2025 Porsche Macan Turbo EV Review: The Anti-Tesla

As a person born in the early ’90s, I’ve officially lost count of the “once-in-a-lifetime” socioeconomic crises we’ve lived through, but it really does feel like we’re on the cusp, if not already in the midst, of an inflection point. Still reconciling from the ripple effects of lockdown, trying to keep up with and brace for “once-in-a-century” financial uncertainty, this is when dynasties fall.

Companies and indeed entire industries once deemed too big to fail are—get this—failing. There’s been discussion of Apple’s inability to keep up with the AI boom potentially being the beginning of the end for the $3 trillion brand. Movies no longer make money. Housing, once seen as a sure-win investment, doesn’t look so sure anymore. And Tesla, the company that made EVs desirable and changed the way many view cars as an object, is slowly immolating before our eyes.

However, with one foot dipped confidently in the future while keeping the other staunchly planted in the past, Porsche is a company that seems well-prepared for whatever comes next. It sees the value of keeping manual gas sports cars around, but also happens to produce some of the best EVs on the market right now. If that wasn’t enough base-covering, it’s invested heavily in sustainable e-fuels. And it’s chosen to sell its gas-burning entry-level Macan crossover alongside the 2025 Porsche Macan Turbo Electric.

Keeping with the theme, the new Turbo Macan is an electric car built in 2025 that begs you to drive it rather than let yourself be driven. This is an EV that still has a volume knob and a physical gear selector. What’s more, this is an EV that appears to have attached its physical gear selector to a mechanism made of cast iron. It pairs most of what’s good about Progress with cherry-picked virtues of the old ways—the “heritage”-screaming crest on the hood has had its color drained.

This may not be your grandfather’s Porsche, but it’s very much still a Porsche.

The Basics

Sitting on Volkswagen Group’s PPE electric car platform shared with Audi’s new A6 and Q6 E-Trons, the electric Porsche Macan is, technically speaking, the “second-gen” Macan, even though the “first-gen” gas Macan is, for now, still being sold concurrently with this one. Electric Macan’s wheelbase is 86 mm longer than the gas Macan’s but remains a similar size overall thanks to little overhangs.

Stylistically, the new Macan is a pretty car, especially this shade of Frozen Blue Metallic. It looks chunky, luxurious, and race-car in equal measures while remaining unmistakably Porsche. It looks more approachable than the Taycan in that it looks less like an alien in the face, but that holds in practical ways too, with the regular, non-pop-out door handles and easy-access ride height.

That simplified Taycan theme carries over inside. Unlike many luxury EVs, which rely on touchscreens for absolutely everything, the Macan Electric uses physical toggles on its dedicated climate control panel. We already mentioned that there’s even a volume knob and—make sure you’re sitting down for this one—you adjust the air vents by reaching out and moving little plastic nubs with your hands. What a novel idea.

It’s a good thing the vent controls are physical because the 10.9-inch infotainment system, despite running on a Porsche-skinned rendition of Android Automotive OS now, isn’t very good. Like the current Mercedes system, it’s clearly best when set up with your own Porsche account that presumably stores all your preferences, but pretty janky used as a “guest.” No matter what I was listening to last, the car always defaulted to FM radio static every time I started it. And that’s only before you tap through the three (3!) FBI-warning wall-of-text-style screens that pop up at the beginning of every journey.

I’m happy for you though, Porsche. Or sorry that happened. Either way, I ain’t reading all that.

As part of this press loan, Porsche did provide generic login credentials, but when I put those in, they just … didn’t work. Can’t say I didn’t try. Bottom line, this is one of those infotainment systems where it’s probably best to connect Apple CarPlay (supposedly wireless, but it asked for a wire every time) or Android Auto and just leave it at that. There’s also an optional 10.9-inch passenger screen, which you can and should probably skip.

The rest of the Macan, however, is first-rate. Porsche’s build quality, inside and out, is frankly unmatched and always a treat to behold. Everything feels over-engineered and absolutely rock solid, and all buttons respond with a satisfying click. Merely opening the door from the inside is a weirdly satisfying tactile experience. The Turbonite Gray Porsche badge on the steering wheel (and on this car’s nose) is exclusive to Turbo models, obvs, and admittedly looks fucking sick.

Standard Bose audio sounds really quite good—guitars sound like they’re in the car with you—and this isn’t even the upgraded audio system. There’s a $4,710, 21-speaker Burmester setup on the table that this tester did not have. Front seats are sportily bolstered without being uncomfortable or drawing much attention to themselves, while rear passengers get their own little screen complete with toggles for climate controls and a fair amount of space for the segment. Despite the big battery underneath, occupants actually sit lower here than they did in the gas Macan, and there’s also more rear legroom than before.

Driving the Porsche Macan Turbo Electric

This being a top-trim, 630-horsepower, dual-motor AWD electric luxury car, the Macan Turbo is face-meltingly quick in a straight line, able to hit 60 mph in 3.1 seconds and pull more than entire g while doing so—ask me how I know. They’re all like this, though. So while this car’s accelerative abilities are alarming, they aren’t shocking. Porsche’s artificial electric noises are pretty cool and remind you just enough of a sonorous German flat-six without feeling too derivative, nostalgic, or hokey. This can be toggled from subtle to in-your-face (I kept it in the former), and doesn’t feel overproduced or like a hopeless facsimile of internal combustion—big cyberpunk 911 vibes and I’m here for it.

The real reason you should buy a Porsche, electric or otherwise, though, is the way it negotiates corners. Sports car-level grip and precision is applaudably entertaining in what is, at the end of the day, a 5,393-pound SUV. Standard Porsche Torque Vectoring Plus incorporates an electronic diff lock on the rear, while the traction management system is said to work five times faster than conventional AWD. The result is agility, pace, and outright stability that operates at a level on which a Model Y could only dream of.

As a tradeoff, the ride errs on the stiff side even with the air suspension set in Normal mode. It isn’t rough enough to be considered truly uncomfortable, but it also would never be mistaken for cosseting. It’s still docile, light, and usable around town but also never feels like a RAV4. Sport and Sport Plus alter the fake noise and dampers to sharpen things up when you’d like to have more fun, but the latter alterations are relatively subtle despite the air ride’s two-valve setup. There’s even an Off-Road driving mode, and perhaps it makes a difference for that one time in history when a Macan Turbo owner takes their 630-hp Porsche on a serious rock crawl, but engaging this on a simple dirt road just sort of ruined the ride, so that knob promptly went back to Normal.

The steering feels quick and perfectly weighted while all-wheel steering lets the rear wheels rotate up to five degrees (the most of any Porsche to date), shrinking the turning circle by more than three feet for easy city maneuvering. Highway stability is appropriately good in that it may not decimate continents stoically like an airliner or a Rolls, but it will make runs up to 100 mph feel like the car is drumming its fingers, egging you on to go faster. The top speed, if you’ve got the space, is 161 mph.

Thankfully, the brakes are hella strong too, blending regenerative and rotors-on-discs action pretty much imperceptibly. Some regen happens when you let off the throttle, and you can configure it to give you more, but there is no full one-pedal driving mode here.

Range, Charging, and Efficiency

Drive it like a sane person and the Macan Turbo Electric is good for 288 miles on a full charge, according to the EPA. This lands it at the top of its segment, besting the 277-mile Tesla Model Y Performance and the 230-mile Mercedes-AMG EQE SUV. The 800-volt, 100-kWh battery (95 kWh of that is usable) can DC charge at speeds of up to 270 kW and the Porsche-quoted charge time is 10-80% in 21 minutes.

Over 300 mixed test miles during a somewhat chilly week in early April, I saw 42.7 kWh per 100 miles, giving it an effective real-world range of 223 miles. It proved less efficient than its EPA-official 37, but still better than the official figures of the competing BMW and Mercedes. The Tesla is your best bet for ultimate energy efficiency … but, well, you know.

Taycan is like this too, but shout out to the Macan Electric for having two charge ports, although only the one on the driver’s side supports DC fast charging.

The Verdict

Starting at $107,295, the 2025 Porsche Macan Turbo Electric is the ultimate compact luxury electric crossover if you give even half a shit about driving. On-screen software is largely a bummer, which may be a dealbreaker in any other vehicle, but the fact that it isn’t speaks to just how stellar everything else is. The handling, the build quality, the consistency, the vibe, it’s all in a class of its own as far as electric crossovers are concerned.

This is the anti-Tesla in the sense that while Teslas are big on tech but underbaked when it comes to the Car Stuff, the Porsche could use more work in the screens but makes up for it when it comes to the metal, oily, and leathery bits. It retains a lot of the virtues of the Taycan while actually being easier to get along with as a human-machine interface—performance being comparable, this SUV is less expensive than that car, too. A certified missile on the road that’s also fantastically luxurious and appropriately practical, the Macan Turbo isn’t just something you’re obligated to purchase in order to get that ever-elusive GT3 allocation. It’s a genuinely good EV in its own right.

Is it good enough to help secure Porsche’s future? I don’t have a crystal ball, and despite some of their attitudes, none of my colleagues do either, so who the hell knows? But from the driver’s seat of the new Macan, it’s on the right track.

Quick Take

In an era of extremes, the new electric Macan carefully positions itself where truth often lives: somewhere in the middle.

Got a tip or question for the author about the Macan Turbo Electric? You can reach him here: chris.tsui@thedrive.com

The post 2025 Porsche Macan Turbo EV Review: The Anti-Tesla appeared first on The Drive.