It feels like automotive model cycles are lasting longer than ever before, which means that the mid-life facelift is a critical thing to keep customers interested in a car that’s been on sale for three, four, five, or even more years. However, sometimes a facelift can only do so much. Take the BMW iX, for example. It’s getting tweaked styling, a new entry-level trim, and updated powertrain options for the 2026 model year but I can’t tell whether visually, it’s an improvement or not.
Let’s start by talking about powertrains, starting with the new BMW iX xDrive45, because it seems the most promising. With a 100.1 kWh battery pack and a combined output of 402 horsepower and 516 lb.-ft. of torque, it promises 312 miles of range and a starting price of $76,325, which is three more miles of range than last year’s iX xDrive50 for $12,100 less. Sure, it gives up 114 horsepower over the xDrive50, but it still scoots from zero-to-60 mph in just under five seconds. That’s definitely not slow.
For 2026, the xDrive60 replaces the old xDrive50, adding all of 20 horsepower for a total of 536. It also features a boost in range to 340 miles, and while an extra 31 miles of range thanks to new batteries and silicon carbide inverters shared with the rest of the iX range is certainly nice, you can’t help but get the feeling that the bigger number on the trunk is primarily a marketing exercise.
However, the new xDrive60 would get a bit confusing if it were sold alongside the 2025 iX M60 xDrive, so the M-lite trim for 2026 is now the M70 xDrive, which gets an extra 40 horsepower over the old M60 xDrive yet isn’t officially quicker. Strange, but considering it costs the same as the old M60 xDrive, not the end of the world. Come to think of it, the updated M Sport styling might be more of a turnoff than a bigger number with identical claimed acceleration times, especially on the M70 xDrive with its unique grille.
Let’s jump back the standard BMW iX xDrive45 and xDrive60 for a second, because these variants have changed the least visually over last year’s iX xDrive50. BMW’s gone with the old Sport trim bits, added a new set of faux-grilles and painted almost all the vulgar shiny black plastic trim on the lower parts of the body to match the paint color, and that’s about it other than the new headlights all 2026 iX crossovers get. In this case, painting shiny black trim body color is good and the new faux grilles look less busy, although the new illuminated grille option seems particularly tasteless.
However, these models are also available with an M Sport package, and that’s where things start to go off the rails a little bit by falling into the same trope as other new BMWs, the one where it looks like the bumpers were designed by people who’d never seen the whole car before. Sure, the lines off the front air curtains pinch the headlights, and the butt-chinned grille with a huge KitKat-shaped black plastic slab above it isn’t great, but the busy rear bumper definitely seems like a downgrade over standard. With the M Sport Package, the iX still isn’t the worst-looking BMW launched in the past few years, but what is that really saying?
Of course, questionable bumpers aren’t the only new additions for the new M Sport package. One thing that actually seems worth the money is a set of front sport seats with adjustable bolsters and adjustable thigh support, especially since they look great for skinnier drivers who might find themselves flopping around in the standard seats. The M Sport package also features a circular steering wheel which sounds nice, shiny black plastic on the center console which doesn’t sound so nice, and available 23-inch wheels which sound detrimental to comfort.
It’s worth noting that minor updates like this won’t alleviate some of the fundamental annoyances on the BMW iX. The hatch opening is weirdly small due to a set of concealed second taillights, the surfacing of the quarter panels and fenders isn’t great, and the giant faux grilles are controversial to say the least. Still, if you can get past that, the iX does seem improved on paper for 2026. Maybe stick with the cheapest one, though.
(Photo credits: BMW)
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It’s like someone slapping you in the face, but now they’re wearing a thin glove while they’re doing it. Like, yeah, I guess, technically that would be a little bit better than just doing it bare-handed.
BMW bravely proving that just because a car is expensive, doesn’t mean it has to look good too
It’s only saving grace is not having fallen victim to the “separate eyebrows and headlights” stupid trend, but otherwise it’s still the same incredibly ugly molerat-looking car.
God that thing is ugly
I miss understanding what it was BMW were doing.
They don’t know either
So that’s who Jaguar copied it from!
Are they doing all of this just to fuck with us? This styling debacle has been going on for so long now that I think they’re just fucking with us at this point. Like, “haha, look how pissed off everyone is, haha!”
I’m not one to normally engage in conspiracy theories but has anyone ever seen a tan iX and a naked mole rat in the same place at the same time?
Kinda makes a fellow wonder.
Still looks like the Buc-ee’s mascot. Part of the tragedy of the iX is that a lot of the small details and surfacing are really well done. Even by BMW standards all the finishing is really good; swear they gave these better than typical paint and yet they’re butt ugly because the sum of the parts add up to this oddly misshapen conspicuous-non-consumption-mobile. It’s like BMW is stuck in 2012 where marketing folks thought (rightly too-based on success of the Prius) that the only way to sell green vehicles was to appeal to virtue signaling greenies.
Still looks like a pig
23″ wheels. I wonder what a set of hakkapeliittas goes for at that scale? My wallet cries…..
Also, don’t fall for the frog soup. This face looks even worse. Familiar this time around, but steadily worse.
I’m getting used to the new designs, but I’m still not a fan. The 3 series still looks good after it’s 2025 refresh. I was shocked it kept the small grill, but maybe it’s so it doesn’t look exactly the same as the 4 series. At least BMW is out there with some really great colors.
So… I have a ’23 iX M60. I know it’s the cool-ade, but the looks do grow on you, and it’s a fantastic car. The new “entry level” actually sounds like a great improvement (it’s cheaper). I would never opt for the 23″ wheels. IMHO the appeal of this car is quiet comfort (I opted for 21″).
I would love David’s take on this car as IMHO it’s the spiritual successor to the i3 he so dearly loves.
I said this elsewhere having seen a fair number on the road here in the Seattle area the iX has a lot of really great thoughtful details and micro design when you see it in person it is very nicely crafted and even as someone who doesn’t love the overall look I appreciate how well done it is if that makes sense? Also it seems like it has a truly nice interior that’s trying to move away from “the way it’s always been done”?
Interior is nice, but the outside just screams ‘GMC Terrain’ to me in a bad way. From the square arches to the fake black strip on the D-pillar and the ‘saggy butt’ rear tailgate, it’s full of design mishaps.
https://i.imgur.com/spBcJ8P.png
To be fair-I think GMC ripped off that D pillar treatment from BMW? But I could be remembering wrong on who first tried that. Like don’t get me wrong I am not a huge fan of the shape or overall looks-but it has a lot of nice details and I do think the surfacing is really nice. It doesn’t show in photos but when you see one in person close up it “feels” expensive imo, even if the overall effect is less than the sum of its parts when you zoom out.
That second gen Terrain came out in 2018, the iX concept was shown in 2019 with a 2021 release date on the production car. The ‘floating pillar’ has been a disaster ever since Nissan and Lexus did it around 2015. I don’t doubt that the surfacing on the iX is generally nice as I’ve heard others say it as well, I just think that the rest of the car is covered in such trite design cliches and compromises that it undermines any semblance of uniqueness it might have otherwise had. Personally I think the Genesis cars show a lot more nuance and attention to detail even if some of their decisions are a bit over-the-top.
Whaaaaaat?
I actually believe this. It’s a dedicated EV platform. It uses a fair amount of CFRP (carbon fiber reinforced plastic). They both seem a bit more concepty than the mainstream BMW lineup (especially the interiors)…
Yeah, I can’t tell whether this new shade of lipstick complements the pig’s eyes better either. It always seemed like a summer pig, and this still feels a little too autumn-y to me.
Putting those flat plane scallops around the wheel arches makes it look like every other cheap looking CUV. They have never been a good feature. And the rest of the thing.. I wonder how much better it would be if the kidneys were shrunk back to the size of the good old days.
No, it’s still bad. Somehow even more overwrought. And WTF is with that back end? Oh, I get it. They added a Mini Trunk Extender.
It’s awful. The outside is a crime and the inside looks like the old red booths at the Shoney’s. It’s a shame they can’t make a single car that doesn’t look absolutely terrible.
I will regrettably admit that BMW has beaten me with their current styling so much that I’m battered to the point that I no longer have a visceral reaction when I see the buck toothed shit in the wild. Is any of it GOOD? Of course not, but I’ve been subjected to so much of it at this point that I’m more or less indifferent. I occasionally see the current M3 in one of its better colors and am like “I could live with that, but I’d feel the need to explain myself to everyone so it would eventually become a drag”.
That being said, it’s still god awful…and I’ve never understood why 21st century BMW needs to go through these cycles of looking elegant, offering the most over-styled, busy designs on the road, then shifting back again. I’ve heard it described as troll design language and I honestly think that’s what it is.
BMW understands that bad attention is better than no attention, and every few years they decide to try to see how far they can take their ludicrous designs before people stop buying them. Unfortunately they haven’t reached that limit, because they’re doing incredibly well when it comes to sales. They understand that their most consistent customers are the conspicuous consumption crowd…and that that crowd will stretch their budget to the absolute limit in order to be able to afford to lease shit like this.
I don’t have the numbers in front of me but I’d imagine that posers leasing BMWs they can’t afford to flex/post about them probably make up half of their sales or more at this point…and for a while they’d lease iXs for $6-800 a month! I hate to say it, but it’s a great deal. You can roll around in a gaudy consumptionmobile for less than the cost of the average car payment if you can manage to save enough for the downpayment.
Anyway, this shit, the light up grilles (which look patently absurd in person), the superfluous M badges, etc. are what those people want and I can’t blame BMW for giving it to them. I don’t have to like it, and as a lifelong BMW fan (I remember my uncle letting me help him work on his E30 3 Series when I was a kiddo) it pains me to see how far they’ve fallen since they were primarily a company for enthusiasts.
But at the end of the day they know we aren’t good for the money and there aren’t very many of us. We’d rather wait and be the second or third owners after an M car comes off a lease, or even later. The social media addicted young-ish people who just got their first $85,000 salary and middle/lower management title will come in and lease the gaudiest thing on the lot that they can afford every 2-3 years. They’re good for the money, and they’re willing to live off ramen to afford their light up grilles.
A good example of that which has stuck with me was the enormous light-up 3-point star in a Mercedes: you could have it light up if you were willing to give up the safety sensors that would otherwise be behind the star.
Form over function all the way, baby!
If you want to laugh even harder pay attention to what models and trims those are on. You’re never going to see one on an S Class, AMG, etc. It’s always on lease spec entry level shit like the GLA, CLA 250, etc. Super cool, dude. You got a $499 a month white over black turbo 4 cylinder, front wheel drive, vinyl interior crossover. BIG FLEX!
I still kinda chuckle because I do remember it was on entry-level ones.
‘Yep: they sure saw YOU coming!’
Angry beaver. Maybe pissed off beaver.
Maybe the BMW drivers like them because all that face says is “get the hell out of my way”.
One more reason to never own a BMW.
I’ve gone with “beaver going through a messy divorce” in the past.
I like Haughty Beaver
Maybe the BMW drivers like them because all that face says is “get the hell out of my way”.
So don’t. Point and laugh instead.
Every time one drives past me I feel violated. That is not an improvement.
Better? Yes.
Good? No.
It’s still fucking terrible to look at
It’s too damn early to be reading an article with BMW model names.
Seriously. My eyes glazed over at some point while reading, through no fault of Thomas’s.
I hate alphanumeric code-based names so much.
Yeah, they should give this an actual name so we know what it it.
I suggest “Pixelated Dogshit Dipped In Glitter”.
I mean, I don’t feel that strongly about their appearances, but you make a good point.
I just really miss the handsome cars with nice engines that were fun to drive.
Dear BMW.
No.
Sincerely, everyone.
*Insert gif of Gary Oldman screaming “EVERYONE”*
I no longer experience a visceral reaction when sighting a Beavertooth BMW, thankfully. This does seem to look a bit better, but I wonder if that’s partly due to the wide plate across it?
Looks like the pigs from Angry Birds.