Mercedes-Benz EQV Review & Prices

The Mercedes EQV is a premium MPV that runs on all-electric power and has a great amount of space on offer. Primarily going up against the Volkswagen ID Buzz, the Mercedes also has competition from the Peugeot e-Traveller, Citroen e-Spacetourer and Vauxhall Vivaro Life Electric – although those three are much cheaper.

But with a premium finish, it’s a lot like buying a large house built in the 90s with loads of rooms, glass walls and nice fixtures – very practical, but it does have its downsides.

On the outside, it’s much like the V-Class van, with the only changes being the more aerodynamic grille and more streamlined wheels. So for an electric car, the blocky shape isn’t the sleekest thing in the world.

The similarities to the V-Class continue inside, with wood and leather trim throughout. The dashboard is quite bulky but as you’re sitting higher up you get a good view out of the front. Unlike newer electric Mercedes though, you get dials and a small display in the middle instead of a digital driver’s display. It feels quite dated.

Space-wise, the EQV is excellent. You get seven seats in all versions, with the middle and top spec models getting tables for the rear five chairs. You get room to stretch out and be comfortable while being ferried around.

To make the most of the boot, you need to take the rearmost seats out, which are bulky and you then need somewhere to store the chairs. You get an okay space behind those seats if they’re in place and it makes for a useful taxi, but it doesn’t have as good a dedicated space for five people as the Volkswagen ID Buzz.

You get one battery and motor choice with the EQV – a 90kWh pack is teamed with a 204hp motor mounted to the front axle, giving you a range of up to 213 miles. That’s a bit less than the funky and electric drive-optimised ID Buzz.

The ID Buzz is also more car-like to drive, as the EQV’s van heritage makes the Mercedes feel a little rigid and unrefined at times with a lot of noise from outside. Saying that though, it is easy to drive around town with the turning circle impressive for a car of this size.

On the motorway, the EQV does feel settled and you can use adaptive cruise control to take the strain out of longer drives. You get good visibility all-round, while the electric motor does give enough kick to get you up to speed.

Where the EQV feels a bit wobbly is on a twistier road. The high sides mean it can lean a little in the bends, while the light steering that works well in town doesn’t help so much out here as it feels like there’s limited feel of the grip on the front tyres.

Although the Mercedes EQV isn’t as suited to being an EV as the VW ID Buzz, if you need to ferry people around often in town, it feels like a premium product and has plenty of space for passengers.

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For a car that’s a little off the pace in terms of interior styling and equipment, the EQV is quite expensive. Volkswagen’s ID Buzz, which is quite costly anyway, starts £25,000 cheaper than the Mercedes and has funkier looks, a more modern interior and superior electric range. The Citroen e-Spacetourer, Peugeot e-Traveller and Vauxhall Vivaro Life Electric are much cheaper and offer the same seven seats, but quality isn’t as good.

If you’re after something where you’ll be ferrying lots of people around consistently, such as a taxi or airport transfer service, this is a smart zero-emission way of doing so. But you’ll need to find consistent ways of charging it.

The EQV manages to be comfortable and easy to drive in most scenarios, but the chassis can judder over bumps and range isn’t great

In town

For such a long car, the Mercedes EQV manages to be relatively simple to pilot around town. The light steering makes manoeuvring easier and you have a turning circle of just 11.8m, but that can’t hide the fact the EQV is close to 5.4 metres long. A Volkswagen ID. Buzz has a tighter turning circle too at 11.1m.

The standard-fit comfort suspension does a good job of ironing out a lot of creases at higher speeds, but at slower speeds, there can be some shakes and bumps through into the cabin. Where the EQV will work best is in town, so the air suspension that’s offered on the top-spec model might be the way to go.

You do get the parking package as standard that offers a reversing camera and sensors on the front and rear. Those do help make getting through tighter gaps and into parking spaces pretty simple, but mid- and top-spec models also come with a 360-degree camera to help your life even easier.

With large windows all around, visibility is good. You can easily look over your shoulder into your blind spots, while the rear window is large too – although the rearmost head rests can block it when in place. The bonnet also isn’t too long, so you have a good sense of where the front wheels are.

The electric motor doesn’t provide sparkling performance, but does get you up to speed well enough. You can deploy the regenerative braking to help with recharging as well, with the intelligent recuperation – engaged by pulling both paddles on the steering wheel at the same time – the best mode to make the most of the battery pack.

On the motorway

For long-range drives, the EQV can be a comfortable car for up to seven people, but you may be charging it up fairly often. While the 90kWh battery pack sounds like it’ll take you quite far, the rather blocky shape of the EQV means you don’t get great efficiency when driving at motorway speeds.

As mentioned earlier, getting up to speed can be a little slow, with the 0-60mph time of 12.1 seconds certainly not the fastest for an EV. When you’re up to speed though, the EQV can be put into the slightly fiddly adaptive cruise control mode to help you keep a safe distance to the car in front and help you chew through the miles in comfort.

You do get lane keep assist and blind spot detection to help with keeping you safe in traffic.

On a twisty road

Being van-based, the EQV isn’t suited to being ragged on a twistier road. The front-mounted electric motor isn’t punchy enough to give you an exciting time while driving and the EQV’s height can mean you lean a bit through corners at higher speeds.

The lighter steering that helps around town doesn’t help communicate the grip from the tyres as successfully here. That’s not to say the EQV feels unsafe at all, it’s just much more suited to calmer driving and keeping passengers in comfort.

You won’t be wanting for space inside the EQV with loads of room for seven people, but the boot space, while good, isn’t as practical as alternatives

The EQV definitely doesn’t lack spaciousness, as the front two seats give you plenty of room. The driver’s seat gets a good amount of adjustment, with head and legroom for the passenger also ample.

Being a van, you inherently have a large space between the front seats. But rather than filling that with a centre console, Mercedes has left that empty to help with the roominess. You do have a storage bin below the infotainment touchpad though – a bit of a throwback in Mercedes design – while the doorbins and glovebox are okay, not special.

Space in the back seats

With two rows of seating behind the driver, you get plenty of room for passengers. That’s usually set up as a row of two in the middle ahead of three chairs at the rear – which can be removed to improve boot space, but you will then need to find a place to store them while they’re not in the car.

You can slide the seats on both rows forward and backwards easily to give you more legroom – although you don’t need to to be comfortable. You get good headroom too, making it great for ferrying people around.

Boot space

The 1,030-litre boot with seven seats in place is a good size for a family vehicle or a taxi service, but is a little short of the 1,100-litre space offered by the VW ID Buzz. You get a flat floor throughout, and by sliding the seats forward you can capitalise on storage space and still have plenty of room.

The Stellantis trio of the Citroen e-Spacetourer, Peugeot e-Traveller and Vauxhall Vivaro Life Electric – that are built on the same chassis – all get 1,384 litres up to the roof, but you can’t move the rear seats of those forward to improve rear space like in the EQV.

You can improve the rear space even further by taking the rear seats out altogether. That said, you’ll then need to find a place to keep them in the meantime, which if you don’t have a garage, can be very impractical.

While you get decent levels of equipment and it looks stylish enough, the screens look outdated

Based on the V-Class that was originally introduced in 2014 and facelifted in 2019, the EQV isn’t the most modern-feeling Mercedes you can buy. It feels much better than the Stellantis alternatives and is on a par with the newer VW ID Buzz – although the VW costs a lot less. Where the Buzz has the advantage is the look of the dashboard – it’s much simpler and less fussy than the Merc.

The dash does get a nice wood finish as standard, while there’s lots of shiny metal detailing around the edges to brighten the darker surface. You get squidgier surfaces on top of the dash and on the door tops, but you’ll find a fair few scratchy plastics – something taxi drivers or families may be pleased to hear, helping with long-term durability. It doesn’t quite befit a Mercedes costing more than £80,000 though.

Rather than digital displays for the dials that you see on most EVs, the EQV gets conventional dials with a small information screen in the middle, which looks quite dated now. The infotainment touchscreen display and controls also carry on that out of date feel compared to the other Mercedes EVs.

The main infotainment screen is a 10.25-inch unit that does house the latest Mercedes software, which is smooth enough and clear to use. Mercedes’ latest MBUX setup is one of the best you can use. But what most of you will do is connect your phone, and with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto available, you’re more likely to use them as they look like your phone screen. That privilege, however, is a £299 option rather than standard, which is not great on a car this pricey.

You can add screens to the back seats to keep passengers entertained, as well as bluetooth headphones for them. But there’s not a lot else on the options list.

The EQV is fitted with a 90kWh battery pack paired to a 204hp electric motor mounted to the front axle. The EQV 300, as it’s labelled, doesn't have a particularly streamlined shape and weighs more than 2,600kg – not the best combination for long-range efficiency.

You get up to 213 miles of range with that setup, and that isn’t as good as the Volkswagen ID Buzz’s official range of 258 miles. You’re also needing to achieve 2.3 miles/kWh to get that figure, which is quite tricky at motorway speeds.

For charging, you get 11kW AC charging, which can take close to 10 hours to go from 10-100% charge. On DC, you can charge up to 110kW, getting you from 10 to 80% in 45 minutes.

Being an EV, you don’t have to pay road tax for the emissions at time of writing, although you will from April 2024. As the EQV costs more than £40,000 though, you’ll need to pay VED for that premium price.

When the V-Class was originally tested back in 2014, Euro NCAP gave it five stars. In the intervening years, that rating has been maintained, and when the EQV was introduced, it gained the same rating, although it should be noted that the crash test has been made more stringent in recent years.

The EQV also comes with a decent amount of safety assists as standard, including active brake assist, blind spot assist and lane keep assist, as well as the driver assistance package that adds adaptive cruise control. All of these help make drives much easier, especially in a bulky van.

You’ll be able to fit child seats with ISOFIX points on the five rear seats, while other security features include child safety locks and airbags in both the front and rear compartments.

The EQV has had some issues with suspension. The front axle of some models from 2020-2021 weren’t connected to the steering knuckle properly on some, while some suspension struts weren’t mounted successfully reinforced. If you’re after a used model, this is something you should make sure has been fixed.

With every Mercedes, you get a three-year/unlimited mileage warranty, while – being an EV – the EQV also gets an eight-year, 100,000-mile warranty for the battery pack. You also get roadside assistance with that warranty that includes Europe-wide cover.