2026 Zeekr 7X Performance AWD review

If ever there were a car primed to topple the might of the undisputed heavyweight champion of the electric SUV world, the Tesla Model Y, then it’s this, the Zeekr 7X.

That’s a big call to make about a nascent company that has been in Australia just on a year and, with the addition of this new electric SUV, has exactly three models in its local line-up. It’s also its most important.

But, unlike other brands hailing from China, Zeekr isn’t hell-bent on trading blows in a cut-price war of price attrition. Instead, the positively infant manufacturer that only began producing cars in 2021 has taken a different road, aiming to tap into the upmarket end of the electric vehicle spectrum; a segment dominated by Tesla and its Model Y mid-size SUV.

Plenty have tried to knock the Model Y off its lofty perch, but with 17,972 sales to the end of October this year, Tesla continues to outsell its nearest rival – BYD Dolphin 7 – at a rate of almost two-to-one.

So can this fledgling brand from China take on Elon Musk’s Tesla juggernaut and capture a significant slice of the electric medium SUV pie?

Three variants make up the Zeekr 7X line-up in Australia. And all of them undercut their Tesla Model Y equivalents in price.

Pricing starts from $57,900 plus on-road costs for the entry-level RWD (rear-wheel drive), steps up to $63,900 for the mid-spec Long Range RWD, and tops out at $72,900 for the all-you-can-eat Performance AWD (all-wheel drive).

That places the 7X somewhere between the BYD Sealion 7 range ($54,990–$63,990 before on-road costs) and Tesla Model Y ($58,900–$89,400). The Zeekr also undercuts the newly arrived IM6; a premium-focused electric mid-size SUV from fellow Chinese brand MG ($60,990–$80,990 drive-away).

On test here we have the flagship Zeekr 7X Performance AWD, which brings two electric motors for combined outputs of 475kW and 710Nm for a claimed 0–100km/h time of 3.8sec, and a 100kWh battery offering a claimed driving range of 543km (WLTP tested).

As befitting a flagship model, the Performance AWD is loaded with the type of gear and technology buyers paying premium money expect.

A by no means exhaustive list of external features brings adaptive air suspension, 21-inch alloy wheels, LED head- and tail-lights, a powered tailgate, power-operated doors, and a panoramic sunroof.

Inside is where the 7X makes its luxury aspirations known with big screens, plush nappa leather, heated and cooled front seats with 14-way power and massage function, heated rear seats, powered rear sunshades, and a heated steering wheel.

A comprehensive suite of safety and advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) is also bundled into the 7X.

Customer deliveries of the 7X have only just started, and given the demand to date, deals are unlikely to be easy to come by – but you can find thousands of other new and used electric cars for sale at Drive Marketplace.

Find your nearest Zeekr showroom here to see the 7X in the metal, while for more information on pricing and specifications for the Zeekr 7X range, click here.

The 7X’s external dimensions closely mirror those of its main rivals from Tesla and BYD. The Model Y is a touch wider, while the Sealion 7 is a smidge longer, but the overall dimensions of the Zeekr conform to the mid-size SUV template.

That results in a generously spaced interior. One that – in this flagship model – looks and feels refined and solidly built, which are the hallmarks of a premium car.

That’s reflected in quality materials throughout. A highlight in this flagship grade are the soft and supple nappa leather seats. They’re comfortable too, with good side bolstering, decent under-thigh support, and in this Performance AWD range-topper come with 14-way power adjustment.

The cabin adheres to the modern minimalist principle, with the central screen the nerve centre of the 7X. Almost all of the car’s functions are located within the screen, with just a smattering of physical buttons gracing the dashboard – for opening the glovebox, volume control, adjusting airflow direction, and a Mode button that can be customised to suit personal preferences.

The heated leather-wrapped steering wheel looks sporty with its flat bottom and top, and feels reassuringly meaty in hand. It’s festooned with shortcut buttons on the spokes that can, depending on the screen selected in the digital driver's display, adjust the steering wheel, external mirrors or even change climate-control settings. It takes a bit of familiarisation to get across the myriad functions, but once you do it becomes second nature.

Storage for bits and bobs is plentiful, with a deep central storage bin covered by a nicely padded lid with bi-directional opening, making for easy access to the storage bin from both either the driver's or passenger's side.

Two cupholders – under a retractable lid – grace the centre console, while the door pockets offer generous space for bottles.

Space in the second row is excellent, with nicely cushioned seats and decent amounts of foot, knee, leg and head room. A flat floor ensures the middle seating position isn’t compromised in terms of foot and leg room either, while power-reclining seatbacks bring a level of lounge-ability.

Second-row amenities include air vents in the door pillars (but no distinct climate controls), a fold-down armrest with cupholders, storage trays under the seat base, as well as generous door pockets capable of taking bottles.

For those with little ones, the outboard seats are equipped with ISOFIX child seat mounts, while all three seatbacks feature top-tether anchors. Keeping UV rays at bay, powered sunshades on the side windows are a nice touch.

Out back, the 7X offers 539 litres of cargo storage, expanding to 1978L with the second row folded away in 60:40-split fashion. That’s more than the BYD Sealion 7’s 500L.

Lifting the 7X’s boot floor reveals a shallow area for more storage and the ideal spot for charging cables. Up front, a small cubby under the bonnet adds more storage capacity. There’s no spare tyre, however, with the Zeekr like almost all of its contemporaries, equipped only with a tyre repair and inflation kit.

A word on the power-opening doors. They are activated externally by a button on the B-pillar (fronts) and on the rear quarter window (rears). When pressed, the doors swing open by themselves to a predetermined aperture of up to 100 degrees, but in reality the widest opening is more like 80 degrees (I didn’t get my protractor out to get an actual measurement, but it’s definitely less than 90 degrees).

There are door handles, but in this flagship model they are redundant. You cannot open the doors with them.

Inside, buttons on the door handles both open and close the power doors, while an emergency manual over-ride is tucked away neatly under the handle.

The self-opening doors are claimed to detect obstacles – whether closely parked cars or nearby walls and pillars, or even hands and fingers lingering in the door frame. And they worked too, certainly in detecting cars and garage walls, say. But we had some issues with the fingers-in-door test.

Substituting a cucumber for a child’s fingers, the doors stopped their closing when the cucumber was fully inside the door aperture. However, when we repositioned the cucumber to mimic the ends of fingers just inside the door frame, the sensors failed to detect the obstacle and sliced off the tip of the cuke. Watch those fingers.

A large 16-inch centrally mounted touchscreen hosts the 7X’s infotainment system. Excellent screen resolution results in crisp graphics, while response times to inputs are also excellent.

They need to be, because the screen hosts the majority of the Zeekr’s functions and features. The menu structure can feel a little overwhelming at first, but becomes familiar after just a few days’ use.

Climate controls are hosted inside the screen but they are on permanent display across the bottom. Temperature and fan speed can also be adjusted via the digital driver's display using buttons and switches on the steering wheel.

It’s clear the infotainment setup has been loosely modelled on Tesla’s with very similar menus, menu items and swipe functions. Anyone transitioning out of a Tesla into the Zeekr will have little difficulty adjusting.

Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are standard, as are Bluetooth connectivity, satellite navigation, and a crisp 360-degree surround-view camera.

I used Apple CarPlay for the majority of my time with the 7X and it proved flawless, quick to pair, and quicker still to reconnect. The screen lights up and CarPlay is active near-instantly after unlocking the Zeekr.

There are two 50W wireless smartphone charging pads ventilated to keep devices nice and cool.

The 13-inch digital driver's display isn’t as configurable as some other systems, but it does provide the must-have information clearly. Adding to the available bank of driving data, a large head-up display projects information directly onto the windscreen.

A 21-speaker Zeekr-branded sound system offers decent sound clarity, and can be configured in multiple ways to provide different listening experiences. The headrest-mounted speakers in the driver’s seat add to the immersive audio experience.

The Zeekr 7X remains untested by Australia’s independent safety body ANCAP.

It has, however, received a five-star safety rating from ANCAP’s European counterpart, NCAP, where based on 2025 testing criteria, the 7X scored 91 per cent for adult occupant protection, 90 per cent child occupant, 78 per cent vulnerable road user and 83 per cement for its safety assist systems.

ANCAP and Euro NCAP’s testing protocols are closely aligned, and it’s likely, although not guaranteed, that the 7X will receive an Australian five-star safety score. Stay tuned to Drive to find out in the future.

Zeekr deserves kudos for its nicely calibrated safety assist systems, as detailed in the table below.

All too often, fledgling carmakers give scant regard to how these systems actually work in the real world, with the result a frustrating user experience where systems overzealously react to perceived dangers where there are none.

Not so for the Zeekr 7X, where everything from the AEB and lane-keeping intervenes only in genuine critical moments. When intervention is needed, it’s a gentle application with none of the jerkiness or tugging at the steering wheel that some (all!) poorly calibrated systems offer.

Extra points to Zeekr for removing overspeed warnings for the Australian market. A mandatory technology under European regulations, but not here, all too often the beeps and chimes and bongs infuriate from behind the wheel. Deleting it from Australian-delivered cars only enhances the feeling of thoughtful quality.

My only real gripe, and it’s a minor one, concerns driver attention monitoring, which can be a little too quick to point out the driver’s eyes have lingered a fraction too long in the rear-view mirror or on the infotainment screen.

Zeekr warrants the 7X for five years/unlimited kilometres, while the battery is covered for eight years or 160,000km.

Servicing intervals are spaced at two years or 40,000km, whichever comes first, with Zeekr recommending ‘optional’ health checks at one-year/20,000km intervals.

The first ‘optional’ check-up at 12 months/20,000km is free, with the first scheduled visit at 24 months/40,000km asking for $605. Book in for the 36-month/60,000km optional service and you’ll be hit with a $330 bill, while year four/80,000km asks for a hefty $1150. Year five or 100,000km is optional and is priced at $300.

The total maintenance bill over five years or 100,000km runs to $2385, including optional health checks, while visiting the Zeekr workshop only at the recommended 24-month/40,000km intervals will cost $1755.

A year of comprehensive insurance for a 7X Performance AWD runs to $3978 based on a comparative quote for a 35-year-old male living in Chatswood, NSW. Insurance estimates may vary based on your location, driving history, and personal circumstances.

The Zeekr 7X Performance AWD doesn't have the longest range of the three variants in the 7X line-up (that honour goes to the Long Range RWD and its 615km), but its 543km WLTP-tested claim stacks up in real-world testing.

Zeekr claims an energy consumption figure of 19.9kWh per 100 kilometres. My week with the 7X covered a variety of daily driving conditions including highway, urban, and suburban running, ultimately netting an indicated return of 16.5kWh/100km, which is significantly better than the manufacturer’s claim. Based on that, a theoretical driving range of over 600km is possible.

Unsurprisingly, blowing the cobwebs off the Performance-focused version of the 7X on some rural twisties moved the needle, but not as much as you’d expect, with the final number resting on 20.5kWh/100km.

The 7X range is built on Zeekr’s 800-volt EV platform, and that means a maximum DC charge rate of 420kW is possible. Problem is, there are no 420kW chargers in Australia at the moment and, at last count, just two 400kW chargers. The numbers improve when looking for 350kW chargers, but the reality is the most readily available fast chargers max out at 150kW, while 50kW remains the most common public charging infrastructure in Australia, for now.

Still, Zeekr has future-proofed the 7X and when 400–420kW superchargers come online in greater numbers, the Performance AWD’s 100kW battery will be able to be topped up from 10–80 per cent in just 16 minutes.

Using the commonly available 50kW outlets will result in a 10–80 per cent top-up of around 1h 25min.

The 7X range is capable of 22kW AC charging with an estimated 0–100 per cent time of 4h 35min. But 22kW AC chargers are rare, and the more commonly available 11kW will take 9h 10min to reach full from empty.

My single public charging session on a shared 150kW charger (meaning a maximum rate of 74.94kW) took 42 minutes, netting 42.85kWh at a cost of $30.43.

The flagship 7X Performance AWD doesn’t hang about in terms of living up to the ‘performance’ in its name. With two electric motors driving the front and rear wheels, the 7X Performance boasts combined outputs of 475kW and 710Nm, which is lusty enough to propel the circa 2.5-tonne SUV from zero to 100km/h in a blistering 3.8 seconds.

Sure, that sub-four-second claim is a headline-grabbing number, but at its core, the 7X is more than just about straight-line speed.

Acceleration is, as you’d expect, rapid, even when you’re not trying to break land speed records when the light turns green. Instead, under more moderate throttle applications, forward momentum remains linear and smooth.

That calm yet brisk demeanour changes when you ask for more from the 7X Performance's twin electric motors. A lively drive on one of my favourite sections of rural B-road highlighted just how ferocious the 7X in this guise can be, with a neck-snapping turn of straight-line speed that leaves you equal parts laughing and breathless. Usable in the real world? Not really. But, it does make for light work of merging into traffic or executing overtakes.

That said, the 7X Performance is no one-trick pony. Riding on adaptive air suspension (the only model in the line-up to do so) results in settled and composed road manners. And that rings true whether navigating scrappy suburban roads and patchy highways, or when hustling some enticing corners where body roll remains nicely in check while mid-corner bumps do little to unsettle the mid-sizer.

There’s a lightness to the steering, even in Sport mode which does add some heft, but not so much that it becomes unwieldy. It’s accurate and direct in its responses, imbuing confidence from behind the wheel.

Brake pedal feel is excellent too, with the transition between generative and friction braking seamless. The 7X does feature single-pedal driving and it can be toggled through Standard and Strong. But it’s not as aggressive as some single-pedal modes we’ve previously encountered. Instead, brake progression remains smooth and gentle, and while it does bring the 7X to a complete stop eventually, I found myself using the brake pedal more often than not.

The 7X Performance is an amiable and comfortable companion in most driving situations, with quiet and refined on-road manners and an easy-to-drive manner. But it can also be a ton of fun when the right conditions present themselves – fast beyond most drivers' needs or wants, the 7X embraces spirited driving with a confident alacrity.

The Zeekr 7X Performance AWD hits an awful lot of the right notes in its bid to firmly establish the brand in Australia, and should be right at the top of the list for anyone considering taking the plunge into medium-SUV electric motoring.

Well packaged and nicely equipped, the 7X blends the brand’s premium aspirations with a compelling performance package that’s competitively priced for the segment.

Add in better-than-claimed driving range, the ability to charge at blistering speed (even if the infrastructure in Australia isn’t ready yet) and a general feeling of quiet premium, and the ingredients are in place for a title fight with the Tesla Model Y. The inevitable comparison awaits.

Rob Margeit is an award-winning Australian motoring journalist and editor who has been writing about cars and motorsport for over 25 years. A former editor of Australian Auto Action, Rob’s work has also appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, Wheels, Motor Magazine, Street Machine and Top Gear Australia. Rob’s current rides include a 1996 Mercedes-Benz E-Class and a 2000 Honda HR-V Sport.

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