What It's Like To Live With A BMW i8

So far, our only encounters with BMW’s futuristic i8 have been fleeting ones. A couple of years ago CT Editor-in-Chief Alex hooned one around Scotland for a day, and about a year later we got the i8 together with the outgoing Audi R8 for an unconventional twin test. But when it comes to EVs and hybrids, you really need to spend quality time with them to find out all the benefits and pitfalls of running such an unconventional machine.

Since the excitement and hype around the car has died down, we thought now would be a good time to do exactly that, by living with the pretty ‘Prontic Blue’ example you see here for a week, to answer some questions many will still have about the i8.

Do people still go nuts when they see it?

When the i8 first arrived in 2014, it caused something of a stir. No, wait, that’s a bit of an understatement. It was more like a massive explosion went off in the car world. Never had a production car looked so damn similar to its concept counterpart: here was a car with look-at-me dihedral doors, crazy U-shaped tail light clusters and a heavily sculpted body that channels air through them - all for a super-low drag coefficient of 0.26 Cd.

But what about now? Have people had enough time to get used to the i8? Not at all, as it turns out. I’ve been fortunate enough to drive some nice cars for this job, but nothing has received anything like the attention the i8 did. Complete strangers come up to speak to you and have a look inside. Pedestrians turn around and stare as you drive past. One kid even pointed at the car as I trundled down the street, arm outstretched and mouth agape with the shock of seeing such an other-worldly car. If you like to be discreet, this isn’t the car for you…

Is it practical?

Err, ish. The i8 is mid-engined, but because the unit that’s mounted just in front of the rear axle is a dinky 1.5-litre three-pot, you do get a little boot behind it. I filled it with about two bags of shopping, to give you an idea of how little we’re talking, but it’s a good job it’s there, as you’ll get nothing in the front. Yep, sadly there’s no frunk here, because all of the i8’s batteries are stored up front.

However unlike every other new mid-engined car out there - save for the Lotus Evora - you actually get rear seats in the i8. Sure, you’re not going to get a full-sized human in there, but it’s fine for kids or baby seats (the latter being something I tried out myself, as you can see…), or for dumping luggage you couldn’t fit in the boot.

Getting in and out of the car isn’t easy if you’re a bit tall and gangly like me; you’ll need to duck to get your head under the low roof line, while lifting your bum up in a semi-acrobatic manoeuvre to avoid the high sill of the carbonfibre tub. Oh and if you’re really, really fat, don’t even bother.

Can it really do 134.5mpg?

Realistically, no. In fact the trip computer won’t even record anything over 99.99mpg. Over the course of the loan with a mix of motorway miles, town driving and hard country road driving, with a decent amount of charging at home, I averaged 35mpg, while on one spirited drive followed by a little town driving I zeroed the second trip computer and ended up with a result of 24mpg.

Sounds terrible, but in reality it’s not. All plug-in hybrids - not just the i8 - massively skew the result of the EU economy test, because they start with a full charge and are able to spend much of the very gentle simulated run on nothing but electric power. Until the test is changed - which it will be by September 2017 - you may as well ignore MPG figures for cars like this.

Also, when you look closer at that 35mpg figure, it’s actually pretty good. While it was a mix of driving, the majority was of the hooning variety, and since something like the Porsche 911 won’t be particularly far into double figures when you’re driving hard, that 24mpg I mentioned earlier is commendable indeed. Had I been with the car longer - not feeling the need to pack in quite so many country road blats - I’d have easily put it well into the 40s, which for something with 357bhp, 420lb ft of torque and a 0-62mph time of 4.4 seconds is bloody good going.

Also it’s worth mentioning that if your commute is well within the i8’s maximum 22-mile EV-only range and your employers are nice enough to let you charge the thing at work, you could lock the car into ‘eDrive’ mode (the car can either run with the engine off entirely with it working as a generator only or powering the rear wheels) and not use a drop of fuel all week. That’d be a massive waste with a car like this, obviously, but what you could do after your petrol-free week of commuting is take it for an almighty Saturday morning thrash, and your overall MPG figure would be something completely bonkers.

Is it a pain in the arse to charge?

That depends. For £315 BMW, will fit a ‘Wall Box’ which looks like it’ll make charging nice and easy, not to mention quicker - giving you an 80 per cent charge in about two hours. If you don’t have that, or a garage with a power socket, it’s a faff. Even though I have a driveway, it was still a pain to have to trail an extension cord through my garden and into the house via the cat flap (sorry, cats). And if you just park on the street or live in a flat, well, you’re gonna have a bad time.

You’re looking at about eight hours for a full charge from empty, and depending on your electricity tariff it’ll probably cost you less than £1 - the i3 costs an average of £2 to charge fully, and that has a much larger battery capacity. You do want to be charging relatively often, as it’s hard to keep the batteries topped up when you’re not driving like a lunatic, with the car in sport mode and heavy braking giving you lots of juicy re-generation.

I did also try a ‘Charge Now’ public charging unit at a shopping centre, which - after a few failed attempts and a bit of shouting - worked rather well. It came with free parking, but you do have to pay for the charge.

How does it drive?

The way the i8 drives is simply fascinating, and unlike anything else I’ve ever driven. What you get is the 1.5-litre turbocharged three-banger - good for 228bhp - driving the rear wheels - and an electric motor powering the front wheels with 139bhp of thrust. So it’s four-wheel drive, but without any physical link between the front and rear axles.

Having the engine and the motor working together means you have the best attributes of each: you get the instant torque delivery of the electric motor giving you a swift kick off the line, much like you feel in a quick EV like a Tesla Model S. However in an EV, after the initial burst everything feels a bit linear and not all that fast, but that’s not the case with the i8, as you have the 1.5-litre engine kicking in not long after. The whole package feels punchy, responsive, and a lot more rapid than the figures might suggest.

When it comes to handling, things are a little more confused. The steering is light and fast, but it brings with it a frustrating sense of detachment. The chassis isn’t the most communicative, either.

It feels deliciously nimble and stable in the corners, where you benefit from a low centre of gravity, but the i8’s eco-friendly, low-rolling resistance 215 front/245-section rear tyres (the standard-fit boots are even narrower) mean it’s easy to run out of grip, particularly in the wet, often with the front wheels giving up first. That’s when you’re treated to the overly-aggressive traction control system - which you’ll want to switch off - and when you feel the weight of all the hybrid gubbins the i8 has to lug about.

When you’re not attacking corners like a man possessed, it’s utterly relaxing to drive. In EV mode it’s quiet, and the ride is seriously comfortable; it’s the perfect antidote for stressful driving through congested towns and cities.

Should you buy one over a conventional sports car?

The question I kept asking myself when living with the i8 was this: is it a sports car? Yes, I’ve decided tentatively, but it’s certainly not a sports car as we know it. It’s not as exciting as something like a Porsche 911 GTS or a Jaguar F-Type R - it’s a sports car that will intrigue and beguile you, rather than one that’ll make your bits go fizzy. But actually, I rather like that. It’s a completely different way of going fast, and I love the fact that hybrid technology has been used to enhance the performance as well as the efficiency.

And you can’t ignore the whole efficiency side of it. Sure, you could argue the people who have the £104,950 necessary to buy one (minus a £5000 grant from the government, thanks Dave) are rich enough not to care about running costs. But even the well off can’t ignore the fact that it costs £0 to tax (an F-Type R or 911 GTS is nearly £900 for the first year and just under £500 thereafter), could save you thousands in fuel costs every year, and will let you potter about town almost guilt free. You could also have one as a company car, and pay just one third of the Benefit In Kind tax you’d suffer with the Jag or Porsche.

Is it the future?

When you’re wafting around in the i8, dashboard aglow with blue strips of light and twin screens displaying information about power flow, charge and fuel economy, you certainly feel like you’re in some sort of sports car of the future. But is that what it is in reality? Yes and no.

The i8’s construction features a plethora of recycled materials - including a tub made from recycled carbonfibre - something we’re likely to see a lot more of on all cars of the future. And that whole idea of using electric power for performance and not just for economy and emissions is likely to become a whole lot more common - just look at Volvo and its ‘T8’ hybrid cars.

However, it’s the hybrid system itself that makes it more of a car of the here and now than one of the future. Anything that still features good old fashioned internal combustion power - even if it’s supplemented with electricity - is still intrinsically linked to the past. So what we have here is more of a stepping stone; a stop gap that shows us that manufacturers can screw together a fast and fascinating car without massive, thirsty engines.

I’ll miss big silly engines, obviously, but if fast cars of the future are anything like the i8, life as a petrolhead will still be pretty sweet.