Porsche’s orderly PR operation is a well-oiled machine. Never more so than when it comes to PH’s first experience of the second-generation Taycan. Having been given the full technical rundown in Germany in February, the drive then took place in Seville on an identical route to the one on which I got to experience the third-gen Panamera last month.
The amount of data that was dumped at the preview means I don’t need to attempt a full run-down again. Which is good, because my fingers hurt after typing out the last one. Highlights are upgraded batteries, with even the smaller 82.3 kWh unit now having a capacity almost identical to the pre-facelift XL Performance Plus battery. The bigger pack in the new car – optional on the RWD and 4S, standard on the Turbos - now boasts 97 kWh. Power outputs have grown at the top end of the range too, with the Turbo S now making up to 938 hp in its Launch Control mode.
But the standout new feature from a dynamic point of view is definitely the Active Ride, one which also gave an obvious point of comparison over the Panamera which I’d driven over the same roads, and which offers a version of the same system in range-topping Turbo E-Hybrid form. One which delivered the revelation that the Taycan is in a completely different dynamic league to its mostly-combustion sister.
Don’t worry – you don’t need to tick what will be a £6,291 option in the UK to experience an excellent car. But Active Ride definitely makes the Taycan better. As in the Panamera, it is an electro-hydraulic system that uses a high-pressure pump to send force to each corner, countering roll, pitch and dive – the new hardware replacing conventional anti-roll bars. The concept isn’t new; Citroen had a fully hydraulic system in the Xantia Activa three decades ago, Merc’s Active Body Control made its debut in 1999 (and Land Rover has a very similar system in the new Range Rover Sport SV.)
But the Taycan feels like the best implementation of the idea to date, putting a filter over the world without making the car feel numb or floaty. On some choppy Andalusian Tarmac, it reduced the expected motions of visible bumps to make it feel as if the Taycan was driving over a much smoother road, but without any sense of disconnection.
Active Ride impressed in the Panamera, too – but the Taycan doesn’t carry the physical compromises of having to lug a weighty engine up front. The EV’s mass is lower and better distributed, most of it in the battery pack beneath the floor, and it feels much more lithe and athletic than the Panamera over the same route – even with the lightest possible Taycan configuration being 2,090kg. As before, the Taycan is brilliant at carrying drama-free speed down a demanding road, and with Active Ride’s Active Tilt and Active Lean functions feeling much more subtle and natural.
It was much harder to experience a car without Active Ride than with it, almost all of the demo cars at the event being heavily specced show ponies. But there was a solidary rear-drive Taycan, the only model in the range not to get the option of Active Ride, which therefore became the car I was keenest to experience, both for the regular suspension but also the new entry-level powertrain.
The first rear-driven Taycan always seemed very much like a base car, with performance that felt leisurely compared to the nuttily fast models that sat above it in the hierarchy. The new RWD is still much slower than its faster siblings, but it no longer feels like a poor relation in terms of performance. Despite a new motor at the rear, peak output hasn’t risen - the new car’s 402hp the same as claimed for the pre-facelift overboost mode (although specifying the larger battery pack increases peak output to 429hp). The maximum is now available all of the time and, on both Porsche’s numbers and subjective experience, the RWD feels punchier - the 4.5-second 0-60mph time might not be scintillating by the standards of high-end EVs, but it is a full 0.6 second faster than before. Traction remains the obvious limitation of a single-powered axle - accelerate hard on a tight corner and the stability control is working hard in the background to maintain order - but that also brings an unarguable purity to the driving experience.
Even without bells and whistles, the standard suspension impresses. The rear-driver I experienced had the Sport Chrono pack which brings a Sports Plus mode and the familiar dashboard clock, but it didn’t have the torque vectoring rear diff or rear-axle steering that can (somewhat improbably) be specced onto even the base Taycan. Nor did it need them, even in near-vanilla guise the combination of air springs and double valve adaptive dampers still combine excellent comfort in the softer settings and body control once everything is turned up. It lacks the physics-bending magic of Active Ride, of course - but even in bare-bones spec the Taycan is still one of the best-handling EVs you can buy.
Moving up the range adds plenty of performance, but much less experience. This was the criticism I had of the original Taycan, where I honestly couldn’t see the point in going past the 4S for anything other than badge bragging rights. And having driven 4S, Turbo and Turbo S, it’s the way I still feel about the newer one.
The 4S definitely still feels like the sweet spot in terms of performance against price, bringing the obvious benefit of extra traction as well as the hiked output. With the regular battery pack, the 4S now makes a quoted peak of 455hp, or 536hp in launch control ‘overboost’, and with the bigger Performance Plus battery those numbers increase to 509hp and 589hp respectively - so fractionally more than the Kia EV6 GT that most people would regard as being at the sharp end of raw EV performance. On road, performance is huge, with instant response pretty much regardless of speed. On Porsche’s numbers, the 97kWh battery 4S can go from 0-60 in 3.5 seconds and 0-100mph in 7.8 seconds. Yet there are still three more powerful variants above it in the range.
I can only write about two of them this time - the Taycan Turbo and Taycan Turbo S - as Porsche won’t let me tell you about the range-topping Taycan Turbo GT I drove on track at Monteblanco until next week. Impressions of the Turbo and Turbo S harvested on the road did bleed heavily into each other given the ease with which both can generate accelerative forces which are physically uncomfortable, and the performance numbers are actually pretty close. The Taycan Turbo’s peak output is quoted at 697hp regular, but with up to 871hp in Launch Control mode; the Turbo S manages 764hp and 938hp.
On the plus side, the huge performance doesn’t bring harshness, both Turbos cruise with all the comfort and refinement of the lesser versions. Beyond the need to pay more and a slight range hit, there is no penalty to heading straight to the top of the range. But both the Turbos are packing more performance than even the keenest owners are going to regularly exploit, neither more than a twitched ankle away from being north of any speed limit. Porsche quotes a 2.5-second 0-60mph time for the Taycan Turbo and a 5.5-second 0-100mph time; the Turbo S cuts those figures by 0.2 and 0.3 seconds respectively and means the Taycan is pretty much as fast to 100mph as a Bugatti Veyron. But to put it all in perspective, I used the Turbo S’s ‘Push to Pass’ button that boosts output to 857hp for up to 10 seconds precisely once, just so that I could say that I had.
Dynamically, much of the new Taycan feels very similar to the old one. The steering feels pretty much unchanged to me, delivering crisp, linear responses and a surprisingly decent amount of low-load, off-centre feedback. The new car has much more capacity for regenerative braking, but from the driver’s point of view the integration between this and traditional friction retardation remains seamless and invisible. As before, there isn’t a one-pedal mode, and even the highest rate of throttle-off regen is pretty gentle; Taycan drivers will need to continue to use two pedals.
Most other changes really are ‘blink and you’ll miss them’ - the most obvious interior revision is the fact that the optional passenger display screen has a mono-directional filter so it can’t be seen from the driver’s seat. Based on my experience wearing sunglasses while riding shotgun, the viewing angles aren’t great in the passenger seat either. And the arrival of fake vents containing nothing more than textured mesh on the rear bumpers of the Turbo models really does feel like a bridge that shouldn’t have been crossed.
The most significant change is the one I didn’t get the chance to exhaustively test over a two-hour route - the significantly improved range. On WLTP figures the rear-driver with the Performance Plus battery is now the rangiest model in the clan, capable of travelling up to 421 miles. The Taycan 4S is slightly behind at 398 miles, and the Turbo and the Turbo S are both rated at 391 miles. All of which are sizeable improvements on before.
Pricing has also increased, although the massive spread between the £86,500 base read-driver and the £162,500 Taycan Turbo S Cross Turismo is partially offset by the much more generous standard kit on the Turbo and Turbo S models. And while first impressions are that a 4S with a few ticked boxes will remain the sweet spot in the range, I suspect many will be more than happy to persuade themselves that they really need the extra urge (and toys) that come with the Turbo badge.
Plus there’s the even higher summit of the Turbo GT, which brings 1020hp for £186,300. I can tell you what that one’s like next week.
Specification | Porsche Taycan Turbo S
Engine: Double electric motors, all-wheel drive
Gearbox: Single-speed reduction (front), double-speed (rear)
Power: 938hp (system peak)
Torque: 811 lb-ft (system peak)
0-60mph: 2.3sec
Top speed: 161mph (limited)
Kerb weight: 2295kg
MPG: N/A
CO2: 0g/km
Price: £161,400
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