Reader’s Review: The Enigmatic Honda e by Julian C
Guest Writer Article by Julian C.
Dear reader, I am going to write about the Honda e. No, no, don't immediately jump to another review! The Honda e is a Marmite car AND a jelly & ice cream car, wrapped into one - let me explain.
I am a bit of a car geek. I passed my test 47 years ago - "good heavens" say the youngsters, was there a test back then, or did you just drive forwards and back and get a pass? I digress. I've been reading car magazines, watching Top Gear and Fifth Gear and more recently viewing YouTube videos about cars for a long time. So, it was not surprising I saw the launch of the Honda Urban EV Concept in September 2017. Oooh I thought, I like that and I could see there was a look / connection to the original Honda Civic.
The pre-production model was renamed Honda e and was shown in February 2019 at the Geneva Motor Show. I got a £500 refundable (that was important) deposit down as soon as I could and Honda very kindly invited me to the Festival of Speed in 2020 to view & sit in the prototype, and soon after our Honda e was collected on 1st September, 2020.
Exterior
To me, the Honda e (always written with a lower-case e, I looking at you motoring journalists) is a joyful car (jelly & ice cream). The round front headlights provide an open face, matched by the rear lights. A sort of Pokémon character meets Disney's Cars. The charging point is a glass pop up opening in the bonnet (hood for any American readers). A good function and design idea - but perhaps expensive in a front-end crash? As you approach the car, the front indicator lights (circle around outside of headlamps) and the daytime running lights illuminate - likewise the rears. This was six years ago. I know lots of cars today do a headlight greeting, but I don’t remember many that long past? I stand to be corrected.
Speccing the Car
There were two versions of the e; Standard and Advanced. I chose Advanced and the no cost option colour was a dayglo yellow – which I liked, but my wife said she’d never drive it, so we paid extra for the blue.
A no cost option was 17” wheels over the standard 16”. I went with the larger wheel (it looked better), but it did reduce the range slightly (more on that later). Otherwise, everything is included in the price. I think the car sits well on the road – a wheel at each corner. I was able to negotiate interior mats & a boot liner as part of the deal. I did add small mud flaps (probably also impacted the range) which have kept the paint looking bright.
The theme of the e is a lot of technology packed into a small space. As you approach, the front door handles pop out and you may wonder where the wing mirrors are? Rear door handles are in the C-pillar. As you pull the door handle, the window drops, like a sport coupe and you realise the windows are frameless.
The car has independent MacPherson strut suspension at each corner and weighs about 1540kg. It is rear drive, but there is no “froot”, when you pop the bonnet (which is held up on gas struts) and under there it’s full of controllers, brake systems, 12V battery, washer fluid and traction battery coolant. Yes, the 35.5kWh battery (28.5kWh useable) is temperature maintained through a fluid, but the e does not have a heat pump – again potentially impacting range.
The boot is….compact. No load lip. And there is a small under floor storage for the “granny” charge cable and get you home tyre repair kit – no spare is provided. A solid parcel shelf covers contents, and the rear seat can be easily folded flat, but it is a one-piece affair.
Interior
Getting in is easy, with front and rear wide opening doors. Seats are a grey knitted wool fabric and appears though out the cabin. Ahead of you, on Grandma’s sideboard are 5 screens plus 1. I will explain. These screens appear to sit on a wooden plinth – yes wood – in a car from 2020!
Straight ahead is the drivers display, and to the left of this is a touch screen for infotainment – sat nav or Apple Carplay (and Android Auto). In front of the passenger is a 3rd touch screen that can display additional information. These two views an be swapped between. So, a passenger might set up the navigation on their screen and then “exchange” it to the one closer to the driver. A good solution.
Book ending these 3 screens are two additional screens for the rear facing camera mirrors – remember I wrote that it looked like the e was missing wing mirrors? This is because it has little “nubbin cameras” where the wing mirrors would normally be. They are inside the width of the wheel arches, keeping the car compact – and actually improving aerodynamics and hence range. Huzzarh! And for us, they work really well in sunshine or rain with no dazzle. And the screens are positioned inside the car where your eyes naturally go to look behind. They seem a much better solution than the Audi or Hyundai camera answer where they have sticking out pods on the car, just wating to be knocked. And there is one last screen – the interior mirror is a screen or a mirror. Again, I think this works well – and I wear varifocal glasses.
Side Cameras
Better Aerodynamics: The camera pods reduce aerodynamic drag by roughly 90% compared to standard wing mirrors, adding a 3.8% boost to the cars efficiency and range.
Reduced Blind Spots: Normal View reduces blind spots by roughly 10% and Wide View slashes blind spots by up to 50%.
All-Weather Visibility: The camera housings are designed to shed wind and water with the lense featuring a water-repellent coating.
Automatic Brightness & Anti-Glare: The interior displays automatically adjust their brightness according to outside lighting to prevent blinding or night glare.
The interior has a few more party tricks. There is an HDMI connector (as well as USB charging ports so you can connect a games consol and use the cars screens to play, say Mario Kart. When stationary. And the two touch screens can operate as a fish bowl (3 versions), fish swim about. You can feed them! Beat that farting Tesla fanboys 😊
There is a glass roof above with a cover. Between the seats are a pop out cup holder, storage and driving controls with forward, back, park, electric handbrake and sport button – e has only two modes normal and sport. There are two flappy paddles for brake regen on the steering column, and a separate button near the drive controls for one pedal driving. If you’ve driven a Honda before, the e is built to Honda engineering standards as everything feels solid and will last.
In addition to the screenfest, there are buttons for volume, heater and aircon, heated seats and steering wheel. On the steering wheel itself are more controls for cruise and lane keeping and radio/Car Play track and volume operation.
The e has a full set of driver aids. Including blind spot and cross traffic and reverse traffic alerts. Lane keeping, active cruise control and speed limit warning. Lane keeping works well on wider fast roads, but it is easy to turn off for local country roads (where I feel it hinders good driving). Again, 6 years ago I think this was unusual in a small car, and goes partly to explaining the high cost of the e.
Rear seat space is for 2 only, but two ISOfix child seats fit, as do two reasonably tall adults. This is NOT a big car, but there is far more rear space than a Mini E or a newer Renault 5. Don’t forget the brown seatbelts, which match the stitching in the seats. All very comfy lounge vibe. One can pull 1500W to boil a kettle or charge electrical items quickly.
Performance and range
The e is quite spritely, 0-60 in 8.3s from 152hp (113kW) motor. My wife tells a story of easily out dragging a Porsche off the line, but it angrily charging past after 50mph on a dual carriage. Handling is good, with the rear drive pushing. Turning circle is an almost London Taxi amazing diameter of 9.2m. The sport button doesn’t add any more performance, but reshapes the torque curve to provide swifter pick up. Ride is really good – quite soft, but not too much roll in the corners. You can really punt the e along country roads. And in the city, it darts around, nipping into spaces. So easy to park – there is even an auto-park function, for the inept.
Range. Now we come to one of the potential Marmite elements of the car. Theoretically it’s 137 miles, and we get about 120 miles typically. It has a bit less range in winter because you have the heating on. However, the A/C in the summer doesn’t seem to impact the range.
Now I genuinely think “range anxiety” has been coined by the fossil fuel industry to panic non-EV drivers. You would have to be a VERY bad driver to run out of electricity – you get so many prompts from the car at 20%, 10% and 5% alarms. It only requires a bit of pre-planning with the likes of Zapmap or ABRP apps. But having said that, the Honda e was/is targeted as a city car, with inter-city potential. Despite this, we’ve been on holiday to Brighton from rural Worcestershire which required a couple of charge stops. But the e is NOT a long-distance motorway “sales person” rep-mobile. The e only received a 4 star rating from Euro NCAP in 2020.
Charging
Home Wallbox (7 kW AC): Takes about 4 to 5 hours to charge from 0% to 100%.
Standard Wall Socket (3-pin AC): Takes around 14 hours and 45 minutes for a full charge.
DC Rapid Charger (50 kW CCS): Takes approximately 30 minutes to reach an 80% charge. The car peaks at a maximum DC power of 46 kW to 50 kW.
Price is the other element of the Marmite status. Now I paid £28k when new, and it is still worth £13k so I feel pleased. But I do understand the price rose to £38k near the end of its short production run in January 2024 – that was expensive.
Servicing costs have been cheap – I purchased 5 years of service for £250 when new. There was no road fund licence costs until April 2025 (now £200/y). I took out the Honda service, warranty & MoT package for years six and seven at £23.7/m or £568.8 for two services, MoTs, warranty and AA cover. I am lucky to be able to charge at home on Octopus Intelligent Go tariff for 6.8p/kWh overnight. This equates to less than 2p/mile and my insurance went down this year to £199, making the Honda e cheap to run.
My 5 Pros and Cons of the Honda-e
Pros
1. For me, the interior and exterior look justify the price
2. Fun to drive – ideal city car
3. Cameras for wing mirrors
4. The amazing turning circle
5. Solidly built to Honda engineering standards.
Cons
1. The front wheels are a different width to the rears – and tyres not available from many companies
2. No split folding rear seats – or Honda Magic Seats (as in the new Super N)
3. Only 4 seats
4. Honda didn’t continue to develop the e, like Renault did with the Zoe over its life
5. Small boot, but sufficient for a weekly big shop
Summary
It is a shame Honda lost confidence in the e and never continued to develop it. Imagine a Type-R version?
Marmite – because of the cost and potential range issue. But I would argue “jelly and ice cream” car. Everyone likes jelly and ice cream. I think the e looks amazing. The interior is like a lounge. The exterior brings a smile, like the handling. The e is not a one car only family car. But for those who’s life it fits into, who like Marmite, will find it a brilliant bit of design, that elevates it above just transport – ours is call Evie Blue. So not everyone likes Marmite, but everyone likes jelly and ice cream and I think, once driven, everyone would love the technical tour de force that is the Honda e.
The Author
Julian had a 39-year career in Consulting and IT Services and he is a self-confessed technology and car geek, who will bore anyone when talking about EVs, solar panels and air source heat pumps (perhaps he needs to hone his sales pitch to persuade more people to lead eco lives?)
Julian is married to Jackie, and they have one daughter, who has left home. He lives in beautiful rural Worcestershire.
