MG4 EV review: Electric hatch that drives like a BMW

THIS battery-powered hatchback from China might well be the best car you’ve never heard of. In fact, the MG4 EV is not just good, but scarily so. It not only signals that electric cars now set the standard for what modern motoring should be, but that the best Chinese manufacturers have become something for everyone else to worry about.

To start with, the raw numbers are promising. The MG4 has a 201 horsepower motor that drives the rear wheels, and its 64 kilowatt-hour battery pack delivers a claimed range of 450 km.

That’s more than competitive in today’s electric vehicle (EV) market, and seriously impressive at this price point. It also means that a little more than an hour plugged into a common 50-kilowatt charger, the kind now at shopping malls all over Singapore, should see the MG4 good to go for a week.