How Fast Is This One, Exactly?

It used to be with The Cars, you got in, turned the key, and drove, stopping for gas on occasion. You had one driving mode, and life was simple. The 2019 Porsche Cayenne E-Hybrid is different. You have six driving modes, and life can be very complicated. Full Disclosure: Porsche flew me to France, put me up in a nice hotel and fed me for a couple days so I could drive the new E-Hybrid. Is this too many driving modes? Yes, this is too many driving modes. The car鈥檚 emergency brake also engaged twice in seemingly safe situations. But we鈥檒l get to all that. Let鈥檚 get through some basics first. And let鈥檚 remember Porsche is going electrified in a big way, with hybrid variants of this, the Panamera, more than likely the next-generation 911, and the fully electric Mission E鈥攁 supposed Tesla-killer鈥攃oming soon. How fast is this one, exactly? Porsche says it鈥檚 capable of going from zero to 60 mph in 4.7 seconds, and doing a quarter-mile in 13.3 seconds.

Top speed is 155 mph, or 83 mph using electric alone. This is reasonably quick for an SUV, but one feeling you can鈥檛 escape while driving is it is just how heavy the E-Hybrid feels. Some cars can be fast and yet feel slow. The E-Hybrid is fast and feels, well, not slow exactly, but definitely lumbering. The new E-Hybrid, probably most notably, will come with 22-inch wheels for the first time. These are big wheels! And though the cars I tested all had 21-inch wheels, when you get to wheel sizes that big, you might as well go one more. Both are massive and add to the overall impression that this car is not exactly here to make friends. Paddle shifters can also let you take control, but the thing about transmissions with more than, say, five speeds, is that they are tedious to drive with the paddle shifters. Better to let the car do what it was designed for, and cycle through the gears by itself.

Some notes on the battery, which is 14.1 kWh, but only 11 kWh of that is utilizable. With the standard 10-amp charger, the battery will recharge full in just under 8 hours, though a 32-amp charger is optional and will do the trick in about two and a half. I couldn鈥檛 blame him; the car was a glove that fit both of us鈥攖all, gangly men鈥攓uite perfectly. I suspect it would fit smaller people even better. Now, let鈥檚 talk about all those driving modes, as there is six of them. They are Sport, Sport Plus, Hybrid, E-Power, E-Charge, and E-Hold. Do you want something boring and safe and economical to ferry your children around? Sure, it can do that. Do you want something vaguely sporty and quick? The E-Hybrid is, you know, fine but more simulacrum of that than the genuine article. Do you want something that鈥檚 all-electric? The E-Hybrid can do that, too, though the range is will be less than most people need except for the shortest commutes. Further, in the course of driving, simple operation of the car is more complicated than any car need to be.

And then there was the emergency brake, which is designed to quickly stop the car if it senses danger up ahead. Twice, the Cayenne stopped the car at low speeds quite jarringly without any imminent danger up ahead, once at a roundabout, and again as we slowly approached a parked car from several feet away. If the system detects an impending collision, it will apply the brakes and stop the vehicle as quickly as possible,鈥?while also noting that the cars at the launch were preproduction models. So these might鈥檝e been glitches, in other words, but one couldn鈥檛 help feeling a little unnerved. The 2019 Porsche Cayenne E-Hybrid is a comfortable, powerful boat of a vehicle that has something in it for everyone. Will people buy it, or will they just opt for the standard S and Turbo models with more conventional powertrains? The power and fuel economy benefits here do make a solid case for this one. It makes you admire Porsche鈥檚 ambition while also questioning whether the engineers could鈥檝e made some more focused choices鈥攃utting down on driving modes in particular, to some that drivers are more inclined to use daily. I鈥檓 not even really sure this is Porsche鈥檚 fault exactly, since, for now, we鈥檙e stuck in the weird in-between of the past and the future, necessitating all these redundancies. I鈥檒l propose two modes next time: A good all-electric with a longer range, and then Super Crazy Sports Mode That Also Charges The Battery. For most people, driving conservative and safe and driving Super Crazy Sporty Feeling Your Emotions are the only two real modes.