandkate]

I think you're right Robert. The ICE is simply financially better all round over 10 years ownership considering fuel, tax and servicing and 12k a year :-( So, as Kate said, a Zoe or Leaf

[@garethbrooks2750]

List price is £23k, however ended up paying £15k with government discount and dealer discount. I agree £23k is way to much for it And I’d never of paid it.

[@R08Tam]

That steaming up issue was quite concerning. 🤔

[@mikedelphine1216]

R08Tam ...Probably was in recirculating mode !?... and most definitely they didn’t mix with a/c! Air conditioning takes out humidity very quickly! 😏

[@excismos8056]

James and Kate are like two peas in a pod!

[@michaelgoode4104]

Love the beast.

[@alanclegg8568]

Carwow has a price of £16,000 for a new top of the range ForTwo.

[@markjennings2315]

steaming up issues? was in on recirc or something? That noise is really bad. It is almost like the drivetrain is bolted directly to the chassis with no damping or isolation and the interior is acting like a sound box, Unacceptable road noise...oh and that price!!!

[@Jamesandkate]

The owner has since been in touch and said its terrible. I think a new set of rubber should cure it.

[@jack5611]

Why the fuck do you have 7.7k subs?You deserve atleast a million

[@davidwebb4904]

I value this car at £15,000. And thats me being generous.

[@garethbrooks2750]

David Webb List price is £23k, however ended up paying £15k with government discount and dealer discount. I agree £23k is way to much for it And I’d never of paid it.

[@stevemccormack9948]

Smart was always cute as hell and a great format but way over-priced. In fact it never made sense. What a pity. They never got the price down. I have high hopes for the Microlino EV being developed in Italy which is a reinvention of the bubble car except electric. Lets see.. And then we had the Toyota IQ Electric which was sold for about 1 week as I recall. When will car makers do a feasible EV in this category?

[@stevenbarrett7648]

We've had a few petrol Smarts but never paid anything like £23k for one, love it but no thanks!

[@christill]

Steven Barrett The real price is about £16k including 22kw charging and basically all the upgrades. Actually a cheap car.

[@garethbrooks2750]

List price is £23k, however ended up paying £15k with government discount and dealer discount. I agree £23k is way to much for it And I’d never of paid it.

[@danielsciarra6869]

23k - sadly 10k of that is probably the battery pack

[@michaelsimpkins5178]

Worth half of 23k

[@Dorsetwatersofteners]

That noise st 23,000 nope.

[@davidwebb4904]

£23,000. {choke}. The Tesla Model 3 std will be around £30,000 and is ten times better than this golf cart...

[@ephphatha230]

David Webb You can buy this though.

[@markfitzpatrick6692]

David Webb when you ever get a 30,000 or 35000 model 3 let me know.

[@davidwebb4904]

Mark Fitzpatrick The Model 3 Lite should be available in six months.....@£30,000

[@tiborklein5349]

@@davidwebb4904 SHOULD BE...

[@engasser]

As with certain EVs, availability is key and certain models appear to be made of that rare earth element "unobtaineum". Even the 2018 Leaf appears to be scarce with its supposed battery supply problems.

[@plaw9999]

Too expensive, too small, too loud, rhd version can't demist driver side, apart from that it's a cracking car?