00:00I don't have to drive a lot, but I still need a car for getting around town to pick up
00:04groceries
00:04and my kid from school. That's why something like the Fiat 500e caught my attention.
00:09This is one of the smallest and cheapest EVs around.
00:17I've been driving this car for a week. I've taken it into New York City from the suburbs
00:21of New Jersey and back, and I've only needed to recharge it once. Right now I've got about
00:2695 miles, and that's more than enough if all you're doing is going to the grocery store and back a
00:32couple times a week. It's motor here. It's 118 horsepower, producing about 162 foot-pounds of
00:39torque. Not the biggest motor by any stretch of the imagination, but because this car is so small,
00:44it's actually very peppy on the highway. I'm driving over cobblestones right now, which isn't the
00:50smoothest in the world, but the Fiat handles them pretty well. It has smaller tires than a typical
00:55car, about 17 inches, so you do feel potholes a little bit more, but otherwise it's a fairly smooth
01:02ride. One thing I like about the Fiat 500e is that there's manual controls for things. All the
01:09environmental controls are laid out in a row right in front of me here, so you can sort of reach
01:14things by feel and not have to worry about, you know, going to the touch screen and finding stuff.
01:18You can, of course, do things on the touch screen, but it's nice to have physical controls as a backup.
01:24One of the things I really like about the Fiat 500e is a little shelf that's right underneath the
01:30dashboard here, and you can slot your phone in there, and it'll automatically recharge your phone
01:35if you have wireless charging. It's a little feature, but it's a handy one. The 500e has a large,
01:41but not overwhelming, 10-inch touchscreen, which lets you control everything fairly easily. It has,
01:46you know, CarPlay if you have iPhone or Android Auto, and there's also media controls, you know,
01:53for a serious satellite radio. You can control the climate here, and there's also navigation.
02:02The drive controls for the 500e are also pretty straightforward. You just have four buttons here
02:07right in front of the dashboard for park, reverse, neutral, and drive. One of the other major
02:12considerations with the Fiat 500e is its range. This car is only rated for about 139 miles on a full
02:20charge. I was able to get it to maybe about 140-ish, 149, but it is something you can consider,
02:27especially if you take a lot of longer trips. The 500e's charging port is in sort of a traditional
02:34spot where you'd usually find a place to refill a gas car. Pop it open, though, and you have
02:40the plugs to recharge the car here. And there's also a nice little status symbol on the side that
02:45lets you know just how full the car is. Like all Fiat 500s, this is a small car. I'm about
02:52six feet
02:52tall, and as you can see, I can easily get over the top of it. If you're sitting in the
02:57front seat of
02:58the Fiat 500e, you'll find plenty of leg room, but it's a different case if you're sitting in the back.
03:05I'm going to slide in here and close it up. The front seat is moved almost all the way forward,
03:11and I still feel a little claustrophobic. It's pretty tight for me. Of course, one of the drawbacks
03:17having such a small car is that there's limited storage space. Unlike some larger EVs, there's no
03:23frunk for the Fiat 500e. You've got room for maybe two carry-on suitcases, but not much more.
03:29Back seats do fold down, but if you're doing a large Costco run, you'll probably need a larger car.
03:42When it comes to customizing the 500e, you're fairly limited in your choices. Fiat offers the car in
03:48white, red, black, and sort of a mist gray, but there's not much more you can configure in terms of
03:54like motor, for example, or tires, or trim packages. As you can see, it has a nice, you know, 500
03:59styling
04:00logo on the front here. Nice, attractive headlights, too, that were plenty bright at night, and you can
04:06adjust them, obviously. It has a nice red, white, and green of the Italian flag here, because after
04:10all, this is an Italian car. The styling of the Fiat 500e is simple but elegant. I do like on
04:17the seats
04:18here, it has the Fiat logo stitched into it, and there's a nice sort of fabric dashboard here. Nothing
04:24feels cheap. Nothing feels overly ostentatious on it. So that's a look at the Fiat 500e. It is a fun,
04:35little affordable EV. It starts at just $32,500, making it one of the least expensive EVs that you
04:42can afford. However, there are a few compromises at this price. For one thing, the small size,
04:48which is great for cities, also means you don't have a lot of storage space, and it's range about
04:53139 miles, is small compared to most other EVs. But if all you need to do is drive around the
05:00city
05:00or around your town for groceries and things like that, then this could be a great, little,
05:05fun electric car for you. What do you think about the Fiat 500e? Leave your thoughts in the comments
05:10below, and be sure to follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and other social media sites. For Tom's Guide,
05:17this is Mike Cosgrove.
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