Chevrolet has boosted the Bolt EV, giving the company's electric car nearly 10 percent more range, without needing a bigger battery pack for 2020.
It's 34 km more range for the 2020 Bolt EV. That brings the total range estimate to 417 km. So how'd they do it? New chemistry in the pack. The engineering team made small changes that boosted the energy in each cell electrode. The pack is the same physical size, but thanks to the new cells it gets a boost from 60 kWh to 66 kWh.
Competitively, that gives the 2020 Bolt EV more range than most competitors. It edges out the Hyundai Kona EV's 415, and beats the Kia Niro EV's 385, and even has more than the Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus with 386 km. The cheapest car with more range is a Tesla Long Range Model 3 that costs $65,990 and doesn't qualify for the federal government EV incentive – it has 499 km of range.
"At Chevrolet we’re constantly listening to customer feedback and we heard the desire for more range. The team worked diligently to find ways to improve battery energy, giving customers the confidence to go more than the extra kilometre,” said Tim Grewe, Director of Global Battery Cell Engineering and Strategy.
Other changes for 2020 include dropping the eye-earing Shock paint colour and replacing it with Cayenne Orange and Oasis Blue.
The 2020 Bolt will arrive at dealers later this year. Chevrolet wasn't giving out pricing yet, but we don't expect much change for two reasons. The first is that the US base price is unchanged. The second is that if the price climbs more than $200 from 2019's $44,800, then it will take the Bolt EV out of the running for the federal EV incentive.
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