The Latest 200 MPH Supercar Is Completely Electric
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| NIO EP9 |
Ferrari, Porsche and McLaren are getting there, but new car company NIO just beat them to the punch and announced itself by introducing the EP9–a 1,360 horsepower fully-electric supercar with a top speed of 194 miles per hour.
Okay, so NIO isn't exactly new. It's actually Chinese electric startup NextEV's new brand. The car isn't exactly new to us either, as we saw it in broad daylight running around the ‘Ring last month.
But that doesn't make the nature of a 194 MPH electric supercar anything less than special! The new company claims the EP9 is good for 1,360 horsepower, with four electric motors accomplishing a combined 4,670 lb-ft of torque from a 777 volt powertrain that manages a claimed range of 265 miles on a charge.
If those figures are true, the EP9 is certainly an insane driving experience. There's no claimed zero to 60 time just yet, though it's probably insanely quick because the claimed zero to 124 MPH time is just 7.1 seconds. That's about as quick as my Focus gets to 60 running down a hill. The total weight of the car is 3,825 pounds.
If we compare the EP9 to the other electric "hypercar" or supercar or whatever out there, the Rimac Concept S (the sportier version of the Concept One), then the new NIO kid on the block has some catching up to do, at least in the top speed department.
The Rimac Concept S is just a touch heavier, but claims to have a ridiculous top speed of 227 miles per hour backed by 1,365 horsepower (just 5 more than the EP9) and 1,328 lb-ft of torque. Rimac claims the Concept S can hit 124 MPH from zero in just 5.6 seconds, or 1.5 seconds quicker than the EP9. The Rimac's range is significantly shorter, however, with no claimed range for the Concept S but only 205 miles of electric juice for the Concept One.
Rimac only built and sold eight Concept One models. We've heard that NextEV's NIO will be building only six EP9s for China next year, so there's that. Oh, and NIO claimed it beat the electric vehicle record when we saw it testing around the Nurburgring, setting a time of 7:05.12. Neat.
That sounds amazingly terrifying. As the wise and cognizant David Tracy once said, what a world we live in. Justin Westbrook/Jalopnik