Automotive Business Magazine – Q3 2026 – Digital edition - Flipbook - Page 64
REV I E W
FIAT GRANDE PANDA
The cheeriest
small EV in Britain
Fiat Grande Panda
Electric review
BY ADRIAN SIMPSON
L
iving with the Fiat Grande
Panda for seven days proved
two things at once: the Grande
Panda is one of the most
likeable cheap cars you can
buy, and you should never, ever
ask it to take you from Sussex
to Leeds.
I came away from my first
drive of the Grande Panda genuinely
charmed. A week later, I'm still charmed,
but I've also learned exactly where the
charm runs out. Roughly junction 23 of
the M1, with the battery gauge doing
impressions of a countdown clock.
More on that ordeal shortly. First, the
good news, because there's a lot of it.
What small cars are for
The thing that strikes you every single
morning with the Grande Panda is that
someone clearly enjoyed designing it.
In a class where most cars now look
like they were focus grouped into beige
submission, the Fiat turns up wearing
Limone Yellow paint and a grin.
It's boxy in the way the original 1980
Panda was boxy – all flat panels, honest
proportions and just shy of four metres
long – and it has the good manners to
be cheerful about being cheap, rather
than apologetic. The detailing keeps
rewarding you throughout the week. The
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AUTOMOTIVE BUSINESS
Q3 2026
word PANDA is pressed into the door
panels, which looks like a styling gag but
actually stiffens the metal. There are little
nods to Fiat's historical Lingotto factory
dotted around the cabin if you go looking,
and the brand's four-bar monogram is
embossed on every available surface.
None of it costs anything, all of it
makes the car feel designed rather than
assembled, and after seven days I was
still noticing new bits. That's rare in
anything, let alone something starting in
the low 20s.
Inside, the same logic applies. The
dashboard is a simple shelf, the cabin is
bright and unintimidating, and the blue
and white fabric trim is a relief after a
decade of funereal grey plastic.
You get a 10 inch driver display, a 10.25
inch Uconnect touchscreen with wireless
Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, proper
sat nav, DAB, a wireless charging pad
and, crucially, actual physical sense to
the layout.
Climb in cold on a wet Monday and
you understand the whole car inside
30 seconds. For something a household
might share between several drivers,
that intuitiveness is worth more than any
amount of screen real estate.
Yes, the plastics are hard and obviously
built to a price. But the cabin is honest
about what it is, and that honesty is far
