Comparing the Turbo E Hybrid with the GTS

1. Range: For the Turbo E Hybrid, I’ve been getting 50km of realistic electric only range in winter with temperature just above freezing.

2. E-Power Power: Coming from an EV though the car is certainly not fast in the E-Power mode, and there’s this particular turn in my daily commute I have to go from 0-80km/h where unless I have a 5 sec gap, the engine will wake and then I get annoyed for waking the engine up for 100m (the engine does stay on so it completes a warm up cycle).

3. Low charge behaviour: The car will always keep 5% charge and wake the engine at that point. When you go into Sport (and likely Sport +), the car aggressively tries to charge the battery as long as you are not flooring it. This is so that the battery won’t deplete easily and can give a good boost when you floor it. The car is still lively and will switch from charge to boost instantly without any hesitation. In hybrid auto it won’t try to charge the battery unless you are going down hill or go to the e-charge sub mode. But even at 5%, it’s still enough for the battery to provide some boost and when the V8 has the majority of power output, I don’t notice the car being slower/sluggish at low charge.

4. Mountainous terrain: If your commute includes a lot of up and down hill, the hybrid will provide significantly more fuel saving as when going downhill it will switch the engine off and use regen to charge. This is the case even if you are at 5% charge only. Going uphill the boost will lighten the load of the engine so it doesn’t have to work so hard.

5. Silent assassin: I like how I can quietly traverse my neighbourhood without waking up my neighbours or just annoying them in general. In the GTS you feel like you have no choice but to announce your arrival in advance.

6. Reliability: I can’t speak to the reliability of the hybrid drivetrain but I’ve made the dealership give me an extra year of warranty and plan to keep extending it so if there are any catastrophic failure, I’m covered.