BMW pulled off the casing of the exterior of its first electric sedan, the i4, after teasing a true successor to the i3 EV years ago. The i4 will be on its way by the end of the year – ahead of schedule, the company says – and BMW said on Wednesday it will also offer an M Performance model.
The German carmaker showed off the i4 at an annual business conference before a full outline of what the electric car could do in the coming weeks. For now, BMW has only shared a few specs. The company said the i4 will be available in different configurations, with a maximum range of about 300 kilometers and a power of about 390kW (about 530 horsepower) delivered from one car.
This is all in line with what BMW set out in the draft version of the i4, which broke the cover last year at the digital Geneva Motor Show in 2020. If the production i4 really closely follows the draft version, you should also expect it to powered by an 80kWh battery pack. As for the interior, we already know it will use the new version of BMW’s iDrive software and infotainment platform unveiled earlier this week. This is far from the first pseudo-attempt of an electric car a decade ago with the small Active-E pilot program.
At Wednesday’s conference, BMW also outlined more of its plan to move its vehicles to electric drivetrains. The company said it would sell at least one fully electric vehicle in 90 percent of the markets by 2023 and deliver 2 million motor vehicles by 2025. The number of motor vehicles he sells is expected to grow by about 20 percent annually. 2025 and 2030. At that point, BMW says that half of all new vehicles it sells will be fully electric.
This is a much more optimistic view of the popularity of EVs than BMW has offered before, especially since it has spent years with the i3 as the only fully electric car on the market. The i4 will be a flagship of the company’s renewed motor vehicles, although BMW has already released the iX3 SUV in Europe and China. That said, it is still a less aggressive strategy than other carmakers are pursuing, especially given the increasing number of proposed bans on new motor vehicles.