Polestar’s more conventional 4 SUV is its most satisfying car yet

I’ve never been able to quite work out if it’s an insult to say that Polestar always makes me think of Saab. The dearly departed Saab was, of course, also a Swedish-based carmaker with foreign ownership (Saab by America’s General Motors; Polestar by China’s Geely) and it made quirky, interesting, often deliberately unusual cars seemingly aimed at a more intellectual sort of buyer.

Ditto Polestar, although of course it may well be insulting to suggest that one is like the other, considering that Polestar was born from Volvo (originally it was Volvo’s in-house racing team and high-performance brand), which was Saab’s erstwhile local rival. Perhaps we shouldn’t be trying to rekindle the old Gothenburg versus Trollhatten rivalries.

Still, though. Look at the current Polestar line-up. A compact saloon with, partially, the raised ride height of a crossover. A large SUV whose roof is lower and sleeker than that of some hatchbacks. A dramatic low-slung super-saloon with Ferrari-bothering power and poise. And a mid-size model that can’t seem to decide whether it’s a saloon, a crossover, or an SUV.

That last-mentioned, the Polestar 4, has actually just been renamed and, to add to the confusion, it’s now called the Polestar 4 coupé. That’s really stretching the elastics of semantics, although the car’s relatively sleek styling and the lack of a rear screen (ditched for aerodynamic reasons, allegedly, and replaced by a digital camera) manage to be both talking points and potential barriers to buyers.

Polestar knows this, and knows also that it has to expand, fast, beyond its current niche existence and into the broader car market. Hence, it needs to make cars that are a bit more conventional and more broadly appealing, and hence the existence of this, the Polestar 4 SUV.

The name pretty much describes the car. It has taken the basic structure of the existing Polestar 4 coupé and stretched the rear bodywork up and back a bit, creating a roomier boot, a more conventional silhouette, and adding in a rear window along the way.

So, this 4 SUV is definitely Polestar’s most conventional car yet, and even so, it feels as if the Sino-Swedish carmaker couldn’t resist adding in some quirk. So while it says SUV in the name, the side profile – and some of the engineering and design team’s descriptions – seems almost estate-like, while at the front it’s barely any taller, bulkier, or less sleek than the existing 4 coupé. Which is a good thing, as this is a very handsome, stylish car.

It’s also one that’s tough to pigeonhole. It kind of competes with the likes of the BMW iX3 and Mercedes GLC but is several thousand euro more affordable in its basic form and also a couple of hundred kilometres worse off in terms of range, or so it seems. Again, Polestar defies easy categorisation. Perhaps that’s a good thing.

Underneath, there’s a singular 94kWh battery choice, and so you simply decide whether you want the standard 272hp Single Motor Long Range version, or the double-the-power 544hp all-wheel drive Dual Motor Long Range. On paper, there’s barely any real difference in range (630km for the standard car; 600km for the Dual Motor) but clearly there’s a wild difference in performance. The single motor model scampers to 100km/h in a decent 7.3 seconds whereas the Dual Motor will knock the wind out of you by doing the same sprint in just 3.9 seconds.

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Does that mean that the Dual Motor is the driver’s choice? Not necessarily, no. We drove both versions on sweeping mountain roads, and actually the Single Motor Polestar 4 SUV is slightly the sweeter to drive, with nicer steering (less weight on the nose) and a sense of rear-drive adjustability in corners. Both are, however, exceptionally good to drive.

The steering is slightly numb and artificial in feel, but utterly accurate and quick. The ride comfort, aside from a slight sense of too much vertical movement over big bumps, is very well controlled and smooth, and while in either form this Polestar 4 SUV is a 2.2 tonne car, it never feels overly bulky (aside from its width, which tops 2m and which can make it feel a bit large in tight urban centres).

We did, perhaps slightly pointlessly, take a Dual Motor out on to the racetrack at Ascari, near Malaga, to test out the optional Performance Pack with its adjustable suspension, Brembo brakes (just like a Ferrari …), and its grippier Pirelli tyres, but hauling a big SUV around a track is never going to tell you much, other than that the 4 SUV comports itself surprisingly well in such circumstances.

Of much more importance to buyers will be the range, which is surprisingly good. We were seeing indicative ranges of around 610km for the Single Motor, and 570km for the Dual Motor, in mixed driving conditions (albeit in balmy Spanish weather). Those are impressive figures, and actually they put the Polestar 4 SUV more in the mix with its theoretically longer-ranged German competition than you might think.

The Polestar 4’s cabin is a masterclass in both high quality – everything you see or touch is exceptionally well wrought – and recyclability – items such as the different door panels are all made of the same polymers for easier end-of-life recycling. There’s acres of space front and rear, and the rear seats get an optional reclining backrest for maximal comfort. The (expensive) leather upgrade really lifts the cabin ambience, so it’s worth having, but the lack of physical buttons grates, especially given Polestar’s otherwise impeccable safety credentials. Apparently, new and better cabin layouts are in the offing.

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The taller rear bodywork pays off to the tune of an extra 30 litres of luggage space compared to the 4 coupé, and with more versatility when it comes to larger loads (plus there’s a small but useful 15-litre “frunk” in the nose). The addition of a proper rear windscreen (plus a wiper! Hurrah!) makes this 4 SUV feel much more conventional when you sit inside, and that’s arguably a good thing.

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Prices start from €56,690 for the Business Edition version of the Single Motor, which makes this sleek, slick Polestar 4 SUV an utter bargain compared to anything from BMW or Mercedes. In fact, given that the Polestar is also nicer to drive and better priced than its cousin, the Volvo EX60, this might just now actually be the car of choice in the increasingly more competitive premium electric SUV market.

If only people can be convinced to look past the quirky surface of Polestar and see the substance underneath.