Autobayng News Team
While driving the new Mercedes-Benz GLC EV in Portugal last week, I kept coming back to one thought: this feels like a Mercedes first and an EV second.
Don’t get me wrong. Getting an EV to feel this well-rounded isn’t easy on its own. A competitive option in this class needs to do all the EV things right, from charging specs to software, and the new GLC ticks all the right boxes that make an electric car great.
Its generous range—over 400 miles (643 km) on the more generous WLTP cycle—and ultra-quick charging frees you from range anxiety. I wasn’t constantly focused on the range prediction, worrying that it would plummet when I found a high-speed section.
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
So as I flew through the Portuguese countryside, I felt like I could enjoy this top-end Teutonic torpedo with as little care as if I were in a gas-powered Benz. It’s an accomplished long-distance cruiser with supple air suspension, a serene cabin, and a surprisingly spirited side when the road gets technical.
I only drove the car for around 124 miles (200 km), but I very quickly grew very fond of it. There are still a couple of kinks that Mercedes should (hopefully) have time to tweak before it starts rolling these out, but overall, the GLC is a solid EV and a great Mercedes.
(Full disclosure: Mercedes invited me to both Germany and Portugal, as part of the reveal of the VLE-Class and the first-drive event for the GLC 400. The company covered travel, lodging, and driving expenses for the purposes of this review.)
The Hardware Finally Matches The Badge
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
It was back in 2020 when I got to drive my first Mercedes-Benz EV, the EQC 400. At the time, it instantly became one of my favorite electric vehicles because it was fast, sumptuous, and stylish. It effortlessly made me feel rich and important, even though I was neither. The issue arose when you wanted to exploit its plentiful performance, as that had a dramatic effect on the range prediction. With only around 250 miles of range in a best-case scenario, any spirited driving came with a healthy dollop of stress.
Fast-forward to 2026, and I enjoyed the GLC EV in much the same way, but without any of the unpleasantness that I associated with the EQC’s older EV tech. Unlike its predecessor, which was based on the underpinnings of the gas-burning GLC, this new one is built on a dedicated EV platform called MB.EA.
It’s the first Mercedes to be built on this new 800-volt architecture, which allows the GLC to charge at up to 330 kilowatts, adding 188 miles (305 km) of range in just 10 minutes. Charging from 10% to 80% takes 22 minutes. Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
During my time in Portugal, I tested its charging performance at a 400 kW fast charger that Mercedes had conveniently installed in the parking lot of the swanky hotel where we were stationed. After driving the car for a few hours, I managed to get the state of charge down to 14% and plugged it back in at the hotel.
Even though you can now manually set the car to precondition when you know you want to DC fast-charge it, I intentionally didn’t do it to see how close it would come to matching the claimed peak charging power on an unplanned stop. To my surprise, upon arriving at the charge, I discovered that the battery pack was at 82.4°F (28°C), which is the ideal temperature for fast charging.
In fact, the car predicted it could hit a peak of 351 kW, which is more than Mercedes claims. So I plugged the big CCS connector in, and I didn’t have to wait long for charging to ramp up to 354 kW, even more than the car said it could do. The Mercedes engineers didn’t explain why it could charge even quicker than the spec sheet claimed, but I was there to see it. It went from 14% state of charge to 60% in 11 minutes, adding 49 kWh at an average rate of 260 kW.
Just like any EV, the average charging power would have dropped even more had I continued to observe it, slowing significantly as it approached 100%.
Range Anxiety Need Not Apply
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
I averaged around 2.54 miles/kWh (24.5 kWh/100 km), which is considerably higher consumption than the advertised WLTP average that you need to achieve the claimed 444 miles (715 km) of range. Blame my right foot for that one, as I was enjoying the high-performance drivetrain on a mountain road. You should do significantly better on your daily commute.
I’ll be getting a GLC EV to review at home soon, so I’ll be able to produce a more realistic estimate of electricity consumption than I got in Portugal. But even when I was driving with performance in mind, not efficiency, I still wasn’t worried about range thanks to the big battery.
Speaking of performance, the GLC EV 400 4Matic (the only variant revealed thus far) has plenty of it. It has two electric motors, one in the front (which it can mechanically decouple for better efficiency) and one in the rear, which has a two-speed transmission. Photos by: Andrei Nedelea Photos by: Andrei Nedelea
Mercedes’ arch-rival BMW didn’t put a two-speed transmission in its GLC-rivaling iX3, claiming it doesn’t need one. But Mercedes is adamant it makes the GLC both quicker and more efficient than it would have been without it.
Combined, its two motors produce 483 hp and 590 lb-ft, which is enough to hurl this heavy electric SUV to 60 mph from a standstill in 4.2 seconds. It honestly doesn’t feel as quick as that number suggests—the BMW iX3 50, even though slower on paper, has a more brutal power delivery, which makes it feel quicker.
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
One of the biggest criticisms of earlier EQ cars from Mercedes was the brake pedal feel. The blending of regenerative and friction brakes was clunky and awkward-feeling. This was improved over time, but none of them feel as good as the GLC EV, where you can’t feel where regen ends, and friction braking begins.
Most of it is regen, according to Mercedes, which says that 99% of typical braking is done through regen, which can put up to 300 kW back into the battery and decelerate the car at 3 m/s². That’s some really firm braking—not quite an emergency stop, but still a lot more than most EVs can handle without engaging the friction brakes.
Luxury Comes Naturally
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
As impressive as all the numbers were, the GLC EV felt like it was about a lot more than that. The exterior is understated and classy, except for the gaudy light-up grille, which might be a modern take on 1970s Mercedes grilles, but it makes the car a little too conspicuous. I like the way the GLC EV looks and its stance more than the combustion GLC, and the interior feels nicer, too.
Inside it, you simply can’t look away from the massive 39.1-inch screen that essentially is the dashboard. Unlike the older Hyperscreen setup, which was just three separate screens under a single sheet of glass, the GLC’s display is a single unit, and it’s glorious to look at. While I’m not a fan of just having a slab of glass and calling it a dashboard—it feels like lazy design—it does feel more suitable if it’s all one screen.
Mercedes uses the same design in some of its newer models, like the CLA and VLE, but in those models, you get three separate screens, which just cheapens the look. A trio of screens is also the standard setup for the GLC, but if you buy one of these cars, having the optional full-width screen is an absolute must.
Materials all around the cabin feel great, and it’s as luxurious as you think a Mercedes should be. There are harder plastics on the lower part of the door, cars, and the center console, but this has unfortunately become the norm, even in something with a Three Pointed Star on the hood.
The ornaments around the air vents look like metal, but when you touch them, they reveal their plastic nature. They feel far cheaper than they look. The same goes for the speaker grilles for the optional (and otherwise fantastic) Burmester sound system. These details are made out of real metal in some cheaper Chinese cars I’ve tried, like the Zeekr 001, which also has better-feeling materials lower down in the cabin.
Where Mercedes bests any European-market Chinese EV is with its excellent seats. The GLC I drove was an AMG Line model, so it got more contoured sport seats. These looked and felt fantastic, and were one of my favorite things about the interior. What sealed it for me was just how well they held me in place while pushing the chassis around the many bendy roads in the Algarve. Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
The suspension also felt supremely well judged. All the cars at the first drive event had height-adjustable adaptive air suspension, which really changes the GLC’s character depending on the driving mode. Interestingly, taking corners quickly in Comfort mode doesn’t seem to cause much lean, while in Sport it’s still really good over bumps.
The steering is also a highlight, thanks to its impressive precision and predictable ratio. This isn’t something that I thought I’d say, but the steering in the GLC felt better, sportier, and more natural than in the BMW iX3 that I drove this week. It’s sharper, it needs less lock, and it’s just more pleasant to use. This is now the second Mercedes that I’ve driven with better steering than a comparable BMW, after the AMG CLE 53, whose steering felt better than the M440i’s.
With a rear steering angle of 4.5 degrees, the GLC also seems to transform into a smaller car at lower speeds. This may sound like marketing speak, but it’s impressive how natural-feeling these rear steer setups have become, and it’s not cliché to say that it feels like a vehicle with a shorter wheelbase. There’s no better way to describe it. Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
This is because you don’t really feel it intervening, even at lower speeds. Earlier versions of this technology always made it feel like the rear end was drifting or sliding to the side. That problem is, luckily, a relic of the past.
Today’s version is a fantastic option. It comes bundled with the air suspension in the “Agility and Comfort Package,” but—like the screen—it’s a must-have to experience this car at its best.
Big On Wow
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
I need to come back to the dashboard screen for a second. Even though it looks great and will make your passengers gasp when they first see it, you can’t really do much with it. The front passenger can watch YouTube videos, but the second the driver glances in that direction, playback ends, and it takes a bit to restart.
You can set a few themes that change the colors and background image, as well as the ambient lighting, but there doesn’t seem to be a real purpose for a big screen in the car other than a wow factor. It does all of the normal big-screen things, but nothing truly novel.
But there are other nice details. The electrochromic glass roof, which Mercedes calls Sky Control, can turn from transparent to opaque or into a striped combo, which is another wow feature. At night, 162 embedded light-up Mercedes stars shine through the glass, piling on yet more wow for your passengers.
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
MB.OS makes the infotainment easy and fuss-free. Even though it has Google Maps integration, it’s not built on Android Automotive. It’s an in-house job by Mercedes, and while it’s not as good as the Android-based OS X in the latest BMWs, it is intuitive, snappy, and offers plenty of features.
The coolest thing about it has to be the multi-agent conversational AI system. This digital assistant responds via either ChatGPT or Google Gemini, depending on the type of question you ask, and it’s quick, natural, and you might actually find yourself using it more than you think. I asked it various questions to test it during my drive, and it always answered competently. Plus, it has conversational navigation, where you can ask for charging stops along the route that are nearby Italian restaurants, or look for five-star hotels near parks, and it’ll do its best to sort things out.
The main problem with the AI system is that it doesn’t remember your previous chats, though, and always resets when you turn the vehicle off. I hope they fix that, as all chatbots seem to improve drastically if you give them time to learn your preferences.
The Early Verdict
Gallery: 2026 Mercedes-Benz GLC 400 4Matic EV
My first contact with the GLC EV was very positive. Other than some weird bouncing between the lines when the lane centering function of the adaptive cruise control didn’t appear to work as intended (unlike in the CLA that I drove recently, where it was flawless), even though it has a lot of driver assistance and automated driving hardware.
It has 12 ultrasonic sensors, at least two cameras covering each direction, radars at all four corners of the car, plus an additional mid-range radar hidden behind the badge, all of which go through what Mercedes calls an “intelligent drive controller.”
Overall, it feels like Mercedes finally figured out how to make an EV that delivers the calm, polish, and effortless competence people expect from the badge in the first place. If that character holds up outside carefully chosen roads of a launch event, this could end up being one of the most convincing electric luxury SUVs on sale. More InsideEVs Reviews
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