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A digital view: Polestar 4 first drive

Coupe SUV is Swedish performance brand’s fastest offering yet.
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30 September 2024

BUSINESS MOTORING OVERALL SCORE

7.8/10

What is it?

As its name suggests, the Polestar 4 is the fourth model, and third mainstream one, to come out of the Swedish electric performance brand, and arrives in showrooms (or in Polestar parlance, ‘Spaces’) at the same time as the Polestar 3 SUV.

However the launch of the Polestar 4 has been eagerly awaited by many due to a great deal of pre-publicity revolving around the fact that it has no rear glass screen – instead a roof-mounted digital camera points out the back and transmits an image to a screen where the rear-view mirror would normally be.

This we are told has distinct advantages, such as the view not being obscured by a full rear seat and the image being clearer in less than perfect lighting conditions. Put the car in reverse and it pans downwards, and it can be switched off to become a normal mirror in order to check on rear-seat occupants.

Why go to the bother, however? Well the Polestar 4 is described as a coupe SUV, but it’s like no other claiming such status. Removing the rear screen enables the rear rail of the shell, what would effectively be the top frame of any rear screen, to be placed further back and the roofline to be more gently curved as a result – curving metal is a lot easier than curving glass…

The cabin is longer than is typical with the typically compromised coupe models created from standard SUVs and the bonnet line is lowered too. Polestar states that the 4 can offer that highly coupe-like profile and still provide rear-seat passengers with plenty of space, including above their heads. ‘A coupe on the outside, SUV space on the inside’ is the message from the car’s creators.

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As well as claiming the lowest carbon footprint of any of the brand’s models so far, the 4 is also the fastest Polestar yet. It’s available in two forms – a single-motor variant with rear-wheel drive costing from £59,990 and dual-motor with all-wheel drive, priced from £66,990. Both are dubbed ‘long range’ which suggests cheaper models with not quite as much mileage on offer might be in the brand’s future plans.

The single-motor version hits 62mph from rest in 7.1 seconds while the dual-motor slashes this to a highly potent 3.8 seconds. Add in a very handling-friendly low centre of gravity courtesy of the under-floor mounted battery pack and this is a car clearly expected to perform.

It’s also rather practical, however. All the performance is contained within a package that promises a WLTP-certified combined cycle range of up to 385 miles with the single motor, 367 miles with the dual, and the ability to use fast DC chargers of up to 200kW. Where one of these is available the battery will go from 10 to 80% in half an hour.

Then there is the Polestar 4’s luxury. The brand makes much of its optional and bespoke 3D knit textile surfaces fitted to our test car, while standard features include electrically reclining rear seats, giving passengers in the back a first-class lounge experience, as well as their own media screen mounted between the front seats.

The driver’s environment is typical of recent Polestar releases with its digital displays and Google interconnectivity, but with one major change. Sister brand Volvo was one of the first brands to turn its infotainment screen to a vertical format and previous Polestar models have followed the line, but on this one the 15.4-inch central infotainment screen is to landscape format, and able to be split with the navigation map on one side and customisable widgets on the other.

As expected from the brand’s previous models the Polestar 4 offers a full suite of driver assistance safety systems – while a Euro NCAP crash test is yet to be undertaken a full five-star award seems likely. For such features as the cleverest form of the adaptive cruise control spending £1300 on the optional ‘Pilot Pack’ is required, but the standard version still impresses.

Meanwhile a notable extra is the fact that the climate control can be activated for up to eight hours with the car parked, allowing animals to be left locked in it in complete safety, with the infotainment screen displaying a message to calm worried passers-by.

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What do we think of it?

So having been told that the Polestar 4 is a 4.8-metre long coupe SUV, one might be forgiven for thinking one has been pointed at the wrong car. Visually the Polestar looks highly distinctive, a potent coupe with the highlight that gentle but long slope of the roof to the rear end – the one thing it does not look like is an SUV.

Many might want to try out the rear seats first and one finds a brighter interior than might be expected, thanks chiefly to the fact that the missing rear screen is compensated for by the standard-fit panoramic glass sunroof which extends behind the rear-seat occupants – this can optionally be specified to electrochromatically change between fully transparent and opaque.

Rear-seat passengers do indeed have plenty of room, notably above the head, plus such luxuries as the reclining seats and media screen. The ‘woven’ fabric surface in the front of our test cars was rather smart too. And in terms of practicality the boot will take 526 litres of luggage, including 31 litres under the floor. With the seats folded this increases to 1536 litres.

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For the driver two aspects take some getting used to. The first, perhaps obviously, is the digital rear-view ‘mirror’, because of course it isn’t a mirror and it looks a little different – partly due to the fact it isn’t affected by changes in lighting conditions. Judging the distance of traffic behind appears slightly odd initially but use it for long enough and it soon becomes familiar. As familiar as a mirror, however? The jury remains out…

The second is the central infotainment screen. Polestar favours its minimalist interiors which certainly look very stylish, but achieving this requires containing as many of the car’s functions as possible within the screen. It’s well laid out in groups of functions and illustrated by one of eight ambient lighting options named after the planets of the Solar System.

We like the way that activating a function changes the colour of its icon, but the system is perhaps not as intuitive as it could be. Again, enough use breeds familiarity, but it’s frustrating, for example, to have to navigate a menu screen just to change the direction of the air vents – electronics too far we think.

On the road the Polestar exhibits all the of the typical electric car attributes, and in the dual-motor form of our test vehicle, it is very rapid indeed – more than meeting the potency requirements the car’s looks suggest. Whether the single-motor version will equally satisfy remains to be seen – we haven’t tried this car yet though 7.8 seconds to 62mph sounds perfectly adequate, if not exactly headline-making in the world of the EV.

Our dual-motor Polestar 4 handled pretty well on the road, its active suspension doing a good job of sorting ride comfort, the car soaking up bumps effectively, and aiding handling in corners. Again we’ve heard that the single-motor variant is not as impressive in this area but we’ve yet to test this theory. Polestar also offers a ‘Performance Pack’ for the dual-motor version which makes the most of the brand’s long and glorious racing history with upgraded suspensions rakes and wheels.

The Polestar 4 comes with three levels of brake regeneration, annoyingly yet another thing adjusted via the touchscreen which makes varying the degree of one-pedal driving along one’s route not that practical – it’s better to leave it on one setting.

Overall the Polestar 4 is certainly an interesting addition to the ranks of upmarket performance EVs – we still struggle to call it an SUV. There are irritations but it is certainly worth looking beyond the missing rear screen to appreciate what are many attributes of this newcomer.

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The Polestar 4 Long Range Dual Motor

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Andrew Charman

Andrew Charman has been a motoring journalist for more than 30 years, writing about vehicles, technology and the industry. He is a Guild of Motoring Writers committee member and has won several awards including for his business coverage.

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