Today

Lotus Emeya sets another charging benchmark...

... if there's a charger potent enough

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You might remember that Lotus claimed a ‘record-breaking’ charge time for its Emeya executive car last summer, managing to cram electric in at a 402kW peak for a 10-80 per cent charge in 14 minutes. Not bad going at all, especially using a public charger. Now Lotus has gone better still, an Emeya accepting 443kW for a 10-80 per cent in 13:35. You might argue about the benefit of 25 seconds when taking in the entire charging faff, but fast is fast - and it’s certainly the quickest production car charge we’ve yet heard of. Given pretty much every manufacturer now makes an EV, that’s quite the claim for Lotus. 

As always, there are one or two caveats to this achievement. The 443kW was achieved at Al Ghanim, the Lotus dealer in Kuwait, using one of Lotus’s 450kW DC chargers. And there’s nothing in the photos (or a video yet) to prove the magic number. So we’ll have to take their word for it. And Lotus says 450kW chargers are being rolled out across Europe, with Germany getting them first, so in theory this could soon be repeatable by customers, even in the ‘extreme heat conditions’ witnessed at Al Ghanim. Heaven knows what a 450kW Lotus charger will cost per kilowatt hour… 

Lotus reckons the Emeya can achieve its super duper charging speeds thanks to the 800-volt system (as also seen in the latest Taycan), new cooling architecture and ‘cell-to-pack’ battery structure, which means more cells can be squeezed in the same space. The 2026MY Emeya is said to be capable of 379 miles on a charge. 

Perhaps the 443kW will be of limited relevance to customers in the UK for now, though given the current rollout of chargers perhaps there will be a chance to take full advantage soon. It certainly sounds like another string to the Emeya’s bow as a long distance GT. And the £15,000 that can currently be saved off a new one would pay for a lot of charging, at 450kW or otherwise…  

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• ‘Record-breaking’ time claimed for Lotus Emeya
  
• Revised Lotus Emeya and Eletre on sale now

[damonbill]

I see a gazillion taycans a day, ocassionally see a eletre, but I think i've only ever seen one of these on the road (in old London town too, where I imagine these would sell), Whos buying them? Are they selling but just not in the UK?

[DonkeyApple]

damonbill said:

I see a gazillion taycans a day, ocassionally see a eletre, but I think i've only ever seen one of these on the road (in old London town too, where I imagine these would sell), Whos buying them? Are they selling but just not in the UK?

I saw one in the Cotswolds the other day and I've seen a few in London but I'm not sure they've been flying off the shelf in the UK.

[kambites]

damonbill said:

I see a gazillion taycans a day, ocassionally see a eletre, but I think i've only ever seen one of these on the road (in old London town too, where I imagine these would sell), Whos buying them? Are they selling but just not in the UK?

There seems to be quite a few pottering around Hampshire. I guess I see about one a week (although they might all be the same car).

[M3_Simon_Fr]

Looks like a BYD. And probably drives likes one. Shame.

[Noe]

Not seen one of these in Japan to date but then that’s only Kyoto & Osaka area. As usual here see plenty of classics and a few evora and evira

[chirurgus]

The only one I’ve seen in Australia was in a dealership.

[highway]

A bigger story would concern how many of these have been registered in the UK.
A really big story would be the tale of a private buyer, who chose to buy one of these new, with his own money.
I’m sure PH would love to hear from such a man.

[Red_Kite]

LINO - Lotus in Name Only

[Terminator X]

This is the new 0-60, exciting times!

TX.

[Bobby Lee]

M3_Simon_Fr said:

Looks like a BYD. And probably drives likes one. Shame.

There’s a very good reason for that…

[jeremyc]

highway said:

A bigger story would concern how many of these have been registered in the UK.

HowManyLeft says that 136 of all variants have been registered so far in 2025 (31 in 2024).

[theicemario]

That is a good looking car.

[Gecko1978]

if you charge it that fast does it affect life of the battery? They are nice looking cars just not lotus looking etc. I would have sooner they badged it a Geely or a Link and Co or a Zeeker or Yang Wang or whatever the parent company has as an ev brand.

[Mike1990]

Modern day Lotus Carlton, albeit without ICE! I've seen a few at work, they are huge! but what modern car isn't these days!

[markh450]

jeremyc said:

highway said:

A bigger story would concern how many of these have been registered in the UK.

HowManyLeft says that 136 of all variants have been registered so far in 2025 (31 in 2024).

I think that how many licensed (I.e taxed) that year, so in theory 136 is the actual total number of these on the roads in the UK!

[EV8]

highway said:

A bigger story would concern how many of these have been registered in the UK.
A really big story would be the tale of a private buyer, who chose to buy one of these new, with his own money.
I m sure PH would love to hear from such a man.

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=247&t=2122307&p=22

[nismo48]

Big efficient EV for the man who's moving up

[theicemario]

jeremyc]url said:

HowManyLeft|https://www.howmanyleft.co.uk/?q=lotus+emeya&commit=Search[/url] says that 136 of all variants have been registered so far in 2025 (31 in 2024).

Not quite, but close enough.

howmanyleft said:

Last updated:
Oct 2025 (data to end of 2025 Q2)

[dvd8n]

443kW? That's amazing.

I have a hydro-electric power station near me that is estimated to power between 3,000 and 6,000 houses on average.

It ought to be able to run about 12 of those chargers.

[MyV10BarksAndBites]

Bobby Lee said:

M3_Simon_Fr said:

Looks like a BYD. And probably drives likes one. Shame.

There s a very good reason for that

Exactly... And just looks horrible... Even the big yellow one... That just looks unfinished and crap...