Kia EV9 vs Volvo ES90

The Kia EV9 is £915 cheaper to buy. Running costs are almost identical - about £176 a year either way, at 8,000 miles on an off-peak home tariff. Add 5 years of charging and the Kia EV9 comes out roughly £835 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 291 miles for the Kia EV9 and 286 miles for the Volvo ES90 - effectively matched, and both well below their WLTP figures because sustained high speed is the hardest case for an EV. Both rapid-charge to 80% in a similar time, around 22-24 minutes.

The Volvo ES90 is the easier car for tight UK car parks: it is 38 mm narrower than the Kia EV9. In a standard 2,400 mm bay that leaves about 458 mm of total clearance for the Volvo ES90 and about 420 mm of total clearance for the Kia EV9. The Volvo ES90 also turns in a 0.3 m tighter circle, which helps with U-turns and multi-storey ramps.

Over a 8-year ownership window EVcarsguide's degradation model projects roughly 89% battery health for the Kia EV9 and 84% for the Volvo ES90. That gives the Kia EV9 a modest edge in retained real-world range. Both use NMC-type cells, so for daily use keep the charge limit near 80% to slow degradation.