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The AION V is another new electric compact SUV from another Chinese brand that’s new to the UK; the market is getting crowded, but the AION V feels like one of the more well-engineered options.
Another month, another new EV from a Chinese company that you’ve not heard of. This time it’s a brand called AION and the car is the AION V.
AION was founded in 2017 as an electrified brand of Guangzhou Automobile Group Co., Ltd. (GAC), one of China’s largest automakers, founded in 1997. AION Auto UK has been formed as a joint venture between GAC and Jameel Motors, an independent international automotive distributor.
AION is one of the top-selling BEV brands in China with over 300,000 cars sold in 2025. It benefits from over 20 years of GAC joint ventures in development and manufacturing with Honda and Toyota.
Before we talk about batteries and motors etc, let’s get one thing out of the way first: the AION V has a party trick – it has its own 6.6-litre fridge/freezer/hot box, called a ‘CoolHot Box’. This is in the compartment under the central armrest between the two front seats and you can choose whether you want it to be a fridge, freezer or hot box on the car’s touchscreen. It may sound like a gimmick but it actually came in very useful for keeping drinks chilled when visiting a restaurant where you had to bring your own alcohol because it didn’t have a licence.
The ‘CoolHot Box’ can operate as low as minus 15 degrees C or up to 50 degrees C, and it keeps working if you park the car. AION says that if the CoolHot Box was running for 24 hours, it would only consume 0.5 kWh of battery energy. It should be noted that the CoolHot Box comes as part of the Premium Pack, a £1,495 option. The Premium Pack also has a foldable seat-back tray-table for the left rear seat passenger.
Okay, now that we’ve got the domestic appliance story out of the way, we can talk about the rest of the car. The AION V is a C-segment five-seat electric SUV which measures 4,605mm in length and has lots of rear legroom. It also has a large 427-litre boot, which can increase to 500 litres thanks to the removable floor which opens up the space designed for a spare wheel, or 1,638 litres is on offer if you fold down the rear seats. There’s no frunk.
The interior looks and feels more upmarket than some other Chinese competitors, and has storage space under the floating centre console. Two options are available to recline the seats when parked or charging, Rest Mode and Lounge Mode.
The AION V has a 75.3kWh (with fully usable capacity) Lithium Ferrophosphate (LFP) CATL ‘Magazine Battery 2.0’, and the company claims that it’s the safest EV battery in any car currently on sale globally, being the world’s first to pass nail penetration and bullet impact tests without any resultant ignition, open flame or thermal runaway. The AION V is front-wheel drive.
The car’s ‘hidden’ external door handles resulted in most passengers struggling to open them in the dark.
Unusually, the AION V isn’t rated for towing.
AION is likely to be another Chinese brand that you’ve not heard of, but after a week of living with the AION V, we can confirm that it feels like a quality product to drive.
Ride quality is comfortable, even with the relatively low profile tyres, and if you do hit poor road surfaces or potholes, the suspension feels well engineered, so there are no noisy clunks. Body control is also good, and the car feels stable at speed.
All electric cars are refined and quiet, but the AION V is more refined and quiet than some rivals. It features a ‘soundproof’ windscreen and front windows as standard, which helps to make travel at motorway speeds very hushed – even with the large roof bars.
The well-judged weights of the EV’s controls help to create the feeling that this is a grown up, mature car for this segment. Performance is perfectly sufficient, with a 0-62 mph time of 7.9 seconds, but the smooth, instant torque makes it feel faster than this.
Most EVs with front-wheel drive are susceptible to wheelspin and torque steer under acceleration, but both of these traits were reasonably well controlled in the AION V, however the tyres lack ultimate grip on wet corners.
Three drive modes are on offer, Eco, Comfort and Sport, with three levels of brake regen.
As well as an 8.88-inch driver’s display, there’s a large 14.6-inch landscape central touchscreen featuring all car controls – there are no physical buttons – with permanent shortcuts at the bottom of the screen for items including climate control, seat controls, audio volume, heated rear screen, 360-degree surround view, door lock/unlock, and quick access to the panoramic roof blind settings.
Like virtually all Chinese EVs that we’ve driven, there’s lots of beeping if you don’t switch off various driver assistance settings. There are no physical controls to adjust the door mirrors, you have to go into the touchscreen to do this. It wasn’t an instant success connecting to Apple CarPlay, and the car didn’t seem to like reconnecting.
The AION V gets the award for having the slippiest key, which, with no key ring or lanyard, can fall out of your hand really easily.
The AION V has a WLTP combined electric driving range of 317 miles which the company claims is the longest standard range of any electric C-segment SUV in the UK. After a week on test the real-world range was averaging an impressive 300 miles. Consumption (WLTP) is 4.2 miles/kWh.
The AION V has a maximum DC rapid charging rate of 180 kW, which is faster than many rivals in this segment. This should deliver a 10% to 80% charge in 24 minutes. AC Charging is possible up to 11kW.
The AION V features a heat pump as standard, as well as Vehicle-to-Load (V2L) capability, enabling the car to power electrical devices.
The AION V is available in a single specification priced from £36,450. A ‘Premium Pack’, as fitted to our test car, is also available for £1,495, which includes Genuine Leather Seating, Massage Front Seats, Second-Row Tray Table (for rear left passenger), Sun Visor (Large Vanity Sun Mirror with LED), CoolHot Box (with heating, freezing and refrigeration functions) and Pm 2.5 Sensor (detects and displays air quality level).
Heated and reclining front and rear seats are included as standard.
The AION V is available in six exterior paint finishes: Wilderness Sand metallic and Arctic White pearlescent as standard choices; Sea Fluorescent Grey, Galaxy Blue and Night Shadow Black, all metallic (£675); and Holographic Silver metallic (£675).
AION has a ‘Great 8’ customer proposition which provides an eight-year 100,000-mile vehicle warranty, an eight-year 125,000-mile battery warranty, eight years’ servicing, eight years’ roadside assistance, and MOT testing fees up to the eighth year from first registration. This transfers with ownership and is applicable across all sales types such as private, fleet and business.
The AION V is another new EV from a Chinese manufacturer that most drivers in the UK probably haven’t heard of, so it will be difficult for them to know if this is a good car. That’s why we’re here. We’ve reviewed every electric car that’s ever been on sale in the UK, including EVs from other Chinese brands, and we can confirm that the AION V feels like one of the higher quality cars in this segment. The driving experience of virtually all EVs is quiet and refined, but this is especially the case with the AION, thanks to features such as suspension that feels well engineered and a ‘soundproof’ windscreen and front windows. The electric driving range of 317 miles is impressive, as is the maximum DC rapid charging rate of 180 kW. There’s lots of rear legroom and a large boot. And of course don’t forget the fridge/freezer/hot box. But perhaps most importantly, the price of £36,450 (plus £1,495 for the ‘Premium Pack’) undercuts many other electric compact SUVs. The AION V is awarded a Green Car Guide rating of 8 out of 10.
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Paul Clarke, GreenCarGuide Editor
