What’s the best EV for finding in a car park?

One of the problems with modern cars and the concentration of sales among increasingly fewer models is that so many of them look similar enough to lose in a car park. Sometimes you can lose the car before you’ve even locked it, whirling around like a Harry Potter character with the fob in the air as you expecto the plunk from the central locking.

One of the ways to combat such difficulties is to park in a distinctive fashion. Bury the car halfway through the front window of the supermarket, for instance. A risky manoeuvre. Parking under the biggest tree you can find has its pitfalls. Or at least something that rhymes with pitfalls depending on how vindictive the local bird population is. 

Another strategy is to focus on acquiring a set of wheels that stand out in some small fashion. Not too hard, you would think, given that the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (the official club for car companies in the UK) recently revealed to great excitement that the top three colours for new cars in 2022 were… grey, black and white. Which, to be fair, is the combination of colours that most cars look after 30 minutes or so of driving on British roads. But opt for one of the less popular hues – your oranges, pinks or greens – and you’ll never lose your car again.  

If you’re still struggling to find your citrus-hued Ford Focus parked under a Canadian redwood and slathered in freshly steaming guano then might we humbly suggest the new Skoda Enyaq Coupe iV vRS. We can almost guarantee that you won’t ever end up in the same car park as another Skoda Enyaq Coupe iV vRS, even when you take it in for its biennial service.  

But even better, the Skoda Enyaq Coupe iV vRS is available in the most horrendously eye-searing shade of green that you’ve ever had the misfortune to set your eyes upon. You’ll love it. In some lights it looks sort of yellow, just think of all the fun you’ll have arguing with people. If the Hyper Green isn’t your thing, then there’s also the option of Velvet Red or Phoenix Orange, hues that are starkly in yer face and everyone else’s faces too.

And yet the panoply of effulgence that makes up the Skoda Enyaq Coupe iV vRS’s paint palette is nothing against the optional ‘crystal face’. It’s hard to describe the crystal face. It very much has the air of the plastic egg boxes that were briefly fashionable when the country ran out of cardboard during the 12th or 13th year of pandemic lockdown. Or maybe one of those skeletal dinosaur kits you can get for an aspiring young paleontologist. 

We obviously know by now that the grille has been rendered almost obsolete by the minimal cooling demands of the modern electric motor, which has led carmakers to play very fast and awfully loose with them. The Skoda crystal face is a clear plastic effort that lights up with the power of 130 LEDs. Skoda has gone for an effect it calls ‘dazzling’, but has somehow alighted on ‘humpback whale filtering for krill’. Is it an abomination? Yes it is. Would you fail to spot it in a car park? No you wouldn’t. 

Best EV for finding in a car park – Skoda Enyaq Coupe iV vRS
Price: £54,315
Range: 321 miles
Engine: 299PS e-motors
Battery: 77kWh
Top speed: 111mph
0–62mph: 6.3secs
Boot space: 570 litres