I recently had the chance to drive the new 2024 BMW X5 xDrive50e, which is a plug-in hybrid with a better-than-most 39 miles of pure electric range. This is a vehicle you can use as a not-so-slow EV for around-town chores and a stonkingly fast SUV everywhere else. Technically, you can use it as a fast SUV for running errands in your local town if you’d like to draw the ire of your neighbors and the attention of the law.
It’s also a hybrid, albeit one with a ton of power. What’s curious here is that this car performs like three different vehicles and I’m quite enamored with two out of three of them and a little unenthused by the third.
Is a car that gives you one good extra optional mode a car that’s 50% better or, if you only like 2/3rds are you getting 33% less car? I guess it depends on how you look at it.
The Basics
This specific BMW X5 is the much-revised plug-in hybrid with an inline-six.
- As-tested price: $86,695
- Powertrain: 3.0-liter turbocharged inline-six.
- Transmission: Eight-speed automatic with integral AC motor.
- Combined power: 483 hp/516 lb.-ft. of torque
- Battery: 19.2 kWh lithium-ion
- PHEV Range: 39 miles of EV-only range
- MPG: 58 MPGe/22 MPG gas only
- Craziest Option: $900 for an illuminated grille
- Best Option: $950 for the 21-inch M Wheels
It’s A Surprisingly Good Electric SUV
If you want an electric SUV all the time you should buy an electric SUV like the BMW iX or, if you plan to spend a little less, a Kia EV9 or MachE. Perhaps you don’t want an electric SUV all the time? May I suggest that what you want is an electric car that’s good for the environment 60% of the time and a big fast SUV that feels like it single-handedly could bring about the apocalypse for that other 40%.
It’s a good idea for a certain kind of person. Too many PHEVs lack range and are, therefore, the wrong kind of compromise. I think there are definitely people who want to plug in something every 20 miles and I also think I am not one of those people.
With an upgraded battery pack, the new X5 xDrive50e (I don’t get why BMW names its cars this way, either) is now creeping towards the magic 40 miles of range, which is about what I think a car needs, at minimum, to be competitive. This is close to the RAV4 PHEV, which is the gold standard in those vehicles in the North American market.
Even better, the motor in the X5 is way more potent, producing 194 horsepower, or about 83 horsepower more than the outgoing PHEV X5. With that much power, the X5 feels more like a normal electric car in regular suburban driving than a RAV4 Prime or Volvo S60 Recharge. It’s even more juice than the Mazda CX-70 PHEV and will carry the BMW X5 above 80 mph if you want to drain the battery as fast as you can.
You won’t win any stoplight races against a Model Y Performance, but you also won’t feel like the car is holding anything back. If you can plug your X5 in at home or at work you’ll probably never even think about it as it’s the rare PHEV these days that doesn’t pay much of a penalty in EV-only mode.
It’s An Outrageously Fast SUV
This isn’t even the fastest BMW X5 you can buy as there are numerous faster versions, stretching from the twin-turbo V8-powered M60i xDrive up to, eventually, the BMW X5M Competition. All luxury automakers seem to love making ever more monstrously powerful SUVs, almost all of which are big gas guzzlers.
The thing is… the PHEV is almost as fast as the V8 version. According to BMW, the xDrive50e will get to 60 mph from a standstill in just 4.6 seconds. Compare that to the X5 m60i, which will get to 60 mph in 4.2 seconds. These are big heavy vehicles and anything faster than about 5 seconds feels more than fast enough.
I also love the way the motor provides torque, deploying it in a way that the company calls “a pre-gearing stage,” which it describes as:
A pre-gearing stage is used to increase the effective torque produced by the electric motor to a maximum 331 lb-ft at the transmission input for the motor. In this way, the compact electric motor is able to provide the sort of torque boost that could normally only be achieved using a far larger and heavier unit.
In ‘Sport’ mode you get the benefit of both the electric motor and the twin-turbo inline-six with a system tuned towards always giving you as much power as you need, then adding 15 percent. Do you want to go fast from 0-100 mph? 50-70 mph? 17.984 mph to 56.980 mph? There’s no legal speed where you’ll ever find the X5 in this trim panting.
Obviously, Sport mode brings it with the usual more aggressive shifting, tighter steering, and stiffened suspension. While all of this feels much better than the car in slow, EV mode, it’s not the sharpest-handling SUV BMW has ever produced. Blame the lack of active dampers, I suppose, though if you want a corner-carver I don’t know why you buy an SUV in the first place.
It’s A Totally Average Hybrid
Here’s the funny thing: I own a hybrid and I own an old BMW. Is this the ideal combination of both? Not quite. My hybrid doesn’t have an EV-only mode so, in that way, the BMW X5 is a superior electric car. I’d even argue that, though being a couple of miles short, the X5 makes a better EV than everyone’s favorite RAV4 Prime.
Obviously, the X5 in this trim is faster than just about any five-door PHEV currently for sale. Certainly, no RAV4 or even a Volvo XC60 Recharge are going to come close to keeping up with an X5 driver if an X5 driver has made the conscious decision to quickly be anywhere else.
What I found most strange in driving this car is that it didn’t feel all that great as a hybrid. The ideal way to drive this car if you’re not going to plug it in all the time is in HYBRID ECO mode, which allows the SUV to determine when it’s most efficient to be an EV and when it’s better to provide assistance from the inline-six.
In Sport mode the X5 is also a hybrid, it’s just one that wants to have fun. In HYBRID ECO it’s not as good at being a hybrid as my CR-V. It’s a little too noticeable when it shifts between modes, which it does often, and throttle response/performance is a little unpredictable. I’m sure after 1,000 miles you’ll get used to it, but given how good the vehicle is in other modes it was a surprise to me that the mode most likely to be used was the one that I liked the least.
How Does It Compare To My BMW?
This BMW is just a hair over 20 years newer than the BMW I own, which is a 2003 BMW 530i Sport. I spent $3,000 on my very high-mileage car and even that, I think, was a steal. I love it, though some of that love might be due to the fact that nothing serious has broken on it and I haven’t had to make any real hard decisions yet.
A new car brings great ease and, while the X5 and 5-Series aren’t precisely competitive, the price differential is interesting to me and I like to think about what a sporting luxury car has become in the ensuing years.
You’re immediately struck by how much stuff there is in the newer BMW when you sit in them back-to-back. My 530i Sport was quite well-optioned at the time and the list of things the new BMW can do is longer than my entire options list. The E39 cannot control itself in highway traffic (Active Driving Assistance Pro), the grille doesn’t light up, it only has two zones of climate control as opposed to four, there’s no air suspension, its all-EV range is 0 miles, and there’s no HUD.
Both feel like BMWs and, for all the whinging about the outside of Munich’s latest creations, the interiors are some of the best in the world. The $750 for the multi-contour seats means you can adjust the support in roughly 9,000 different ways in the new car achieving a level of comfort typically reserved for Tsars. My old BMW has something broken in the seat so only the right half reclines, meaning that hitting the button causes your whole body to twist like the passenger just said something super interesting and you’re desperate to hear.
Would I trade my BMW for this one? Not necessarily.
For the extra $86,000 you get a safer, faster, more comfortable, and bigger car. You get all that but you don’t get a five-speed manual transmission. You get brutal speed, but you don’t get spryness. You get a lot of screens to distract you from driving, but you don’t get the feeling that the drive is exactly the distraction you need to survive another day.
I’d trade it for my CR-V, though, because I’m not crazy.
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“X5 xDrive50e”
May I also interest you in the new
X34BZ4XE29XXXE67BUSYFORX2E?
Ever since the Bangle-butt, BMW’s design has been the usual beautiful skin parched by huge pus-filled boils. They get bigger and bigger, then pop, then the skin heals, to the point of almost forgetting that they ever existed, the skin reaches near perfection, till the next time.
Beaver-tooth pink socks Domango nutjob is going to RR, which is good, but the healing of the current insanities will apparently not start till 2026 at the least.
In the meantime, the brand that used to make the most beautiful dashboards this side of an MK4 Supra, keeps throwing rectangular tablets with 80’s Lansay video game graphcs at the dashboard to see if they stick, and delights in ads where a monstruosity says “OK Boomer” to a V12 E38.
A sad affair. I’ll always wonder if these skin infections are a seasonal flair-up, or the sign of a deeper infection.
Hey, that seat twisting issue in your E39 is an easy fix. Over time, the cable sheath swells until it pulls the end of the cable out of the motor.
Unclip the cable from where it goes into the motor, the heat up the metal grommet with a lighter until the sheath softens. Pull off the sheath with a pair or pliers. Next, cut off about 1/2” of the sheath. Put the grommet back in place. Re-insert the cable into the motor. The seat twisting issue issue should now be fixed.
I’ve driven every base x5 and I useto hate admitting how much I love them. We seriously considered the plug in hybrid x5 instead of the hybrid Sorento she ended up with. We loved how it drove. It was really just the price that kept us away.
Wife has the ’24 Mercedes GLE450e PHEV. The BMW drove better, no doubt. But, the (local at least) BMW dealers still think it’s ’22 and can charge MSRP or more and skimp on trade-in’s… Both BMW and Mercedes each had 2-3 of these on their lots and the BMW shop was like “best we can do is sticker plus our “protection package,” sorry.”
They were within $1k of each other in price. Wife preferred the BMW (less jerky and that inline 6 smooth power!). Went to Mercedes, got $7k more for her PHEV van trade and reasonable $$$ off the new Merc.
It’s quite nice inside (better dash with actual buttons, but stupid haptic thumb controls on wheel), better rear leg room for the kids, has a level 3 charge port (only used once) and averages 52-58 miles of electric range a day. BUT, it ambles down the road, is inconsistent in brake feel and has a 4-cyl turbo that, albeit infrequently since she’s mostly in e-mode, vibrates.
TL:DR – BMW drove better; dealer(s) worse. Mercedes choice saved $12k.
I have an X5 M50i which is the twin turbo V8, it is stupid fast but that’s about it over this maybe .5 second to 60, if they had one of these on the lot instead it would have mad much more sense for me at the sameish price. Should have held out and waited but whatever another dumb decision in a long line of dumb car decisions for me.
I’d love for this to be my wife’s next car, but 80k+. Whew, that’s crazy expensive.
I thought about one of these when they still qualified for the tax credit, but so was anyone else who realized they could be had basically at a discount compared to the regular X5. So pickings were slim.
The post-EV range fuel economy was a bummer though.
Not sure which one is the riskier buy for long-term reliability, the X5 or the XC90 PHEV.
I have a XC90 T8 (PHEV) With the P* tune and it sounds very similar. I can get 36 miles of EV range which is fine most of the time. In Polestar mode it is wicked fast for a 7 seater (and handles decently well with the air suspension dropped down). And the hybrid mode is fine (although I do like putting a destination into google maps that is say 100 miles away and the system will use the battery to maximize efficiency along the route, that’s pretty slick).
Current averaging 62 MPG over 12,000 miles. Would have loved to cross shop the X5 PHEV but we were dead set on a 3rd row.
Not exactly. Leave it in gear and crank the starter repeatedly (and disable any safety interlock that might exist – my manual transmission cars were all built long before that nonsense), and you should get at least 100 feet out of a fully charged battery. Maybe more with the lights off.
LOOOOL. Fair point.
I did that with my Toyota Corolla to get around the driveway,the range was not impressive.
The BMW seat twist is usually pretty easy to fix. It’s usually the insulation around the cable stretches, and needs to be cut back
Good to know!
The X5 is the only Bimmer I can think of where every generation is a banger styling wise. Most consistently good looking BMW award goes to the X5.
I don’t think this is the right way to think about PHEVs – and honestly it kind of brings the whole public charging discussion into play for them, which is to say it’s basically unimportant. Plug them in at night and get your “free” 20-50 miles.
If you’re driving further than that every day, and/or can’t charge at work, it just depends on preference – an EV will go the entire way electrically, a hybrid you don’t have to worry about charging and probably will cost you less, and a PHEV can do all of the above with some compromises and probably a higher price tag. If you can’t charge at all at home, or work, a PHEV seems like the worst of all worlds.
For many people, that range is sufficient to cover most commuting / driving. But you don’t need to cover ALL your driving on battery – just take what it gives you. Public AC charging is good when it’s available, but unless it’s at work or really fast (and your PHEV can charge that fast), it’s really just a nice to have.
Like, I always try to plug in our RAV4 Prime when possible – but (1) unless it’s free, it’s probably going to be more expensive to charge than at home, and (2) it can only charge at 3.3kw – so about 10miles/hr. So depending on whatever we’re doing…we’re probably getting 5-20 miles. Anything 6.6kw or better starts to get more appealing, but to me at least, it still falls more into the nice to have category.
I’m with you. I think pushing 40 is fine, and probably even excessive really. More than 40 in a plug-in isn’t necessary unless there’s other reasons for having a battery that big (this nearly 20kwh battery would be great in a pickup or van to run tools on a job-site, for example). If your commute is 41 miles round trip, then you use a tiny amount of gas every day – who cares? Worse is to lug around (and pay) for a battery that can get you 40 miles when you only drive 20.
XSE Primes do have 6.6 kwh charging capabilities. Hope you like your Prime, I’m deeply enamored with mine. About half the price of the beemer, lighter by about 1000 pounds, but slower 0 to 60 by about one second. I’ll take the Toyota reliability all day. I’m at 93 empg with ev range in mid forties. What’s gas?
Yeah, 6.6 is much more manageable. It doesn’t make a huge difference for us overall, but on the occasion where we can publicly level 2 charge, it’s a pretty big difference.
We love the Prime…it’s a great vehicle.
22 MPG is really bad, and that is presumably not in Sport mode.
My dad has put about 12,000 miles on his and it’s averaged about 40 MPG with everything factored in. I feel like the EPA system doesn’t know how to rate PHEVs when it comes to MPG.
That’s 22 MPG if you never plug it in, which is what my old BMW gets in spite of weighing a lot less. I’m guessing most people who are smart about plugging in will do much better than 30 MPG.
My wife has a ’22 — according to the computer, we have averaged 67 MPG over the lifetime of the vehicle. Plugging in for the win.
It weighs 5,473 lbs, which is the same as a Tahoe with the diesel. WTF BMW?
Complicate and add weight. Ze German way.
This is so true – the new BMWs weigh way more than they should – all the X5s and the 5-series are fat pigs. It is a shame. I would expect this car to be more like 5,000 lbs and the regular 4,500 lbs.
My dad has one of these that I helped him order. He’s an architect so he has very specific taste and it was easier to just order one than try to find the unicorn he was looking for. Anyway it rules. It’s one of the best all around cars I’ve ever experienced.
Edit: also those 4.6 seconds to 60 are German seconds. Folks are clocking these in the high 3s in the real world.
I am zero-percent surprised. I’m sure BMW doesn’t want the car to be faster than the V8…
There are very, very few of these floating around on BMW lots – you will probably have to order one or find one at the “port” that would otherwise be going overseas. How has maintenance and repairs gone for your father – there was a bunch of pattern failures reported early on on some of the blogs?
Does the comfort access key work as it is supposed to, the non-PHEV X5 I rented earlier this year the key worked half the time without issue, this was a blogger complaint that I experienced.