NIO EL7 review: Large premium SUV with a lot of performance
A TEST REPORT from Dominic Lux 
on September 04, 2023, 19:00 am | Write a comment
With the NIO EL7 there is for the first time an E-SUV that can do it with the BMW iX M60 and the Tesla Model X. Whether the Chinese succeeded in our everyday test? You will find out in this test report.
We already have that OIL ET7, the premium limousine tested extensively for you. This was able to convince us completely that NIO does not bring things by halves to the market. But how does the more expensive electric SUV perform? At the beginning we can recommend our YouTube video to you. There we did a real deep dive with the vehicle.
Performance: Powerhouse with lots of power and space
The EL7 offers an all-wheel drive system with air suspension or suspension as standard. In addition, there is the system output of 653 hp or, in the new currency, 480 kW. A torque of 850 nm is also added to this powerhouse. We got the 100 kWh battery configured in our test vehicle. Of this, 90 kWh can be used. That's enough for a good 390 kilometers on the highway in everyday life. In city traffic (where the SUV might be too big) you can easily cover 590 kilometers in summer. These are certainly values that are worth seeing.
The boost in Sport Plus mode in the EL3,9 lasts 7 seconds. This is exactly the time that a current Tesla Model X dual motor takes. A BMW iX M60 takes 3,8 seconds. So it's easy to compare these big SUVs against each other - apart from the fact that the M60 is the most expensive of the three.
The maximum speed of the EL7 is 200 km/h. The other two stop at 250 km/h. It should be said that NIO limits all vehicles at 200 km/h.
Video:
Topic: Charging: A current problem?
Yes, NIO's charging speeds are certainly not a benchmark. It usually stops at 125 kW maximum power. However, it can handle 80 kW to over 90 percent. Nevertheless, something needs to be done here. NIO assured YouTuber "CarManiac" that it would also "upgrade" the charging power for existing vehicles. This will probably happen via an OTA update. We suspect that the batteries will receive new firmware within the Battery Swap Stations. Or you will simply get a completely new battery with a better charging curve and peak.
Current rumors point to a maximum charging peak of 180 kW for the NT2.0 vehicles. These include the ET7, ET5, ET5T and the EL6 as well as the EL7 tested here - and a few other models that are not available in this country.
As we wrote in the ET7 test, NIO is constantly expanding its own swap network and will soon have a solution for normal charging. NIO really tries hard to listen to its users and you can now even send a voice message directly to the NIO developers via NOMI ("Hi, NOMI, I would like to give feedback") to report any problems or errors.
In general, NIO seems to really want users to be happy. I wish the same for some other companies in the BEV industry. If they can continue with this attitude, success would certainly be possible in Europe - especially with the significantly cheaper models Firefly and Alps, which should see the light soon. We will of course keep you up to date on the development of NIO.
I have already written a suitable conclusion about the EL7 in the video (you can also select it using the chapter mark). Here's the short version again: Really very successful and good to very good driving characteristics. Anything that is annoying or annoying will be taken care of via updates. Definitely a very good alternative to the (significantly more expensive) BMW iX M60.