MG Im5 vs Ford Mustang

What's the difference?

Yep, it’s like deja vu all over again! Yet another fresh name in the Aussie new-car market, but this time in the form of a sub-brand from a carmaker that itself feels like it’s only been around for five minutes (but has in fact been in market here for a decade or more).

We’re testing the MG IM5 Performance, the IM badge standing alone in other markets. There, as here, signifying a new level of equipment, performance and quality.

And we’ve been steering this top-spec, dual-motor AWD version of the pure-electric, five-door liftback IM5, priced and specified to challenge a rapidly expanding group of high-performance mid-size EV sedans now occupying local showrooms.

 So, read on to see if this premium electric performer has what it takes to tempt you into a new option from the latest challenger brand to jump into the ever-intensifying, no-holds barred contest for your new-car dollars.

The new Ford Mustang GT was not designed for Paris.

Fighting through the morning peak hour rush (which seems to extend through the middle of the day and the afternoon), the new Mustang feels like a caged animal. Which is appropriate, given the car’s namesake is a wild horse that exists to roam the American wilderness.

But once we finally break the shackles of Parasian traffic we find ourselves getting to let this Mustang gallop across the French countryside and unleash its full potential. But more on that later…

The reason we're driving the Mustang in France is because the American brand wanted to connect it to its new racing program at the famous Le Mans sports car race (you know, the one in the Matt Damon movie, Ford v Ferrari).

No less than Bill Ford, great-grandson of the company’s famous founder, was on-hand to see the Mustang at Le Mans, such is the passion for performance.

Ford (the man, not the company) took the opportunity to declare that the Blue Oval brand is not only committed to internal combustion engines for the foreseeable future, but it will retain the V8 under the bonnet of the Mustang GT for as long as it can legally do so.

Australians will have to wait a few more weeks (maybe months) before the seventh-generation Mustang arrives, but here’s what you can expect when it lands on local roads.