Fiat 500e vs VW e-Up!

The VW e-Up! costs £2,200 more than the Fiat 500e. For that premium it adds 43 miles more WLTP range and 65 litres more boot space. The Fiat 500e is not just cheaper - it also offers a 2.4s quicker 0-62mph time. On EVcarsguide's combined category scores, the Fiat 500e comes out ahead overall.

The Fiat 500e is £2,200 cheaper to buy. Running costs are almost identical - about £136 a year either way, at 8,000 miles on an off-peak home tariff. Add 5 years of charging and the Fiat 500e comes out roughly £2,320 cheaper overall. These figures cover list price and home charging only - insurance, servicing, tyres and depreciation will move the real total.

EVcarsguide estimates a real-world motorway range of about 98 miles for the Fiat 500e and 116 miles for the VW e-Up! - both below their WLTP figures, because sustained high speed is the hardest case for an EV. The VW e-Up! goes roughly 18 miles further between charging stops. A rapid charge to 80% takes around 30 minutes in the Fiat 500e and 49 in the VW e-Up!, so the Fiat 500e loses less time at each stop. So the VW e-Up! stops less often while the Fiat 500e stops for less time - pick on which you would rather do.

The VW e-Up! is the easier car for tight UK car parks: it is 38 mm narrower than the Fiat 500e. In a standard 2,400 mm bay that leaves about 755 mm of total clearance for the VW e-Up! and about 717 mm of total clearance for the Fiat 500e.

Over a 8-year ownership window EVcarsguide's degradation model projects roughly 84% battery health for the Fiat 500e and 84% for the VW e-Up!. That is close enough that capacity loss should not decide between them. Both use NMC-type cells, so for daily use keep the charge limit near 80% to slow degradation. Both batteries carry a 8-year manufacturer warranty.