Peugeot e-208 GTi driven – pocket rocket is a worthy 205 successor

Peugeot seconds its racing team to give its long-lived electric supermini some real driver appeal

Chapter 1: Introduction
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Peugeot’s GTi performance brand is back: and this time, “it’s responsible”.

Eurgh.

But don’t despair - because the firm hasn’t gone at this zero-emissions reboot in any kind of lukewarm, half-committed way. The new Peugeot e-208 GTi has arrived in a segment that’s suddenly crammed with new metal, and yet still sits right at the top of the class on power output and performance. And, as has been typical of the firm’s modern performance models, it’s been developed with help from Peugeot Sport - which runs the mothership’s World Endurance Championship racing efforts when it’s not warming up electric superminis. This is a fast little hatchback that certainly seems like it means business.

The car has a Vauxhall-brand sister model, of course, which we reviewed only a few weeks ago: the Corsa GSE. And it emerges into an electric ‘pocket rocket’ class that’s had the Abarth 500e, Alpine A290 and various electric Mini Coopers in it for a couple of years now; and this year also sees the Cupra Raval VZ and VW ID Polo GTI join the fray. 

How do you stand out amongst all of that lot? With 278bhp of peak power, and a 5.5sec 0-62mph sprint, for a start.

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DESIGN & STYLING

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Peugeot Sport’s widened front axle track smacks you right in the chops when you first clap eyes on this car. It’s some 56mm wider than the standard 208’s and, along with a 30mm ride height drop and some new camber settings, manages to conjure quite a lot of visual presence. The car’s wheels aren’t huge - 18in, with 215-section Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tyres as standard (rivals typically go both larger on diameter and tread width) - but they certainly look vacuum-sucked into its cheeky flared arches.

The rest of the visual makeover isn’t too yobby, which suggests the car might be acceptable to an audience beyond the regular enthusiast crowd. The roof spoiler is discreetly enlarged, the bumpers mildly puffed up, but not too aggressive-looking. It’s a tidy design effort. 

It’s just a shame that some of the detailing isn’t more reminiscent of the iconic 1980s 205 GTi. Would it have killed Peugeot to integrate the charging port and ‘GTI’ badges on the C-pillar, for example, in the vein of the 205? Particularly when Renault is flexing its ‘Supercinque’ design chic so hard right now? Opportunity missed, I’d say.

The car’s chassis makeover includes special coil springs, and new passively regulated dampers with hydraulic bump stops. There’s an unusual ancillary anti-roll bar for the torsion beam rear axle, to boost lateral stiffness back there; and a Torsen-style mechanical limited slip differential for the front axle, where rivals typically rely on electronic brake-based torque vectoring.

Even with that diff, the e-208 GTi is small, and fairly light, for the segment. A Mini JCW Electric is 115kg heavier; the Cupra Raval RZ 70kg heavier or so.

INTERIOR

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There’s a superabundance of sporting flavour to take in when you open the door of the e-208 GTi. Bright red seatbelts, red carpets, red stitching and piping. Wow. The designers were clearly allowed to chuck in as many 205 references as they fancied. Just mind your eyes. 

The seats are a little slim, but they hold you in place effectively. The driving position, unfortunately, is a more unwelcome reminder of the earlier days of Peugeot’s i-Cockpit experiments, as well as driving ergonomics as the French brands used to do them. Your reviewer’s a fairly tall specimen, to be fair. But the 208’s footwells feel shallow to me, and its pedals sit high; which, for the record, was true of the original 208, the 206 and the 207. 

Peugeot’s ADAS settings menu key has a useful second function: after a long press it works like a favourites shortcut, deactivating whichever active safety nannies you find most annoying.
Matt Saunders
Road test editor

So you have to slide your seat a long way back, and crank up your seat backrest angle, to feel comfortable at the wheel - and even then you end up an inconveniently long way from the central touchscreen and, thanks to the i-Cockpit layout philosophy, might well still struggle to put the steering wheel right where you would like it, and still see the instruments over the top of the rim. In some settings the column can actually feel so low as to get in the way of your thighs when you’re getting in and out of the car. i-Cockpit does work much better on Peugeot’s larger cars; but the original 208, appearing way back in 2012, was where it all started. Fourteen years later, they still haven’t quite sorted it out.

The car’s back-row seats, meanwhile, are particularly small by supermini class standards; usable, perhaps, by younger kids, but not very comfortably by average-height adults. For boot space, it’s closer to the class standard; but still not the most usable, practical package overall.

ENGINES & PERFORMANCE

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The e-208 GTi’s physical advantages, relative to some of its rivals, do come across in the car's driving experience, which is taut, grippy, busy and energetic.

Rain-sodden roads in the west of Scotland weren’t an ideal stage to show off the car; but it had the purpose and urgency to surmount them with room to spare, and to suggest that it would be a dynamic match for any of its rivals on a really winding, challenging, dry B-road - and a lot of fun.

The car’s fairly small-diameter tiller, and heavy, meaty steering weight, makes for particularly direct steering responses - in stark contrast to the more fluent, lower-effort steering of an Alpine A290, for example. This is quite a darty-handling car; its steering managing to convey some enticing feel without too much torquesteer under power. Handling isn’t testy or hyperactive, though; and the car’s suspension, though firm, keeps the wheels under constant control and in steady contact with the road so as to assure you of its grip level, and give you the confidence to press on. It feels very well-sorted, relatively light on its feet, and more serious in its performance intent than many of its opponents.

The powertrain makes it fast and intuitive enough to drive, too - although it doesn’t have paddleshift regen control, nor any sort of engine- or gearbox mimickery going on. Peugeot Sport has taken the interesting decision to deactivate energy regeneration completely when you’re using Sport driving mode; so there’s no trailing-throttle regen, and only hydraulic pad-on-disk retardation as you squeeze the middle pedal. Which sounds like something of an answered prayer for enthusiast drivers who just want simple, predictable controls of consistent weight, doesn’t it? 

Sadly, Peugeot Sport apparently wasn’t able to finish the job by tuning the e-208 GTi’s hydraulic brake servo very attentively. So all you really end up with is the slightly mushy brake pedal feel of a regular 208, in an EV that’s running less efficiently than it might be.

MPG & RUNNING COSTS

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Running mostly in Sport mode, our test car averaged around 3.2mpkWh over a route of about three hours: for a real-world, mixed-road electric range of about 160 miles on a charge. 

That isn’t awful; but certainly isn’t very good either, and means the car may be fated to go down as another fun-if-flawed, occasionally-use-only kind of hot hatchback, very much as the Alpine A290 and electric Mini Cooper have. Not, sadly, as the kind of small car you could use for any journey, and like any other, thanks to the way it quite brilliantly combines usability, driver appeal and value for money.

Which isn’t to suggest it’s not good value. Although the car doesn’t qualify for the UK government’s full ECG subsidy, it can still be secured for less than £34,000; which is both a competitive and fairly attractive price.

VERDICT

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The Peugeot e-208 GTi is a likable attempt at a small, affordable, fully electric hot hatchback, and one that’s been turned out with plenty of commitment. It’s quicker than key rivals; is agile and immediate in its dynamic character; and takes a direct route to driver entertainment that it’s easy to warm to.

But, while some buyers will be quite content to settle for only short-range usability, treating their GTi as a weekend plaything and weekday station car, that role doesn’t get close to the universality that the hot hatchback really should aspire to fulfil. 

Other new arrivals in this class are similarly fun to drive; but they can be taken quite a lot more seriously as ‘everyday drivers’, with better electric range and efficiency, faster charging speeds, bigger back seats and cargo bays, and that extra bit of versatility that people need from a compact car - in addition to the entertainment factor they might want.

The electric hot hatchback is growing up fast. Peugeot would, if only in that respect, probably prefer it wasn’t in such a hurry.

Matt Saunders

Matt Saunders Autocar
Title: Road test editor

As Autocar’s chief car tester and reviewer, it’s Matt’s job to ensure the quality, objectivity, relevance and rigour of the entirety of Autocar’s reviews output, as well contributing a great many detailed road tests, group tests and drive reviews himself.

Matt has been an Autocar staffer since the autumn of 2003, and has been lucky enough to work alongside some of the magazine’s best-known writers and contributors over that time. He served as staff writer, features editor, assistant editor and digital editor, before joining the road test desk in 2011.

Since then he’s driven, measured, lap-timed, figured, and reported on cars as varied as the Bugatti Veyron, Rolls-Royce Phantom, Tesla Roadster, Ariel Hipercar, Tata Nano, McLaren Senna, Renault Twizy and Toyota Mirai. Among his wider personal highlights of the job have been covering Sebastien Loeb’s record-breaking run at Pikes Peak in 2013; doing 190mph on derestricted German autobahn in a Brabus Rocket; and driving McLaren’s legendary ‘XP5’ F1 prototype. His own car is a trusty Mazda CX-5.