2020 Nissan Leaf Plus review: More power, more range

Vary nervousness in electric powered autos is a extremely genuine thing. It really is akin to the fear of your mobile phone heading dead, but as an alternative of not getting equipped to look at Twitter for the most recent sizzling requires, you happen to be stranded on the aspect of the street — hopefully with a billed mobile phone so you can summon a tow truck. In the Nissan Leaf’s scenario, an EPA-approximated driving range of 149 miles is just not miniscule, but you know what would be superior to alleviate range worries? A range of 226 miles, which is in which the Leaf As well as will come in.

Better equipped to compete

In contrast to 2011 when the very first-technology Leaf went on sale, the EV landscape right now is a lot distinctive. The Nissan is no for a longer period the only electric powered hatchback in city, with entries like the Chevrolet Bolt, Hyundai Kona Electric and Kia Niro EV now in showrooms. Each and every features effectively around two hundred miles of range, leaving the base Leaf and its 40-kilowatt-hour battery pack much in the rearview mirror.

The Leaf As well as officially arrived very last calendar year with a greater sixty two-kilowatt-hour battery. In the base S As well as trim, it returns the beforehand outlined 226 miles of range, but the superior-equipped SV As well as and SL As well as products with far more options that use up power get an formal score of 215 miles. Without having issue, these quantities are a nutritious improvement around the conventional Leaf, but nevertheless lag powering the ranges of the Chevy (259 miles), Hyundai (258 miles) and Kia (239 miles).

2020 Nissan Leaf As well as: Likely farther and quicker than prior to

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In the course of a 7 days with an SL As well as tester, the 215-mile score appeared conveniently in just reach. I by no means allow the battery dip a lot beneath a 30{36a394957233d72e39ae9c6059652940c987f134ee85c6741bc5f1e7246491e6} cost for the reason that of range nervousness but was easily on observe to deal with 215 miles of motoring making use of the electron-sipping Eco method. 

Activating the e-pedal process yields sturdy regenerative braking the moment you elevate off the ideal pedal. The regen brakes are muscular sufficient to deliver the Leaf As well as to a comprehensive halt for a one-pedal driving knowledge. It really is mildly entertaining driving it this way and fulfilling when you navigate by way of city with out touching the brake pedal. Staying smooth and timing your throttle inputs effectively pays off as you deal with far more floor and barely see the battery cost gauge drop.

When you do deplete the As well as, juicing it up with a 240-volt, Amount 2 charger requires eleven.five hrs. A neat thing about the As well as is that the conventional charging cable handles the two Amount 1 and Amount 2 charging. So, as an alternative of paying out money setting up a Amount 2 charger at household, entrepreneurs can basically have a 240-volt outlet to plug into. As for Amount 1 charging from a typical household outlet, that requires north of 30 hrs.

For these who dwell close to a fifty-kW DC charger, the Leaf As well as can cost from to 80{36a394957233d72e39ae9c6059652940c987f134ee85c6741bc5f1e7246491e6} in an hour. If you happen to be lucky sufficient to have accessibility to a significantly less-prevalent one hundred-kW DC charger, that’ll cut cost time for a dead battery to 80{36a394957233d72e39ae9c6059652940c987f134ee85c6741bc5f1e7246491e6} to 45 minutes.

Additional power

The other welcome improvement accompanying the Plus’ upsized battery is a power jump. The regular Leaf is no slouch with 147 horsepower and 236 pound-ft of torque, but nobody will protest an enhance to 214 hp and 250 lb-ft. All that thrust is transmitted instantly to the front wheels by way of a single-speed transmission having the Leaf As well as to sixty mph in about 7 seconds, which is around a next quicker than the conventional design. There are zero issues having up to speed for expressway merging and passing maneuvers are a cinch. Additional than its -to-sixty time, I’m impressed with how rapidly the Leaf As well as accelerates from 40 to 70 mph and past. 

Straight-line slingshots are about the extent of the entertaining in the Leaf As well as from a overall performance standpoint. Based on trim degree, the As well as is about 340 lbs heavier than the base Leaf, and that doesn’t aid dynamics. There is certainly some dive underneath braking and roll at turn in. The low-rolling-resistance seventeen-inch Michelin Energy Saver A/S tires squawk in protest when you toss it into a corner and balance control intervenes ideal away to get points in buy.

Journey excellent is, nevertheless, buttoned up and relaxed on the fifty-sequence sidewall tires. Impacts from greater bumps are nevertheless felt within the Leaf’s cabin. The handoff from regenerative to mechanical braking is seamless, with halting pressure progressively raising as you press the pedal. The steering is light and devoid of any suggestions, but that is wonderful alongside with the significantly less-than-stellar cornering chops. The Leaf is just not meant to be a athletics vehicle. 

A Leaf within and out

If you happen to be expecting the Leaf As well as to glance a lot distinctive from the conventional Leaf, then you happen to be heading to be let down. Besides an added blue accent strip on the front fascia and the As well as badge on the hatch beneath the trim degree designation, it seems like each other Leaf. And that is not an fully terrible thing. The Leaf wears a reasonably aggressive experience with Nissan’s signature V-motion grille, delicate aspect character lines and five-spoke wheels with a contrasting silver experience and gray insets.

Inside of, there is certainly very little to produce household about, either. It features the Leaf’s higher seating placement, blue accent stitching right here and there and a lot of really hard plastic creating up the complete dash and portions of the door panels. The good thing is, the plastics are nicely concluded, and strategic spots are wrapped in vinyl and padded, these kinds of as the armrests, the center of the door panels and the aspect of the heart console, in which you may rest your knees. 

Space in the Nissan’s front- and next-row seats is serviceable for most adults and there are sufficient cubbies to stash merchandise in the course of the cabin. The Leaf can also shift pretty a little bit of cargo, with 23.6 cubic ft on provide powering the rear seats, which grows to 30 cubic ft with the next row folded ahead.

Quarterbacking infotainment in the Leaf is the NissanConnect process with an eight-inch touchscreen that doesn’t have the most vibrant graphics. It really is a aspect-loaded process with a pleasant Bose audio setup, satellite radio, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi hotspot, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. In the SL As well as, it also has onboard navigation, which frequently requires a minor little bit of time to calculate routes.

On the energetic security technology front, all Leaf products occur conventional with ahead-collision warning with automatic emergency braking, blind-location monitoring, lane-departure warning and rear cross-website traffic alert with rear automatic braking. On my SL As well as examination vehicle, Nissan’s ProPilot driver help tech is also integrated, making use of adaptive cruise control and lane-retain guide for partly automatic, hands-on-the-wheel motoring that performs very effectively in website traffic.

How I might spec it 

I usually consider to retain my builds as spending budget-acutely aware as possible, but with the Leaf As well as, I have to spring for the SL trim. Optioning the midgrade SV will have me incorporating a couple of selection packages to get should-haves like heated seats and LED headlights, bumping the selling price tag to close to-SL stages. Splurging on the range-topping design fees $forty four,825, including $925 for desired destination. Tack on the $695 two-tone black and white paint task like on the vehicle pictured right here and $195 ground and cargo mats, and that brings the bottom line of my suitable vehicle to $45,715. Regrettably, that is not a lot far more reasonably priced than this $forty six,045 tester.

A superior Leaf, but not the benchmark

The 2020 Nissan Leaf As well as will set you back again $39,125 to get started, which is far more than the $37,890 Chevy Bolt and $38,365 Hyundai Kona Electric, but far more reasonably priced than the $40,210 Kia Niro EV. All a few of the Leaf’s competitors provide a greater dose of design, are far more engaging to push and, most importantly, provide for a longer period driving ranges.

What the Leaf has operating in its favor is a sizable listing of conventional and available security tech features, and the truth that it truly is the best-advertising EV to day has undoubtedly made some Nissan loyalists. But to any one new to the EV globe with no preceding allegiance to brand or design, the Leaf As well as likely is just not the best selection in the reasonably priced EV hatchback segment.