The driving experience has some advantages - fast pickup, low center of gravity but the overall experience is far from wonderful. The build quality of a tesla specifically is horrendous - like a chevy malibu or worse. The controls are _awful_ as they lack buttons or door handles or a steering wheel. Highly unsafe to drive. Everything is enshitified to benefit the manufacturer. Nevermind the absolute lack of privacy and the redefinition of 'ownership' that seems to be bundled with 'EV', where you both purchase and subscribe to heated seats, cruise control, GPS or whatever else. The gaps between panels are not uniform or aligned. Zero consideration for repairability or replacement of body panels such that repair bills are through the roof (cybertruck not even insurable on many carriers). Endless recalls. Waiting an hour to fill your gas tank when an ICE takes 2 minutes. The list goes on. Yet the tesla envy is so strong that every other manufacturer just apes tesla such that much of the above is present on every single EV whether tesla or not. EVs at present feel like products worth $10-15k if. China seems to get this - they're inferior products but at 1/3 to 1/4 the price the value prop starts to make sense.
Agreed. Tesla makes the worst EVs out there, which really sullies the perception of EVs. I've test driven both a Model 3 and a Model S and I've never had such a bad driving experience. Everything is hidden: How do you unlock the doors? How do you turn it on? How do you put it in drive? Everything is hidden behind a terrible UI on a glorified tablet. There were no backup cameras - instead, it showed some wiggly outline of the curb that would come and go at random. Once on the road, the accelerator felt like jelly - slow to respond, required a lot of travel, and had a strangely nonlinear curve. The blind spots were unbelievable. The "yoke" was even worse - I couldn't access the turn signal while turning! I couldn't imagine a worse driving experience and I've driven some absolute breakers over the years.
I have owned two EVs: a 2020 Hyundai Kona and a 2022 Hyundai Ioniq 5. I only switched because I had my heart set on the Ioniq 5 and only bought the Kona because the Ioniq 5 was really hard to find.
My Kona was exactly the same as the ICE version, just with an EV conversion. The interior and controls were identical. All of the EV specific stuff just replaced the ICE equivalent in the instrument cluster. Yes, it had an infotainment system and you could control a bunch more stuff from there, but that's true of all new vehicles. That Kona was the perfect example of how EVs don't have to be any different than the familiar ICE. Anyone could just get in and drive without even knowing it was an SUV.
My IONIQ 5 is certainly different - that's part of the appeal - but that's largely only in the exterior aesthetics. The controls and driving are still exactly like a regular ICE. They have adopted the full LCD panel instrument cluster, but again, many new ICEs have. Steering wheel, stalks, accelerator and brakes - they are all designed to feel just like the familiar automatic transmission. The only difference in controls is that the "transmission" control is now also on a stalk, since there's no need for it to be down on the center console. The default drive mode is set to feel just like driving an automatic with the same amount of delay and ramp up in power and the slight engine braking. Press a button and now it's full EV - instant response, no engine braking - it's the ideal race car that does exactly what you ask without imposing mechanical restrictions. It's truly a unique experience in a good way.
Elon Musk certainly doesn't help. His push for different for different's sake, trying to convince everyone that EVs will change the world, pressuring governments to let him bypass regulations and workers' rights, and his quickly declining sanity really hurt the image of EVs, since he is the image of Tesla and Tesla is the image of EVs.
I sincerely look forward to a future where the traditional automotive manufacturers become a large part of the EV market and some semblance of standardization and normalcy returns to the automotive world.
