2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E GT Performance First Drive: The Power (and Torque) of Iteration

Almost no one expected the electric Mustang to arrive first as an SUV, but the Ford Mustang Mach-E has proven itself to be an impressive electric machine with plenty of sports car capability and feel, both in style and performance. For the 2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E electric SUV, Ford’s leveraged both software and hardware upgrades to pull more performance and range out of the sporty crossover, and given it some impressive aesthetic upgrades, too—the Bronze Appearance Package paired with new-to-Mach-E Eruption Green is especially striking. Do the upgrades all add up? We drove both to find out.

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2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E Bronze Appearance Package

Customers who opt for the newly offered $1,995 Bronze Appearance Package on the GT trim will pay $57,885, available to match with either Shadow Black, Star White Metallic Tri-Coast, or the pictured new Eruption Green exterior paint jobs. For that money, you swap in 20-inch Bronze-painted aluminum wheels, a solid but patterned new grille design with bronze paint, and matching "Mach-E 4X" and "GT" badging also in bronze. The package builds on the updated 2024 GT trim's updated MagneRide damping system, red-painted Brembo front brakes, and performance front seating with a 10-way adjustable driver's chair.

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The Bronze Appearance Package Mustangs on site in the wooded foothills near Seattle included an example in Shadow Black, which paired well with the eye-catching bronze-painted snowflake alloys and the subtle bronze badging, showing an admirable amount of restraint. It’s easy to overdo bronze accents, but even with the bold bronzed grille panel and the louder Eruption Green, the effect is tasteful. And Eruption Green itself invites a closer look—it’s deep and sparkly, with bursts of gold flake, and Ford used it to great effect on the 2022 Bronco. It draws lots of attention with its rich luster.

2024 Ford Mach-E Performance Upgrade Shows the SDV Advantage

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The fantastic thing about software-defined vehicles is that you can take customer feedback and apply it not to the next product development cycle, but in some cases to product rolling off the production lines that very second. For the 2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E GT in particular, Ford heard some performance gripes from customers. Not that raw power itself was a serious concern; the GT makes a combined 480 hp and 600 lb-ft from its dual-motor powertrain, and gets an EPA-estimated range of 270 miles on charge from a 91-kWh battery pack. But owners looking to rip through the quarter-mile were frustrated that peak power delivery would fall off before the end of the run. Ford looked at the data coming out of customer cars and realized it could do something about this.

First, Ford redesigned the rear motor, bringing development and production in-house, and simplified its mounting structure (and, most importantly for Ford’s money-losing EV business, reduces cost). The result is, Ford claims, a lighter (the 2024 GT is 22 pounds lighter than its predecessor, for what it’s worth) and torquier e-motor—which goes to show that even small and efficient electric motors have room to grow as the technology matures. Then Ford used more advanced thermal modeling to develop vehicle software that would allow for longer sustained peak power delivery—closer to the full length of a quarter-mile run.

The torquier motor, when combined with this software upgrade, allows the GT to make a total of 700 lb-ft of torque—a full 100 lb-ft more than before. The result is a quicker quarter-mile, at 11.8 seconds, with a higher trap speed of 115 mph, according to Ford. (Total system horsepower is unchanged.) And the 0-to-60-mph time is reduced to 3.3 seconds by Ford’s reckoning, from 3.6 in our testing.

Fortunately or unfortunately for 2024 Mach-E GT owners, the update is available but not standard. It’s a $995 upcharge via a one-time OTA update, either at the time of purchase (once released) or at a future date. (If you pair it with the Bronze Appearance Package or an optional wheel and tire package, it’s $745.) But the improved rear e-motor is standard for all Mustang Mach-Es, including lower-trim ones.

2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E GT Performance Upgrade: Can You Tell?

The pre-update Mach-E GT is already a quick SUV, beating the Mustang Dark Horse to 60 mph by a tenth and just trailing it through the quarter. And during our street drive of the Performance Upgrade-enabled GTs, we had neither a stopwatch nor a drag strip. But warping between hairpins is still as easy as tickling the accelerator, so no magic has been lost—nor has the GT Performance Upgrade been upgraded into sketchiness on a backroad.

There are a few things to credit. For one, the GT trim is simpler now. Ford bundled a bunch of the 2023 Mustang Mach-E Performance Edition upgrades into the standard GT. So now, the Mach-E GT is available in one flavor with two states of tune, essentially—those with the Performance Upgrade, and those without. The 10-way adjustable sport seats, MagneRide dampers, and Brembo-branded brakes are now standard, and appreciated. There’s no trouble hustling the GT to a stop un-dramatically on a windy road. And MagneRide or no, the GT is on the stiff side, close to the cusp of comfort, even in less sporty drive modes.

We’ll always take more torque (and 100 lb-ft and six-tenths in the quarter for a grand seems reasonable), but the increased performance will be best appreciated lined up at a Christmas tree. The changes are iterative, not transformative. And the notion that Ford should charge extra to unlock performance that an owner’s Mach-E can physically provide is going to rub some the wrong way.

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2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E: Range and Charging

And that’s not all, as the hackneyed phrase goes. Faster charging and more range? The 2024 Mach-Es have both, and that’s something that will be inarguably appreciated by all owners. This is another area where software improvements can yield palpable, real-world benefits. In this case, the 2024 Mach-Es gain nearly 20 percent faster DC fast-charging, and about 20 percent greater range (10 percent increased range on the GT, for a total of 280). That puts the Premium rear-drive Mach-E with the extended range battery at a maximum of 320 miles estimated range.

To put this another way, Ford claims this shaves nearly 9 minutes off a 10-to-80-percent fast charge session in optimal conditions—down to 36 minutes. This is significant considering the 150-kW maximum fast-charging rate hasn’t changed, nor has the battery or charging hardware.

To improve the experience even further, Ford throws in a free NACS-to-CCS1 adapter to use Tesla’s excellent Supercharger network. The plug-and-charge experience is seamless, which is to be expected considering Tesla is actually the supplier of the adapters. (We should note that other reviewers experienced some issues getting the Mach-E to connect to the Supercharger.) We took a Premium trim on a quick jaunt south of Seattle proper and observed quick, consistent charge rates and grabbed a 20 percent top-up (going from 29 to about 50 percent) in just a few minutes. Being able to do an end-run around the frustratingly inconsistent non-Tesla public charging network this easily is a huge bonus.

But don’t expect Sync 4A to route you to a Supercharger—yet. A Ford rep told us this should come soon, but that most Mach-E owners use the FordPass app for navigation to a nearby Supercharger (and similar tasks), or their preferred phone mirroring system. Sync 4A isn’t the most intuitive system to use, so it’s our preferred method as well.

2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E Pricing and Availability

The 2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E all-electric SUV starts at $55,890 in its standard GT trim. The 2024 model year Mach-Es (save the rally) are on sale now. We should note that as of this year, the Mach-E is only eligible for a $3,750 tax credit, not the full $7,500 its F-150 Lightning stablemate gets, due to its Chinese-produced battery pack.

What About the Ford Mustang Mach-E Rally?

Stay tuned, we’ll have our first drive impressions of the most sideways-y of the Mach-Es, the 2024 Ford Mustang Mach-E Rally, in a few days.