The Zeekr 7X Proves Chinese EVs Don’t Have to Be Cheap to Compete

It’s time to stop pretending Chinese-made cars will ever cross the Pacific with their radically low prices intact. U.S. legislators and automaker lobbyists aren’t going to let that happen any time soon—regardless of the political party calling the shots. But what if Chinese automakers built a car so good it didn’t need to sell at a discount? With the ability to command a premium, a Chinese company might just be able to swallow the tariffs as a cost of doing business rather than sitting out of the market altogether.

You don’t need to imagine that possibility. It’s already happening just south of the border, where a handful of Chinese automakers are shouldering Mexico’s new 50 percent tariffs to import gas, hybrid, and electric vehicles, many of which aren’t being sold as budget buys. Take the Zeekr 7X, a compact SUV that measures within a quarter inch of the Tesla Model Y and sells for a $1,700 premium yet comes so stacked with extras that it’s impossible to think of it as anything other than a bargain.

The Case for a Chinese EV that Costs More

Owned by car-making giant Geely, which moved 3 million cars last year, Zeekr is already positioned as a premium EV brand in China, Mexico, and Europe. Based on the Zeekrs I’ve seen and driven, it’s easy to imagine the brand being pitched here as a Tesla alternative. The 7X, one of Zeekr’s newest models, is finished with a level of polish that makes it feel like a luxury vehicle next to a Chevrolet, even if it’s not nearly nice enough to outclass a Mercedes.

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From the initial impression, the Zeekr 7X rewrites every preconceived notion you have about Chinese vehicles, no matter what they are. The 7X’s handsome design manages to avoid the amphibian look that plagues so many Chinese models, and while its styling might be a bit generic, the surfacing and proportions are clearly the work of an experienced design team. The panel gaps on the car I drove were as tight and even as anything—at any price—you can buy in America today. And when you’re ready to get in, the doors power open at the push of a button, stopping short of any neighboring car, bollard, or person in their path.

You’ll think of Tesla when you first lay eyes on the 16-inch screen hanging off the center of the dashboard and then again when you dive into the system and discover a similar logic baked into the user interface. The rest of the cabin, though, feels more traditional than any Tesla, which is probably a good thing for an automaker chasing mainstream appeal. There’s a gear selector stalk and a handful of physical controls under the screen, plus a small digital instrument cluster and a head-up display. The front seats will warm, cool, and massage your backside, and there are power sunshades for both the rear side windows and the panoramic glass roof. Are you seeing this, Tesla? A sunroof you can close. How innovative.

Great Hardware, Forgettable Dynamics

The mechanical kit is even more impressive. The 7X rides on air springs and adaptive dampers, and its two-motor powertrain dishes out 637 horsepower, good enough for a claimed 0–60-mph time of less than 3.8 seconds. The 100-kWh battery carries about 20 percent more energy than a Model Y’s unit and operates at 800 volts, meaning it should outlast the Tesla’s 327-mile rated range and charge faster. (In China, Zeekr offers the 7X with a 75-kWh lithium-iron-phosphate “Golden Battery” that can reportedly charge from 0 to 100 percent in less than 20 minutes.)

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I logged only a handful of miles driving the 7X around Las Vegas Motor Speedway’s road course, which is neither the right amount of time nor the right place to judge a compact SUV that will spend the majority of its miles shagging groceries, schlepping kids, and jockeying for position during the rush-hour commute. It was enough experience, though, to understand that to the extent that the 7X has a weakness, it’s almost entirely in the way it drives.

The 7X whistles off the line like an arrow, but it feels heavy, inert, and indifferent when the pavement turns left or right. It’s significantly less agile and athletic than the Ford Mustang Mach-E, Kia EV6, or the Model Y, a sense that’s amplified by the light and disconnected steering. The racetrack also gave me no real opportunity to evaluate the 7X’s ride quality.

One reason Chinese carmakers can develop new vehicles so quickly (and thus cheaply) is that, generally speaking, they don’t sweat the dynamic details the way Western automakers do. They can get away with that because buyers in their home market simply don’t know better or care; they prioritize technology and value above the old-school nuts-and-bolts approach to building cars. It begs the question: Do American buyers still care about things like ride and handling? Well, we know that hundreds of thousands of them tolerated the jostling ride and darty steering of the original Tesla Model 3 and Model Y.

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Is Being a Great Car Actually Enough?

In Zeekr’s home market, the big-battery, all-wheel-drive 7X is outrageously cheap at less than $39,000, but it’d be a fantasy to suggest we could ever see a 7X in the U.S. at that price. A better idea of what might—might—be possible in the future comes from looking to the south. In Mexico, Zeekr sells a single trim, called the 7X Flagship, for about $56,000, or just $1,700 more than a Tesla Model Y Premium AWD sells for in that market.

You don’t need a cocktail napkin to make the case that all that equipment at that price makes the Zeekr 7X a uniquely strong offering. There’s nothing quite like it for sale in America right now, as it’s both more luxurious and a better value than any of the alternatives. But that’s not the same thing as saying it would be a sales success here.

Having a great product at a great price only gets you to the starting line when you’re launching a new brand in the U.S. car market. Long-term success requires getting the marketing, sales, and service elements right, too. Geely should know this better than most Chinese automakers because it has first-hand experience launching—and struggling with—a brand here. Polestar was supposed to be the younger, cooler, techier version of Volvo. Yet for millennials coming into their peak earning years, the Polestar brand has about as much name recognition as Delahaye. The real question for the decision makers at Geely then isn’t when it should enter the U.S. market or how much it could charge for the 7X, but rather, what would Zeekr do differently than Polestar if it eventually tries to make a go of it here?