Mini Countryman Electric long-term test: report 5

The car Mini Countryman Electric Exclusive Run by Chris Haining, sub-editor

Why it’s here To find out whether Mini's electric family SUV has what it takes as a comfortable, versatile daily workhorse 

Needs to Handle a long motorway commute without stopping to recharge; be at home in the great outdoors as it is in the urban jungle

Mileage 5645 List price £44,580 Target Price £43,700 Price as tested £49,600 Official range 286 miles Test range 242 miles 

28 January 2025 – An open and shut case

The worst of the recent cold weather has largely bypassed my corner of Essex, leaving me and my Mini Countryman Electric without much in the way of snow or ice to negotiate. As I expected, though, the chilly snap has had a detrimental effect on how far it’ll take me on a full charge of its biggish 64.7kWh (usable capacity) battery.

However, the car’s idea of what’s chilly seems rather adrift of mine. After a frosty night, it's understandable when the estimated range offered after a 100% charge falls a fair way short of the car's official 286-mile range. It's normal for batteries to not perform as well in cold conditi0ns, as we regularly find in our winter range test. However, recently, after I had left it plugged on a comparitively mild night (the temperature didn't dip below 11deg celsius), a 100% charge could muster only 220 estimated miles. That’s not quite enough to get me to work and back.

It means that, once more, I’m cursed to pause at South Mimms Services on my way home; a place I grew very familiar with during my time with a Lexus RZ, which had a very disappointing range even in the peak of summer. Still, at least the Mini’s reasonable 130KW charging rate means I can plug it into one of that location’s Applegreen rapid chargers, and enough range to get me home will have been added by the time I’ve gone in to use the gents.

Speaking of curses, those are what uttered from my mouth after an incident unrelated to the above. As somebody who appreciates a distinctive exhaust note, I had wound the front passenger window down to better hear a Mercedes-AMG C63 Estate as it turned off the road ahead of me. It sounded tremendous, and, satisfied, I went to close the window… and it remained stubbornly in the bowels of the door.

Closure requests from the electric window button were met with grim bangs and clankings from hidden machinery, and – with the sky looking ominously grey – the car remained sans window. In a bid to keep the car watertight, I wrapped the aperture with cling-film from an industrial-sized roll found locally, and this did the job, except that it ballooned and rippled alarmingly at speeds of 25mph or faster. With the car effectively undriveable until fixed, it had to be recovered to a Mini workshop for repair. Fortunately, the car was repaired promptly and I was kept mobile with a courtesy car.

On one of my own, 20-plus year-old cars, I’d be fairly sanguine about this kind of mechanical gremlin, but it’s hard to forgive on a brand new car that claims a premium billing – let alone one that costs almost £50,000. At least it wasn’t snowing. 

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