Xpeng G6 2024 News

The Xpeng G6 has entered the rapidly expanding and extremely competitive electric medium SUV segment. Priced to compete with the Tesla Model Y at $54,800, before on-road costs, the 2025 Xpeng G6 boasts stats impressive enough to make the Tesla’s $55,900 best-seller sit up and pay attention. Under the skin, the G6 uses 800-volt architecture and boasts up to 570km driving range, comparable — if not better — than $20,000 dearer rivals like the Kia EV6 GT-Line RWD ($79,590), Hyundai Ioniq 5 Epiq ($84,300), Ford Mustang Mach-E Premium ($79,990) and Polestar 4 ($78,500, all before on-road costs). The significance of Xpeng’s 800-volt electric system is charge time, with owners able to recuperate the larger 87.5kWh lithium-ion (NMC) battery from 10-80 per cent in less than 20 minutes, just as Hyundai-Kia’s E-GMP platform allows. You’ll also find this in luxury vehicles like the Porsche Taycan and its Audi e-tron GT relation.The question is, how has Xpeng saved the money? Imported by TrueEV in Australia, Xpeng says it is all to do with streamlined production steps — and it’s pleasingly nerdy. Like Tesla’s ‘Gigacasting’, Xpeng is moving to simpler vehicle construction, with the SEPA 2.0 platform's one-piece castings integrating 300 individual parts into one element. But there are less visible advancements, too. Technical Advisor at TrueEV Andrew Morcos told CarsGuide about the lessons learned from stripping down a G6 to understand its structure and parts make-up. “I pulled Mercs apart for years. You've got so many different modules, and they go half copper, half CAN Bus. The way you undo these things, make it very complicated”, explained Morcos. Typically, the different modules used by OEMs for various purposes — adaptive cruise control, lighting, in-car entertainment, for example — will communicate in their own ‘languages’. The signals are then translated into universal CAN protocol for the main onboard computer, which communicates information to the occupants or other elements of the vehicle. “When we undid the , everything was so easy to undo with clips … instead of having 10 modules, they’ll have one module that does all of the left-hand side, one module does all the right-hand side and they’re in easy positions to get to.“Because the whole car runs on CAN Bus system, it can communicate in micro seconds. That's why the whole thing is dedicated to autonomous driving, to have reaction times,” said Morcos.  “They've designed this whole system — I reckon they spent more time designing this part of the system than the actual body — they pieced it all together and you can see how delicately they put it for diagnosis, and how everything reacts to each other module and it's very simple to diagnose what the problem is, that's what we found out.”With CAN Bus, instead of a ‘rats nest’ of different, heavy cables, the bulk of the wiring harness can be simplified into two wires — one there, one back. It’s lighter, simpler and should be faster. “This whole car, from 4G to the blinker system, no matter what it is in the car, it all works on their CAN Bus system, and it's and it's very responsive,” added Morcos. Tesla is also pushing forward with elegant solutions for in-car electronics, with boss Elon Musk allegedly sending a ‘how-to design a 48-volt architecture’ pamphlet to major manufacturers, including Ford. Its Cybertruck uses 48-volt electronics everywhere, allowing its steer-by-wire system. The G6 promises rapid processing speeds with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8155 chip powering the 15-inch touchscreen and, while the phrase ‘software defined vehicle’ makes everyone in the CarsGuide office groan, it is the future of electric cars. It drives more than the multimedia system too, in theory making the whole experience more seamless. “I've had Tesla technicians come into our car in Melbourne — to spy on us — and they came in and said, ‘man, the refresh rate, processing speed and the quality, it's far superior than ours’,” said Morcos, showing signs of promise for the new G6. Of course, this all comes with one big caveat: We’re yet to drive the G6, or any of Xpeng’s products, in Australia. They could have annoying driver aids, a poor ride, or clunky multimedia systems. Or not. Either way, we’ll have an answer early next year. Unlike Polestar and some European marques, such as Renault, Xpeng does not openly discuss its battery pack’s constituents. The brand does sell vehicles in the EU, which requires battery passports for all vehicles from 2027. Speaking to TrueEV CEO Jason Clarke, it is clear that Xpeng’s target is fixed on the back of Tesla. The importer aims to make Xpeng one of the top-five electric vehicle brands in Australia. The first model to launch is the Xpeng G6, which is on-sale now in two trim levels with a Performance grade to join next year, followed by the X9 people mover. In the near future, expect a larger G9 SUV and a sporty sedan, known as the P7. Prices listed are before on-road costs

Getting out among new car buyers can be a rare occurrence in this line of work, with a focus on new products and the promises of executives filling our regular days. So it was refreshing to man the CarsGuide EV advice stand at the 2024 Sydney International EV show for the weekend and get some insight into how electric car buyers think. Although it was a smaller footprint than Sydney Motor Shows of old, fervent visitors started filling the halls from 9am on all three days. In total, more than 30,000 bodies passed through the doors over the weekend. The overwhelming takeaway from talking to buyers was this sect of Aussies was not at all concerned about brand history, with Toyota and Ford’s stands dramatically quieter than the barely-known start-ups from China such as Xpeng, Zeekr and Deepal.It helps that these new marques dressed their stands to impress. Aside from a wild flying machine, XPeng also had a luxurious seven-seat people mover essentially purpose-built to generate public interest with a huge rear entertainment screen and ‘business class’ reclining rear seats with heating, cooling and foot rests. The G6 is the first retail model from XPeng and it was also well-trafficked, along with the larger G9 the brand is considering for local release. Zeekr turned up with the X small SUV along with a few extra bits of eye-candy like the confirmed-for-oz 009 people mover, a 475kW 007 sedan in a lewd yellow paint colour and a 001 FR the Geely-owned marque’s Polestar 2-related first model. The other new entrant was Deepal, which is being imported by well-known company Inchcape that also handles Subaru, Foton, Peugeot and previously Citroen. Along with the classic Tesla Model Y rival, the S07 electric family SUV, Deepal had some cool stuff. Namely, a Cybertruck-like electric and range-extender compatible E05 electric sedan-pick-up amalgamation that was catching attention. Kia’s front-and-centre placement helped drive plenty of traffic to the brand’s new EV5 while also making Hyundai’s lack of presence quite obvious. With the Tasman due next year and the EV5’s sharp price, it’s a brand that’s sure to go from strength to strength. Tesla’s presence was held up by the Australian owner’s club while BYD was represented by a dealer, with an unfortunate lack of Shark utes on the stand. It was Ford and Toyota that were visibly the lowest traffic OEMs over the weekend, and Australia’s third most-popular brand Mazda didn’t even turn up with its plug-in hybrids. With a pair of bZ4Xs on display and charge-box-on-wheels, Toyota’s wasn’t exactly a dull stand yet it proves that people are more interested in the whizz-bang new models — that’s the point of a motor show, after all. As for Ford, despite having prime real estate among the newcomers, it seemed that not so many punters were interested in the Mach-E and plug-in hybrid Ford Ranger Stormtrak, even with the ute’s vehicle-to-load system that can power a coffee machine, TV, work tools and more.Some other mainstream carmakers present were Audi, BMW, Cupra and Volvo though these stands were notably smaller than the others. As for other brands from China, Chery and GWM proved relatively popular but the Smart stand was quiet. MG’s choice to only bring a Cyberster rather than the affordable MG4 seemed a bit short-sighted — next year, maybe.The most common line of questioning was if we would recommend the XPeng G6 and what the best alternatives to a Tesla Model Y are — we fielded almost no questions about the bZ4X or plug-in hybrid Ford Ranger Stormtrak. Plenty of test drives were taken over the three days and at one point on Sunday, you would have had to queue for four hours to sample XPeng’s new G6. But what does all this tell us about the new car landscape?MG has already proven sharp pricing can drive mega traffic into electric vehicles and that, when EVs reach parity with combustion-engined and hybrid options, they are much more attractive. In this case, customers aren’t cross-shopping, say, a Tesla Model Y with just other EVs, but similarly-priced combustion and hybrid models, too. Electric cars aren’t competing with themselves, but in a battle to bring the other 90.6 per cent of the new car market out of combustion and hybrid-engined choices. Most worrying for big carmakers, though, will be the lack of brand devotion. Despite what the bZ4X advertising campaign suggests, there were very few talking about Toyota’s proven low-cost servicing or reliability. Instead, the long seven- and even ten-year warranties of newcomers seemed enough to allay most fears. Don’t expect Toyota, Ford or Mazda sales to drop off a cliff anytime soon, but the interest and willingness of local buyers to branch out and sample an unknown product will definitely cause a headache.

Sales of Chinese electric cars are booming despite heavy tariffs effectively locking them out of the US, Canada and the European Union.

Xpeng explains how it will win market share in Australia, and why it won't fight low-cost Chinese rivals.