Porsche Taycan review

Pull the handle, drop into the seat… good job. The driving position is near-as-damn-it 911, but the environment is all-new. The centre console locks you in but floats leaving space beneath and the only physical buttons are on the wheel and doors. In here, the screen is king – a sculptural, curved one behind the wheel, a standard rectangular 10.9-inch one in the middle of the dash, an I-Pace style portrait one where your right hand rests, and an utterly pointless (but fortunately optional) one above the glovebox in front of the passenger. The same passenger who is perfectly capable of moving their hand three inches to the left and using the central screen to mess with your music or plug something into the sat-nav.

Next to a Model S, the gimmick count is low, but that passenger screen is unnecessary, as are the directional air vents controlled deep in a sub menu on the main screen. What’s wrong with manually pointing the vanes? But there’s familiarity, too. Your driving modes – Range, Normal, Sport and Sport+ - are controlled via a dial on the steering wheel, and although all the interfaces and graphics are unique to the Taycan, anyone that’s driven a Porsche will be at ease within the hour. As you’d expect, quality is spot-on.

The boot is as big as a Golf’s (366-litres) and there’s a small frunk too (81-litres), and while you can squeeze a six-footer in the back, the rear seats are more suited to kids or vertically challenged motoring journalists. Porsche has, however thoughtfully carved a space for your feet into the battery under the floor – something they call the ‘foot garage’. Unusually, go for the panoramic roof, and there’s actually more headroom in the back.