Xpeng G6 vs BYD Sealion 7

What's the difference?

You never know quite what to expect when you jump into the first model from a brand-new brand, but the XPeng G6 was a pleasant surprise. And at this price, with these features, it should really give Tesla Model Y shoppers something to think about.

The BYD Sealion 7 Performance is well-priced and well-equipped. It more than holds its own against its mid-size electric SUV rivals. It has great motor outputs and it handles comfortably on the road. There's a lot to like here but some of the technology needs to be tweaked.

There’s more than a little Tesla Model Y in the XPeng’s exterior design, with the two sharing the same kind of soft-edged, swept-back SUV styling. 

It helps make the XPeng look familiar and inoffensive, and while I wouldn’t go so far as to call it ground-breaking, I think it has enough exterior flourishes to break up the body work, and I don’t mind the way it looks, and the way it sits on those big alloys.

Inside, it’s a spacious and pretty stylish space. This giant screen is super responsive, and is easy enough to navigate, with the key functions (like climate) glued to the bottom of the screen so you don't have to paw through menus to access them. The idea begins to fail when you have Apple CarPlay or Android Auto active, though, as you have to revert back to the car's home screen to access anything.

The XPeng uses its steering wheel controls to access air-con fan and temp controls as a kind of shortcut, but confusingly they change to distance adjustment when you’ve got the cruise control on. An easier, and much better solution would be to bring back buttons.

I also don't love the stalk-style gear selector, which doubles as a cruise control activator, and, with a double pull, as your autonomous helper. It just feels super old-school in a vehicle this modern.

What is a massive win though is the driver screen. Tesla fans can scream minimalist aesthetics all they want, but the drive experience is simply better when you can see your speed and other key info right in front of you.

It may be named after a sea lion but it doesn’t resemble the blubbery cuteness of the creature itself. However, its sleek dynamic styling and performance outputs do call forth some of the creature's water prowess. 

This prowess is hinted at by the 20-inch alloys which are fitted with Michelin tyres and red brake calipers. There’s some Porsche-like design notes in the wide swoopy nose and LED headlights. The rear is also quite handsome with its long LED band strip and narrow window giving it a sporty silhouette.

Head inside and the Performance showcases the best BYD cabin I've sampled. There are no strange accents or panelling like there are in the Atto 3. This proves that BYD can do premium well.

The quilted leather upholstery feels supple underhand and the sports seats with integrated headrests reminds you what it can achieve in a sprint.

The swoopy design is carried over inside with the door panels. The dashboard is simply styled but headlined by an enormous 15.6-inch display that can rotate between landscape or portrait mode. Some may liken it to an iPad but it works.

The panoramic sunroof keeps things bright and cheerful but there are some simplistic elements that are hard to ignore. Like the lack of buttons, minimalist mirror cover design on the sunvisors and a rather plain-looking centre console.

Everything else flows and my favourite feature inside is surprisingly the lever door handles! They're functional but cute.

At 4753mm in length, 1920mm in width and 1650mm in height, the XPeng fits into the fast-growing mid-size electric SUV space. 

And it ticks a lot of practicality boxes, like with its 571-litre boot, swelling to 1374 litres with the seats folded. But its real party trick is in the back seat, where the space is properly massive. 

I have another mid-size SUV, powered by a petrol engine, at the moment and our baby seat presses against the back of the passenger seat. In this it feels like I could fly a kite in the space between them.

It’s the same for passengers, too. Honestly, the real estate on offer is massive, and that includes for the middle-seat rear passenger, where the lack of a bulky tunnel eating into legroom means adults can sit there comfortably.

There's a pull-down divider separating the back seat that's also home to two cupholders, and there are twin USB connections, as well as air vents (though no temp controls).

There's no spare tyre, though, which means fiddling with the repair kit should you get puncture, or waiting for roadside assist.

The cabin has space, space and then more space. Passenger comfort is all but guaranteed with the available leg- and headroom in each row.

The functions for the electric front seats means it's easy to find a comfortable position. Door apertures are wide for each row and despite a relatively low 140mm ground clearance, it's still an easy SUV to slide in and out of.

Technology looks great and the large 15.6-inch multimedia display is what catches your eye first. Graphics are sharply rendered and the touchscreen responsive. There's a lot of information and menus embedded into the display which means it's a system that will take you a beat to get used to.

It's not unique but the in-built voice assistant rarely works as it should and needs some work. Also, because of the lack of buttons and dials, all functions are accessed via the screen. I don't like this because it tends to draw your eyes from the road far more often than it should and some functions - like the heat and ventilation for the front seats - are buried in a few menus.

There is wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto but there are some gremlins that need to be ironed out. The connectivity is easy enough but the steering wheel mounted phone control didn't access Apple CarPlay. So, I couldn't hang up my phone call properly, it would instead access the Bluetooth phone menu and dial my last call. I had a few 'butt' dials this week because of it.

Storage is on par with the Performance rivals and up front the burden falls across the large glovebox and middle console but there is also a shelf underneath the centre console for bigger items, like a handbag. There are two phone cradles, although only one offers wireless charging, and two height-adjustable cupholders two drink bottle holders and small storage bins.

In the rear, you get two device pockets and a map pocket on the back of each front seat. There is a fold-down armrest with retractable cupholders and a small storage pocket (think Kindle-size) and there are storage bins in each door.

The boot capacity is a decent 500L and the floor can be adjusted to two heights, one offering a level loading space. There is also a frunk storage of 58L for any cables or random bits you don't use often. Under the boot floor there is also enough room for cables and the tyre repair kit. The powered tailgate can be access via your keyfob as well.

For a flagship grade, I would have expected a few extra amenities in the rear, like climate control and sunshades but it does have directional air vents, reading lights and a USB-A and C port.

The Sealion 7 is being offered in only two grades, the base Premium and the flagship Performance that we're testing for this review.

There are only four points of difference between the two grades. The Premium isn't all-wheel drive and doesn't include heated rear outboard seats, a heated steering wheel or dual electric motors like the Performance gets. That creates a $9K price hike to jump into the top-spec grade, bringing it to $63,990 before on-road costs.

It might be starting to sound expensive but it's still more affordable than most of its main rivals. This is because the Cupra Tavascan VZ is priced from $74,490 MRSP and the outgoing pre-update Tesla Model Y Performance comes in at $82,900 MSRP.

What do you get in the Sealion 7 Performance? A lot, it seems. Standard equipment includes electric front seats with heat and ventilation functions, adjustable under-thigh and lumbar supports, panoramic fixed sunroof and leather upholstery, a leather-wrapped steering wheel with mounted controls.

Technology looks top-notch with a crystal clear 360-degree view camera system, a rotating 15.6-inch multimedia system, 10.25-inch digital instrument cluster, coloured head-up display, dual-zone climate control, two USB-A and -C ports, 12-volt socket, V2L capability (via adapter), wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, 12-speaker Dynaudio sound system, over-the-air updates, and satellite navigation.

There's also keyless entry and start, powered tailgate, BYD digital key (via smartphone app), tyre repair kit, rain-sensing wipers, dusk-sensing LED headlights and soundproof double glazed glass on both the windshield and front windows.

This G6 is a rear-wheel drive affair, with a single electric motor housed at the rear axle. It produces 190kW and 440Nm in Standard Range form or 210kW/440Nm in Long Range guise, which don’t sound like massive numbers — especially given the 2.0-tonne-plus weight of this XPeng – but it gets up and moving just fine.

The 100km/h sprint is a claimed 6.2 seconds, while the top speed is 200km/h.

The Performance is all-wheel drive and is fully electric with dual motors, a squirrel cage induction motor located at the front and a permanent magnet synchronous motor at the rear. Together they produce up to 390kW of power and 690Nm of torque.

This gives the flagship grade a 0-100km/h sprint time of just 4.5 seconds. There’s obviously ample power to be had here which will delight EV fans who like that tummy-falling sensation when accelerating.

The Long Range version of the G6 nabs a 87.5kWh battery (compared to 66kWh in the Standard Range), unlocking a claimed driving range of 570km. 

The official power use figure is 17.5kWh/100km, but I did a fair bit of driving on all sorts of roads and my number was more like 14kWh.

When it does come time to charge, the G6 is set up for 280kW DC fast charging which means, should you find the right fast charger, a 10-80 per cent charge should arrive in just 20 minutes. Home charging will take a lot longer, of course – we’re talking overnight plugged into a regular wallbox.

The Sealion 7 Performance has a blade battery with a large 82.56kWh capacity which supports a 456km WLTP driving range. This isn’t terrible for city drivers but a regional driver will likely want a longer range. BYD includes a portable charging cable with the model.

Charging is sorted via a Type 2 CCS charging port which accepts up to 11kW on an AC charger and up to 150kW on a DC charger. On a 150kW DC charger, you can go from 10 to 80 per cent in as little as 32 minutes and that increases to more than eight hours on an 11kW AC charger. All of the figures are quite good and help with the general day-to-day convenience.

The official energy consumption figure is 20.4 kWh per 100km but after doing a healthy mix of open-road driving and city stuff, my average has popped out at 19.1kWh. I reckon it's a solid result for a ‘performance’ grade but I didn’t find the regenerative braking to be particularly strong on this model.

How much you love your time behind the wheel of the XPeng G6 comes down to what you're looking for from your mid-size electric SUV.

Speed and sportiness? There's not much of either. But it does serve up tons of space and technology, surprising refinement and a calm and cosseting ride.

And I think you can mount a pretty solid argument that all of that is pretty important in a mid-size SUV, more so than the ability to carve corners.

I did some solid driving in the G6, including a round trip from Sydney to the start of the NSW South Coast, taking in every road type and surface imaginable, and XPeng proved super comfy, pretty quiet and very, very easy the entire time.

Sure, it's not one of those EVs that makes the scenery blur when you put your foot down. Its outputs and acceleration are a bit more user-friendly than that. But it also doesn't ever feel underpowered, with the plenty of poke away from the lights and even some in reserve for freeway overtakes at 110km/h.

The steering, even in its 'Dynamic' mode, is fairly soft, and you can never magic away the weight of the XPeng in corners, where that compliant suspension does allow for some roll, but it also doesn't feel entirely disconnected from the road below in that disconcerting way some vehicles can.

So, if comfort is mission critical in your SUV space, the XPeng delivers.

Oh, and I know that big screens aren't that uncommon these days, but the multimedia unit in the XPeng is a treat. It's super fast, even when scrolling across maps, and it's relatively user friendly, too.

The Performance grade offers plenty of power that is delivered wickedly quick without feeling overwhelming when you have to accelerate. You still feel in control, which is very important when you have outputs like this does.

The steering is responsive and light enough for quick lane changes. The general on-road handling is quite refined but there is more roll in corners than you’d expect and this is the only time the power can make the handling feel a tad wobbly.

Surprisingly, there isn't a one-pedal function and the regen braking isn’t particularly strong. It’s difficult to ‘creep’ forward in this in stop/start traffic where it can feel a bit jerky at times, so it handles best on the open road.

Visibility is mostly good but the rear window is narrow and a digital rear-view mirror would have been welcomed in this model. Suspension is sports-firm but forgiving over bigger bumps. 

The 360-degree view camera and surrounding sensors makes this super easy to park and honestly, you shouldn’t have any trouble manoeuvring the Sealion 7.

The new Sealion 7 has a maximum five-star ANCAP safety rating from testing done in 2025 and scored well across its individual assessment criteria, scoring 87 per cent for adult protection and 93 per cent for child protection, respectively.

The Sealion 7 features nine airbags, including side chest airbags for both rows but it’s common to see these just on the front, so this is excellent. 

When it comes to standard safety equipment, it's almost a case of what doesn't it have? Some stand-out features include front and rear cross-traffic alert, blind-spot view monitor (which pops a video feed of your left blind spot onto the multimedia display) and child detection alert.

Other standard features include lane keeping aid, lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control, forward collision warning, rear collision warning, driver attention monitoring, 360-degree view camera system, and multiple parking sensors.

The autonomous emergency braking has car, pedestrian, motorcyclist and cyclist detection. For pedestrian, motorcyclist and cyclist detection, it is operational from 8.0 to 80km/h. For car detection, it is operational between 4.0 to 150km/h.

There are ISOFIX child seat mounts and three top-tether anchor points and the rear row is wide enough to accommodate three child seats side by side.

I'm scoring the regular warranty offering here, which is five years or 120,000km, with the battery covered for eight years or 160,000km. Keep an eye out for deals, though. At the time of writing XPeng was offering a 10-year warranty on both, for example.

Service intervals are 12 months or 20,000km. The cheapest individual service is $238, but over five years the total cost is $2064, averaging out to more like $410 per year.

The Sealion 7 is covered by a six-year/150,000km warranty which is good for the class. The battery is covered by an eight-year/160,000km warranty which is a normal term.

The Sealion 7 gets a 10-year capped price servicing but it’s expensive compared to some of its peers at $4157.

Servicing intervals are spaced at every 12 months or 20,000km, whichever occurs first.