Chinese carmaker JAC is celebrating the debut of its new EV for the Mexican market, the 2022 JAC E10x. What’s worth celebrating here isn’t just that it’s an EV in Mexico — though I love to see EVs taking off in all the markets. The E10X is worth celebrating because it’s an EV with over 200 miles of range that costs under $20,000. And it’s technically in North America! That’s both great and a sad reminder of the EV market in the U.S.
The E10X has a respectable range of 224 miles and it’ll cost $416,000 pesos, or $19,960 dollars, according to Motorpasion and Autocosmos. That’s for the commercial E10X, which is missing a backseat to fit more cargo. But the passenger version starts at $425,000 pesos, or $20,400 dollars.
That is priced higher than other affordable cars in Mexico like the Honda City, which starts around $15,300. Still, I can’t help but feel happy about a new electric car — with ties to Volkswagen, by the way — coming in at that price.
Especially considering that JAC is not some fly-by-night startup, but a pretty big player in its native car market of China. The E10X is pretty much a rebadged iEV6E, but the badge engineering did it good. The design has subtle VW cues, which isn’t surprising because of the relationship between JAC and Volkswagen. The companies are working together in the Chinese EV market, the biggest in the world. You could even think of the E10X like an ID.3 Lite.
The JAC’s max range is from 187 to 224 miles depending on drive mode. It has a 30.2 kWh battery and power figures are 59 horsepower and 111 lb-ft of torque. Those aren’t blistering specs, but it’s probably enough for the little hatch.
Really, I’m just excited there’s a solid, cheap EV option nearby. If you’re a Millennial, meaning you were born between 1981 and 1996 according to Pew, then you’ll remember when new cars cost from $10,000 to $20,000. The price of new cars in the U.S. blew past the $20k mark quickly, and that’s not even close to the base starting prices of most electric cars here.
Hope that one day we’ll see an affordable EV is slowly eroding. Right now, EVs feel like premium propositions in the U.S., and that needs to change.
