When BMW announced the i4 in 2021, I was immediately skeptical. The brand was planning to build a full suite of electric sedans, which was a heartening sign. But rather than building them on dedicated electric platforms, these new models would cut costs by sharing underpinnings with their gas-powered equivalents. I thought the inherent compromise of the i4, i5, and i7 would make them bad cars.
I was wrong.
The i4 is wonderful, the i7 is sumptuous, and the i5 I’m driving this week is a competent and impressive daily driver. But these cars are good in spite of their shared underpinnings, not because of them. And this photo proves it:
Photo by: Mack Hogan/InsideEVs
Look at the proportions of this car. Roughly 35% of its length is taken up by its hood.
What’s under the hood? Let’s see:
Based on the size and shape of this cover, you’d think it was meant to disguise an engine. You’d be half right.
Photo by: Mack Hogan/InsideEVs
Nothing you can use. Just a big mound of plastic. What’s under it?
The i5’s hood area is stuffed with power electronics and HVAC components.
Photo by: Mack Hogan/InsideEVs
The plastic cover conceals power electronics like the inverter, the front motor on this all-wheel-drive model, and the heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system. Fair enough, those have to go somewhere. But let’s take a look at the alternative:
The Model 3’s hood is a lot shorter, but Tesla manages to squeeze a drive motor, the power electronics for the vehicle, the HVAC system, and a user-accessible frunk under it.
That nose is not just shorter than the BMW’s, it also takes up less of the overall length of the vehicle relative to the passenger area. Despite this, it also hides the power electronics, HVAC system and an optional front motor. Because of the packaging advantages of a purely electric, software-defined platform, the Model 3 also squeezes a frunk under its hood, giving you an extra 3.1 cubic feet of storage space.
I know what you’re probably thinking: This is not a fair comparison. The Model 3 is a significantly smaller vehicle than the i5, and more directly competes with the i4. But that is my exact point.
The Model 3 is 2 inches (51 mm) narrower than the i5, around 1,000 pounds (453 kg) lighter, and over a foot shorter than the i5—186.9 inches vs. 199.2 inches, or 4747 mm vs. 5,059 mm. Despite this, the Model 3 has significantly more cargo space, with 24.1 cubic feet of combined storage to the BMW’s 17.3 cubes. The Model 3 has 1.4 inches more of front legroom but the BMW beats it on rear legroom by 2 inches.
The Lucid Air is about the same size as an i5, but offers more passenger and cargo space. Photo by: Lucid Motors
Looking at a more comparably sized car, the Lucid Air is just over 3 inches shorter than the Bimmer and 1.4 inches wider. The BMW is a whopping 4.2 inches taller, too, and weighs significantly more than the lightest Air, which still offers more range than any i5. Still, the Air crushes the i5 on packaging, offering more headroom in both rows, more legroom in both rows, a larger trunk, and a frunk. Add both cargo areas together and you get 32.1 cubic feet of space, nearly double what you get in an i5. That’s what a purely electric design and an obsession with packaging can get you.
The i5 is as long as some three-row SUVs, but it doesn’t make great use of its space. Photo by: Mack Hogan/InsideEVs
With a longer, heavier car, BMW offers less practical space than either the Tesla or the Lucid. As an overall package, the pure EVs are simply more practical. Why is that?
I posit that the Model 3 and Pure waste a lot less space. Because the BMW’s nose must also accommodate long inline-six turbocharged engines and wide, messy V-8 hybrid powertrains, it has to be massive. In theory, you could use all of that space for a massive frunk, but the i5 is not packaged efficiently enough to do so, likely because of shared components or structure with the gas versions.
Believe me, gas burners aren’t winning in this arrangement, either. The latest gas-powered 530i is two inches taller than the previous model and nearly 300 lbs heavier. I can’t be certain that’s due to the compromises of platform sharing, but everything on the platform seems to be a porker. The range-topping M5, which squeezes in plug-in-hybrid hardware and a turbocharged V-8, weighs an extraordinarily hefty 5,390 lbs. While critics often say that EVs are too heavy, that puts the top-dog PHEV BMW on par with the Lucid Air Sapphire in terms of mass, and hundreds of pounds heavier than a Model S Plaid.
The plug-in hybrid BMW M5 is powerful, but it’s also massive.
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
The ability to offer serene electric powertrains, butter-smooth inline-sixes, and a fire-breathing V-8 on one platform is understandably seductive. Doing so means you can more easily adjust the mix of EVs, PHEVs, and gas cars you produce, which is useful in today’s extremely volatile market. Yet the numbers prove that a jack of all trades will always be a master of none.
The good news is that BMW has recognized this. Its future EVs will move to its dedicated Neue Klasse platform, which is already proving to have better driving dynamics, packaging, and software than any shared-architecture car. The i4, i5, and i7 were necessary waypoints on the way to that destination, and BMW did a great job with them.
Gallery: 2026 BMW i5 xDrive40: Full Photo Gallery
In fact, I’d argue that BMW’s first line of EVs were among the best in the business, proving more fun-to-drive, stylish, and likable than anything from Mercedes, Audi, or any other legacy brand. Yet they succeeded in spite of their compromised beginnings. It’s no wonder why the iX—the lone dedicated-platform BMW EV of the generation—was also clearly the best in its lineup?. That’s the model for the future.
BMW is finally about to start producing electric sedans designed the right way from the beginning. The new i3 is coming soon, with larger sedans sure to follow on a dedicated EV platform with cutting-edge specs. Imagine how good those will be.
Contact the author: Mack.Hogan@insideevs.com
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