Mercedes-Benz EQA review

A minimum of £45,000 we’re afraid, which means no -£2,500 government grant. Prices start at £44,495 for an EQA 250 and stop just shy of £50,000 for the AWD EQA 300 AMG line. 

AMG line is a £1,500 cosmetics pack. But it's also the entry ticket to the two higher packs. Premium is 19s, sunroof, keyless, better stereo and the slightly fussy AR navigation system. 

For another £3k there's Premium Plus which adds 20s, adaptive dampers, Burmester stereo (not as awesome as on the bigger Benzes, unfortunately), electric seats and head-up display. That knocks about 10 miles off the range.

Safety is usually first at Mercedes. But the driving assist pack, which includes lots of excellent active systems, and adaptive cruise, is £1,495 extra. Luckily you can have it on the base model and we would. 

Not all EVs will tow, but this one will, up to 750kg. Good luck with the range then.

The battery is guaranteed for eight years and 100,000 miles. The rest of the car gets three years unlimited. And like all Mercedes, 30 years breakdown recovery.

TELL ME ABOUT THE RANGE

Battery capacity is listed at 66.5kW, and admirably that's the net, or useable, figure. Too many others still quote the gross figure, which includes the unusable buffer.

On the base version on 18-inch wheels, that's 260 miles range WLTP. We had an up-spec one on winter tyres and it extrapolated at 190 miles on a cold winter day with a significant portion of 70mph work. Our Kia Soul long-termer's 64kWh battery would take it about 20 miles more in similar conditions.

WHAT SHOULD I KNOW ABOUT CHARGING?

But for long journeys the Mercedes has an advantage. We found it would keep pulling good power from a 150kW DC charger all the way to 100 per cent, so gaining another batch of 190 miles shouldn't take long. Mercedes quotes 10-80 per cent in 30 minutes and for once we can believe it. Most EVs underperform here.

The on-board charger can take 11kW AC but that's three-phase, which you probably won't have at home. Still, a public post of that power will charge it flat to full in about six hours. 

Mercedes has a consolidated electric billing system that gives you access to several public networks with one RFID card or app. It includes BP Pulse (the biggest) and Ionity (the fastest but dearest). 

On a normal 7kW home box it will be under 10 hours. A three-pin lead is supplied too but as with any EV it's an emergency top-up measure: you're looking at 30 hours for a full charge.

Even the base spec is pretty strong, which makes an EQA look decent value compared with a diesel-driven equivalent GLA. All EQAs get the big double screens, LED lights outside and ambient within, and connected services.