Maserati GranTurismo Folgore Review & Prices

The Maserati GranTurismo Folgore is the all-electric version of the drop-dead-gorgeous Italian four-seat coupe, and it comes packing a serious power output. Folgore is Italian for lightning and you’ll definitely feel like you’ve been hit by a thunderclap when you accelerate in this car. It’s like someone strapped an Apollo moon rocket to a high-end Italian clothes shop.

You can see a lot of the previous Maserati GranTurismo design in the lines of this GranTurismo, but that’s hardly a big problem. It’s like saying you can see some influence from Da Vinci’s The Last Supper in the Mona Lisa. That said, the headlights do look as if they’ve come off a Ford Puma, but even so this is a seriously gorgeous car with those three distinctive ‘portholes’ in the side, which hark back to classic 1950s Maseratis, even if they are just for show in this electric version.

The interior is pretty cool too, especially if you go for the show-off two-tone leather option. The split-level touchscreens which control the infotainment and climate control separately are fiddly at times, but they’re a better solution than having everything on one screen. Thankfully, there are also a few proper real buttons, and these look and feel great. It’s really good that Maserati put the driving mode switch on the steering wheel, as it means you can flick between modes quickly and easily, with no need to go stabbing at a touchscreen.

Maserati GranTurismo Folgore: electric range, battery and charging data

Range: 270 miles
Efficiency: 2.7-2.8 miles per kWh
Battery size: 83kWh
Max charge speed: 270kW
Charge time AC: 11hrs
Charge time DC: 18mins
Charge port location: Left rear
Power output: 761hp

The front seats are amazingly comfortable, while the back seats are just about useable for adults. The boot is pretty small though, with even less space than the V6 petrol model, and that’s not exactly capacious.

The GranTurismo Folgore’s 83kWh battery gets you a claimed range of 270 miles. That’s enough to get you from Monaco to Milan on one charge, in theory, but of course electric cars rarely if ever manage to meet their claimed ranges.That puts the whole ‘Grand Touring’ thing rather in doubt. Still, with 270kW charging, you can be topped up and on your way again fairly rapidly.

Speaking of rapid… the Folgore has no fewer than three electric motors; one at the front and two at the back, and each one has 340hp. Now, that doesn’t mean you get 1,020hp, because the car’s electronics won’t let that happen. However, you do get 761hp, which is still lots. And more than you get from the V6 turbo model, as it happens.

Around town, the Folgore is quite smooth, although it’s a bit on the big side and visibility isn’t great. On motorways, it cruises quietly with so much power in reserve that you can easily annihilate lines of slow traffic. On twistier roads, with all that weight in the battery pack, you’d expect the Maserati to feel a bit plank-like, but actually it’s really good fun and even the fake engine noises sound reasonably convincing.

The tough part is going to be getting past the Folgore’s massive price tag. There are other high performance electric cars which are just as quick, but have more range and come with considerably more affordable prices. However, the Folgore has way more charm, and more styling that’s far more handsome, than pretty much any of them.

If a slinky Italian super-coupe with electric power is at the top of your shopping list, why not check out Carwow’s offers on new Maseratis, or browse used Maseratis for sale. Remember too that Carwow is the place to be if you need to sell your old car, with our trusted network of dealers bidding to get you the best price.

This is where the GranTurismo Folgore’s case rather falls apart, because it’s within shouting distance of £200,000 in basic form. That’s not only a lot of cash — like, a serious lot — but as an EV, the Folgore is also going to depreciate heavily, so unless you’re buying this car to pass on to your grandchildren, it’s not a great purchase from a private point of view.

It’s better if you’re someone who’s buying it through their company, as the depreciation can be written off to an extent, and the company car tax costs are surprisingly mild (see below), but it must be remembered that the likes of the Porsche Taycan Turbo and Mercedes AMG EQS 53 are pretty much as quick, have much better range, are roomier inside, and not much less fun to drive. They’re just not as pretty, is all.

With all that power, the Maserati GranTurismo Folgore is massively fast, but it’s also deft on a twisty road and easy to drive around town, although the suspension fidgets a bit too much and the range isn’t great

In town

Being electric, the Maserati GranTurismo Folgore is whisper-quiet around town, which is nice, but the downside to that silence is that you hear every little rub and squeak of the leather-clad interior as you drive over bumps. It’s not that the car is badly made, just that leather is inherently squeaky, and the silence of the motors amplifies that.

It’s smooth and easy to drive around town, aside from slightly grabby brakes. There’s good visibility front and rear, but the windscreen pillars have massive blind spots. The turning circle is also massive. The suspension gives an occasional jolt over sharp bumps, but for the most part the GranTurismo Folgore is entirely pleasant around town.

On the motorway

The way the Folgore picks up speed from 40mph to 70mph, such as when you’re joining a motorway, or slipping past slower traffic on the inside lane, is really quite something. In fact, with 761hp and four-wheel drive, it can sometimes feel as if you’ve broken physics and made the Earth rotate backwards under the car. Blimey.

When you’re cruising at 70mph, the Folgore is very quiet, with only a little bit of wind noise. The excellent front seats are supportive and squishy in just the right areas, but the range takes a real hit at motorway pace. We saw efficiency as poor as 2.0 miles per kWh, which would equate to a range of just 166 miles. There is lane keeping assistance and adaptive cruise control too, but these are both easily confused by less than perfect road markings.

On a twisty road

Brutal honesty would suggest that a car with a large battery and a hefty kerb weight, and one that’s also set up for long-range comfort, wouldn’t do all that well on a tight and twisty British B-road. And yet the Folgore picks up its electric skirts and really gets into the groove on a road with lots of corners.

In fact, the Folgore is mightily impressive when you get it onto a challenging road, not least because the fact that there’s a motor for each rear wheel means that the Maserati can play around with physics by vectoring power to the tyre that can best handle it, making sure that as much of that 761hp is meeting the tarmac as possible. Maserati has also tuned the electric motors so that instead of dumping all their power at once — boom — the Folgore accelerates more like a petrol powered car, with the power building up as you go.

The air suspension does get rather fidgety though, even in the softest setting, and the GranTurismo Folgore doesn’t really settle down properly until you come to a smoother, wider stretch of road. The upside of that is that there’s almost no body lean in bends, and the steering is super-accurate, even if there’s not much feel through the wheel. The weight, and the speed across the steering lock, are just about ideal though. The overall handling might not be quite as good as that of a Porsche Taycan, but it’s still really good. The brakes are excellent too, with a natural feel to the pedal.

Maserati has also managed to give the Folgore some truly convincing fake engine noises, which don’t sound fake so much as ‘just right’.

The GranTurismo is practical enough in the front, and can actually just about fit adults in the back seats, but the boot is tiny

Space up front is good, and even tall drivers and front-seat passengers will be able to get very comfortable indeed, thanks in part to excellent front seats which are very supportive. There are storage areas in the Maserati’s cabin, but they’re not massive. There’s a very shallow space under the armrest, which is home to a wireless charging pad and some USB sockets, but there’s no room for anything much bigger than a phone in there. There are two cupholders, with a removable centre piece which opens up one bigger, deeper cup holder. Annoyingly, there’s no cover for the cupholders.

There’s a small storage space under a butterfly lid, which is made of lovely carbon fibre, but again there’s not much actual room in it, and there’s a second, shallow, wireless charging pad under the touchscreens. The glovebox — opened by pressing an icon on the screen — is ok in terms of size, but we love the gorgeously damped way that it opens.

Space in the back seats

Most 2+2 coupes are basically lying when it comes to the +2 bit, and cars such as the Porsche 911 and the Ferrari Roma are basically two seaters with a bit of nice leather luggage storage space in the back. The GranTurismo is a little better than that. It’s certainly a squeeze back there, but you can just about fit four adults in, although probably not for a long journey. Kids will fit back there easily, though, and there are ISOFIX points in the rear seats which is helpful.

Boot space

Going on a grand tour with your GranTurismo? Well, you’ll have to have your luggage sent ahead. The V6 petrol version of the GranTurismo has only a 310 litre boot, but this electric Folgore, because of the need to package its big battery, has a mere 270 litres of boot space. A Mini Cooper has more. There is a slim load-through hatch if you need to carry skis, but this is most definitely not a practical car.

There’s no ‘frunk’ in the nose, which is annoying, and the windscreen washer filler is mounted in the centre of the base of the windscreen, which makes it hard to get at.

The Folgore’s cabin is gorgeous, but the touchscreen is laggy

In short, the GranTurismo’s cabin is stunning. Okay, so the two-tone leather option looks a bit blingy, but everywhere you look there are nicely upholstered surfaces, and expensive-looking carbon-fibre trim. The big paddles behind the steering wheel are made of real metal too (although annoyingly they only manage the regenerative braking, and there’s no one-pedal mode), and the engine stop/start button, and the switch for changing the car’s driving modes, dangle enticingly like metallic grapes from the steering wheels’ spokes.

You sit low, too, thanks to the T-shaped battery pack being located down the middle of the body, and into the boot area. The driving position is excellent, and the three-spoke steering wheel feels fabulous to hold.

The infotainment system, possibly inspired by Audi, has been divided across two big touchscreens. The lower screen looks after climate control and heating alone, while the upper screen — the two screens look like someone’s opened a hardback book on the dash — takes on the mapping and entertainment. There are, thankfully, still a few physical buttons dotted around, but the overall layout of the infotainment screen is decent, and the graphics look suitably expensive. The problem is that the screen itself isn’t very responsive, lagging under your finger in an annoying fashion as you try to select options. It’s also obviously set up for left-hand drive, as all the shortcut buttons are on the left, while it’s too easy to press the lower screen with the heel of your hand when using the upper screen.

At least the stereo is good, with 17 speakers, and there’s a display that shows you how much power each motor is producing at any one time.

Lexus-like, instead of handles, you open the doors by pressing a button on the armrest, theoretically allowing you to push and exit in one smooth movement.

Range on a full battery is claimed, by Maserati, to be 270 miles but as ever with an electric car, you’ll be lucky to match that in the real world. Figure on being closer to 200 miles in real-world conditions, and less again if you’re cruising on the motorway, which does put a dent in the GranTruismo’s touring ability.

Then again, if you can find a high-speed charger, you’ll be back on the road in no time. Thanks to an 800-volt charging system, the GranTurismo Folgore can accept up to 270kW charging power, allowing it to get from 10-80% in just 18 minutes. Charging at home on a 6.4kW AC charger will take rather longer, about 11 hours. At an average of 2.8 miles per kWh, according to the official claim, the GranTurismo Folgore is hardly the most efficient EV around, but you’ll probably get closer to 2.0 miles per kWh in real life, especially with motorway mileage.

Happily, the GranTurismo Folgore compensates for all of this by being exceptionally cheap to tax. Even with the expensive car levy, you’ll only pay £435 in VED road tax in the first year, which presumably could be easily afforded by anyone able to cope with the purchase price, while the BIK tax would only work out at around £1,800 for the year for a business user (who, let’s face it, is going to be a company CEO).

The Maserati hasn’t been crash-tested by Euro NCAP, so we’ve no idea of how its safety systems stand up to independent scrutiny.

It’s not lacking safety kit, with the expected likes of speed limit warnings, lane keeping steering, adaptive cruise, and automatic emergency braking all as standard, although some of those active systems seemed easily confused at times on our test. The brakes are excellent, though, easily hauling this big, heavy, fast car down from 60mph in just 35 metres.

Maserati — models nor marque — hasn’t shown up in the most recent Driver Power customers satisfaction survey, so it’s a little hard for us to get a handle on how reliable this GranTurismo is likely to be.

On the upside, batteries in general seem to be robust, and electric motors only have one moving part. On the downside, Maserati has a poor history of flaky build quality and electrical fragility, although it has been doing rather better since it was bought by Fiat in the 1990s. It’s still very much a low-volume, hand-made car though. If you want something reliable, buy a Porsche.