BYD Dolphin vs Jaecoo J7

What's the difference?

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BYD Dolphin
BYD Dolphin

2024 price

Jaecoo J7
Jaecoo J7

$31,990 - $45,990

2025 price

Summary

2024 BYD Dolphin
2025 Jaecoo J7
Safety Rating

Engine Type
Not Applicable, 0.0L

Inline 4, 1.6L
Fuel Type
Electric

Premium Unleaded Petrol
Fuel Efficiency
0.0L/100km (combined)

7.0L/100km (combined)
Seating
5

5
Dislikes
  • 7.0kW AC charging
  • Not as big on the inside as some rivals
  • Occasionally overzealous active safety

  • Average driving experience
  • Lack of physical buttons inside
  • No spare for the PHEV
2024 BYD Dolphin Summary

It’s about time for a change. Since the beginning of the EV era, Tesla has been the dominant name, and not without good reason.

Tesla made electric cars popular, cool, and above all, accessible. To this day, the Model 3 and Model Y remain excellent purchases in their respective categories.

And yet, the tide seems to be turning. Many buyers haven't been thrilled by Elon Musk's antics, how popular the Tesla brand has become or maybe they never liked the look and feel of Tesla to begin with.

For those prospective EV buyers, it looks like BYD is set to be the next big thing in electric cars.

Offered at a far more accessible price-point, the Chinese brand still stands out with its distinctively styled vehicles and innovative features.

And the new car we’re looking at for this review, the Dolphin hatchback, could be the one to elevate the brand to the levels of popularity and recognition Tesla currently enjoys.

At the time of writing, it was also the most affordable electric car you can buy in Australia. But is it more than that? Read on to find out.

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2025 Jaecoo J7 Summary

Yep, it’s yet another new brand. And, yes, it’s from China.

You can be forgiven for not keeping up with the influx of new car brands in recent years, even as a professional I can find it challenging at times. But that’s why we’re here, to help you determine which brands to pay attention to and which ones you can probably ignore.

So which one is Jaecoo?

Well, the good news for the brand is that it comes from one of China’s biggest and most successful car companies, Chery, which has been a leading exporter for more than two decades, so it has a reasonable understanding of international markets.

Jaecoo is designed to be a separate, stand-alone brand from Chery, and in Australia will be sold at specific Omoda-Jaecoo dealerships (as the Omoda 5 is also spun-off into yet another ‘new’ brand). The Jaecoo J7 we’re driving here is its first model, a mid-size SUV that will compete directly against the likes of the BYD Sealion 6, Toyota RAV4, Hyundai Tucson and more.

Because despite management referring to Jaecoo as a “luxury” brand and calling the J7 a “premium SUV” that’s all within the context of the Chery universe. Jaecoo is simply a more premium alternative to Chery, not a true luxury brand that will challenge the likes of Lexus, Mercedes-Benz and the rest on quality and, as you’ll soon see, price.

We’ve already sampled the entry-level J7 2WD but now we’re getting to experience the 4WD and range-topping SHS, which stands for Super Hybrid System, but is better known as a plug-in hybrid. The SHS is the model we spent the most time in and that’s what we’ll focus on in this review.

Chery/Jaecoo executives say that what it calls ‘new elites’ - people that are “moving up in the world” and are looking for a “fashionable” and “cool” car - are the target market. But as we’ll explain, the market for the J7 is likely to be much broader than just the fashionable elite and cool kids.

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Deep dive comparison

2024 BYD Dolphin 2025 Jaecoo J7

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