Fiat 500e 3+1- The little “Gelato”
You either love it or you hate it, there’s no in-between. The full-electric Fiat 500E 3+1 La Prima makes people talk and everybody has their own opinion. I drive a fiat 500 myself, the 2018 Twinair edition, I thought I had the best version and no other 500 could do better. The electric one made me doubt my thoughts!
Fiat kept the looks on this electric city car classic, no big changes compared to the older versions of the 500 and they stayed true to the roots of the 1957 version. It’s a little less round and appears a bit bigger. The front lights are amazing, they’re full led, they look very playful which suits the car great and makes it just that bit more childish.
There aren’t many options when it comes to colors, 3 to be precise: Onyx Black, Glacier Blue and the color on this one, Rose Gold. To be honest, this girly car deserves this beautiful pink, or is it just me who wants that color?
Let’s move to the inside of the car!
Here the changes are more striking, the infotainment is bigger than it was ever before with a 10.25” display and it finally works with wireless Apple CarPlay or Android Auto. The screen looks very “less is more” and makes it classy. The whole interior feels and looks more luxurious compared to the ICE versions. There’s also a wireless charger but we noticed that not every phone can be charged. I have an iPhone XR, perfectly chargeable but my boyfriend has an iPhone 13 Pro max and he couldn’t charge due to the camera bump. We don’t have this problem with other cars.
Fiat uses vegan leather for the seats and to be honest I didn’t feel a difference from real leather. The seats are heated, something new for the Fiat 500 and something I miss in my car. It didn’t work as well as in the cars in a higher price range, but it's good for a small car in the “lower” price range. It feels a lot more spacious on the inside than it did in the ICE versions because there’s no central tunnel anymore. So no loss of space in between the front seats and from the front seats to the back.
With its 3+1 doors, it’s very practical to get to the backseat but we had the feeling that the back is less spacious compared to my 500, there’s less space for your legs. Also because of the extra door, you have a lot of noise from outside the car. You hear the cars passing by, wind, water underneath the tires but that’s the only minus for me.
Fiat also thought about the comfort of the driver with the armrest, something that should be a standard in cars in my opinion. Because come on, who doesn’t like to let his arm rest and drive in a relaxed way? The steering wheel with the two-spoke design hints back to the 1957 Fiat 500. It’s comfy and feels very good. There are a few buttons on the back of the steering which you can use to adjust the volume, skip songs or switch radio channels. The doors can be opened with a button on the inside. They added a lot of nice features and improved the car, So.. thumbs up for the interior!
The road to “Amore”
Last but not least, driving this sweet little beauty. The car is great for people who live in the city or people who don’t have to drive long distances every day. The 42 kWh battery pack with 118HP gives you a range of 320km (WLTP) and even up to 460km (WLTP) with the city cycles. The Fiat 500E has a good range for its price class but in the real world don’t expect to drive these distances. The battery drains a lot faster than you would think. If you’ll get 270km out of one full charge, then it was a good day meaning perfect sunny weather.
Driving EVs gives me so much joy and with this one that wasn’t any different. It accelerates so fast and so smooth, believe me when I say you could easily outrun a sporty petrol car from a stand.
There are 3 drive modes on the Fiat 500E. The first one is SHERPA, it gives you the best range but the lowest acceleration and speed, with a maximum of 80KPH. You can drive faster but you’ll have to push your paddle a bit deeper to hit the button. The second one is RANGE, it still gives you the best range and allows you to drive like you normally would do. You can use the one paddle drive in this mode, which I don’t like. I just don’t like it when my car brakes when I didn’t ask for it. The last one is NORMAL and gives you the full acceleration and speed.
To put the car in drive, reverse or park, you have to push a button on the center panel. Each mode has its button, which I had to get used to.
The Fiat Co-pilot works a lot better than expected. The car drives almost autonomous, which I wasn’t expecting from a Fiat 500. There’s adaptive cruise-Control which works very well. Even the parking camera is superb for such a small car, it’s very wide and the visibility is amazing.
Did the 5OOe hit the sky like a big pizza pie?
So if you’d ask me about my experience with the Fiat 500E 3+1 La Prima, you won’t hear anything super bad except the weight of the trunk door, it’s extremely heavy, especially for such a small car. Fiat did an amazing job with this car. It has everything you would expect from a Fiat 500 and so much more. It’s just a great small car, even the price isn’t that bad for being an EV. The Fiat 500 3+1 La Prima starts from €36.000(BE) and is loaded with a lot of options, almost full option. This car is worth the money.
