Zeekr 9X 2027 review: International first drive

The Zeekr 9X will be Australia’s first ultra-luxury car from China, but will it find an audience?

That’s the question I’m asking myself at the brief Chinese preview drive of the monster three-row large SUV that will top the brand’s line-up in Australia later this year.

Read More About Zeekr

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I'm keen to learn if these are ingredients for success or perhaps a bridge too far for an ambitious luxury brand with only five years of history.

First, where will it sit in the hierarchy of Australian luxury SUVs?

At a whopping 5239mm long and with a wheelbase of more than three meters, the 9X is an imposing beast of a car, something rammed home by its expansive bodywork, huge chrome grille and boxy roofline.

It also has three rows of seating, putting it up against the Audi Q7 ($108,815) at one end of the price spectrum, or the full-size Range Rover (which you need to spend at least $321,000 to get three rows of seats) at the other.

Of course, its enormity and grandiose styling would have Zeekr wanting you to think it’s more akin to something like the Bentley Bentayga (from a cool $412,600) or Rolls Royce Cullinian, which will leave you little change from a million dollars.

The 9X, meanwhile, starts from the equivalent of A$95,400 in its Chinese home market, suggesting a starting price a bit over $100,000, perhaps even north of $120,000 by the time it lands locally.

Zeekr also takes the 9X in a completely different direction from its aforementioned segment rivals, which are powered by everything from 2.0-litre four-cylinder diesels to 6.7-litre V12s, instead offering a dual- or tri-motor plug-in hybrid system, backed by a 2.0-litre turbo petrol engine and a massive battery pack.

The result is either 660kW/935Nm of combined power for the base two variants, or 1030kW/1410Nm for the top-spec car, as well as between 300 and 380km of fully electric driving range without even needing the engine.

The all important 0-100km/h sprint time? As low as 3.1 seconds. Not bad for a three-tonne SUV.

Like I said in my review of its smaller Zeekr 8X sibling, it’s just so much car, even at more than $100k.

Every version of the 9X offered in China gets air suspension and a 900-volt architecture, allowing the battery to be charged in nine minutes on a fast enough DC pylon.

Every version is clad in lavish full Nappa leather trim and there’s even active noise cancellation.

Inside feels impressive, too. The 9X gets a different cabin layout and even a unique steering wheel from the rest of the Zeekr range, befitting its flagship role.

Space is gratuitous in all three seating rows, with the third row perhaps surprising me the most. Having spent a decent amount of time in the third row of a Zeekr 009 people mover as part of this same trip, it’s worth asking if you need something this large when the 009 people mover offers a slightly better third row and is fully electric at an equivalent (or perhaps slightly cheaper) price.

Still, there are so many luxuries in all three rows. Everything is electrically adjustable, heats, cools and massages you, and there’s shades for all the windows.

To top a swish interior off, despite the fact that I fit in all positions at 182cm tall, there’s still 470 litres of boot capacity, and it even has a super suave split tailgate like an old Range Rover. Awesome.

Vehicle to load (V2L)? Yep, got that. Full-size power outlet in the cabin? Got that too. Of course, the list of safety kit is exhaustive, but it remains to be seen if the Australian-spec version will also be exhaustive.

You don’t want for included kit then, but how does this monolith of an SUV drive?

Shock and awe is the answer. A 0-100km/h acceleration test was an expletive-laden experience, with the huge, circa-three-tonne SUV leaning back on its haunches and hurtling forward with terrifying alacrity. It is one of the most intense bouts of acceleration I have experienced in recent memory.

The body certainly feels its dimensions when rounding a corner, and interestingly the steering feels a bit more detached than that of the 8X.

The 9X stayed surprisingly composed and rode relatively flat during the 'moose test' part of the exercise set up for us during our brief test drive, no matter how unwieldy it looked from outside. Clearly, the air suspension does a lot of dynamic heavy lifting.

The enormous monoblock-style wheels transmitted a noticeable amount of thud to the cabin before the adaptive suspension wised up to the speed bump test we subjected it to.

But just like the 8X below it, the sheer weight and size of the 9X appears to be its primary drawback. There’s only so much suspension magic that can make up for the sheer density on offer here, and I can’t imagine it’s going to be easy to reliably find 5.2-meter-plus parking spots for such a car in the centre of the city.