BMW has been building up to the release of the new iX3 for many, many years and it feels like I’ve been essentially an expectant uncle watching this “pregnancy” over all that time. The company launched prototypes, samples, and innovations at CES over several years and 18 months ago I went to their factory in Spartanburg, USA to see the first look at the infotainment system.

Now here we are mid to late 2026 and the car is ready to be driven out of showrooms by Australians keen on what is a future vision from BMW for not just electrification but driving generally. 

EFTM Snapshot: BMW’s Neue Klasse era begins here in Australia with the iX3 — a striking blend of familiar BMW design and genuinely futuristic tech, from the panoramic windscreen display to 800V ultra-fast charging, and it drives every bit as good as it looks, delivering on that old “sheer driving pleasure” proBMW iX3 review: Australia gets the first Neue Klasse EV, with an 805km range, 800V charging, a wild panoramic display and genuine driving pleasure. Is it BMW’s best yet?mise in fully electric form.

Neue Klasse – From 1961 to 2026

The term “Neue Klasse” doesn’t really mean much to anyone who’s not a BMW fanatic but it all started in 1961 at the Frankfurt Motor Show with the reveal of the Neue Klasse BMW. The models that came from that design really set the tone for a company going forward after a period of uncertainty. It followed that success with the 2 Series, which you could see as the predecessor of the modern three-series classic BMW. 

In simple terms Neue Klasse means all new, the new class of BMW and it’s not something that BMW has just taken to with a sketch pad. This vehicle, this platform, is essentially a ground-up new vision for BMW, allowing them to create vehicles of all shapes and sizes, of all different drivetrains, including a very electric iX3. 

BMW iX3 Design

This car doesn’t look crazy outrageous on the road or against other vehicles but it certainly looks remarkably modern. It also, importantly, looks entirely BMW. A classic narrow kidney grille that is a shout back to that early 60s BMW look with flat but sharp lines across gentle curves around the entire medium SUV-shaped body.

Australians will get the M Sport package by default because it’s just what we do, while other markets, including Germany, will get a very base model of this vehicle. For Australians, BMW is a premium brand, so it’s premium from the ground up here in Australia.

The flush-fit door handles are a good look. They present when you approach and they give the side of the car a really sleek look. Up top a large panoramic sky roof not only gives great light inside the cabin but also offers just a touch more headroom than you might normally expect in a vehicle this size.

Importantly under the bonnet there is storage. It feels like every traditional legacy car company is learning that you should have storage under the bonnet. This is an electric car. There’s no engine there, so compress all that electric design to allow for space because space is one of the benefits of an electric vehicle. 

The Technology Inside the BMW iX3

Inside the BMW iX3 is a whole lot more futuristic than the outside might present or represent. Starting with the steering wheel, this is something very different. Each option of steering wheel isn’t your normal steering wheel at all. In fact only the M steering wheel, part of the M Sport Pro package, even begins to looks normal with a two-spoke design. Whereas on the rest the four-spoke design, top and bottom, can be quite off-putting the first time you get in because where you would normally see your instrument cluster is a huge steering wheel spoke. There is no instrument cluster in the BMW iX3.

Instead this is where the design really stands out from any other car on the market and it’s not just about a head-up display. The 3D head-up display in the windscreen is good but I would argue the three-dimensional component of it is irrelevant. It would have been better placed in my time driving it if it was just a traditional head-up display. Looking at it in front of me never felt three-dimensional, actually felt a little bit washed out and I think with a bit of clarity and brightness, without the 3D, it would have been a better head-up display.

Underneath the head-up display though, this is where it really gets different. Across the entire width of the windscreen at the bottom, where essentially the bonnet sits and the windscreen fades underneath, every car has a black unused portion of windscreen. BMW’s taken that space and reflected or projected, however you wanna see it, a set of screens. There are essentially three large areas:

  • driver-focused
  • central-focused
  • passenger-focused

You can customise what you want in these screens by mode or by personal decision. In front of the driver things like basic gears. speed and range present themselves in a very beautiful, bright, crisp resolution. This could also be navigation if you choose. You might put the music display or track information in the centre. On the left-hand side with the passengers, you might put basic information like the clock or G-forces for them to enjoy if you’re doing a bit of spirited driving.

No matter what you choose to put in the panoramic vision, the one thing you cannot argue is this thing is stunning. It’s not at all distracting interestingly, but what I’m blown away with most is just how crisp the resolution is. Given this is not an actual screen, it’s a reflection, just like a head-up display. It is so clear. The resolution is amazing. They’ve done a beautiful job of presenting this information.

Around the rest of the cabin, just sheer gorgeous design, lovely materials, large centre console with wireless charger, easy access buttons for basic functions, and a toggle lever in the centre console for drive mode for gear shifting. The whole main cabin is the central display infotainment system but it’s not just a square box. It’s a strange, what they call, free-cut design angled into the driver and it just works. What the infotainment system does is present the most commonly used information or functions to the driver’s side so it’s easily accessible. It’s a large screen that, when you’re using Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, obviously boxes out and leaves unused space. If you were to stick with the pure infotainment system, it’s really well laid out and very snappy performance.

It suffers from what all good infotainment systems suffer from: too much information, too much technology, too many settings. It’s hard to find things that you might naturally want to look for and if there are exclusive features that BMW has, you may never know about them until you spend time digging into the settings. This is not uncommon in any car, especially Chinese modern cars, but BMW’s tried to lay them out in a more reasonable set of categories to allow you to find the functions that you want. In the end I still found myself just driving with Android Auto 95% of the time.

All Electric Excellence ready for the modern roads

BMW’s put a lot of effort in here to learn from what they’ve known about electric cars through their own history in recent years and the market generally, and I think it works.

A huge 108 kW usable battery, 800 V system with 400 kW potential charging. Even the simple things like AC charging work up to 22 kW, something that so many electric cars don’t allow for. In Australia three-phase power is so common it’s a game changer for their household to be able to charge your car so fast at home.

That battery allows for up to 805 km of range in the iX3 50 variant or up to 635 km range in the iX3 40 variant. That comes thanks to, obviously, beautiful, slick design, which gives it a 0.24 coefficient of drag. Most importantly it’s about efficient battery technology, motors, and general design principles. 

Here’s a nifty feature. The charging port cover obviously comes up, allows you to plug in, but then it actually just comes down and acts like a veranda over the top of your charging cable if it’s a wet or cold or even snowy day. Obviously that’s probably a European thought but it’s a fun nifty little feature anyway. 

And it’s got some punch too. 4.9second 0-100km time in the iX3 50 variant and 5.9 seconds in the iX3 40 variant. That comes from 345 kW of power in the iX3 50, with a maximum torque of 645 Nm. This thing is no slouch.

All that battery power, performance, and efficiency lead to a 300 to 400 kW charging time of just 21 minutes from 10% up to 80%. In the real world at home on an 11 kW charger, you’ll go from 0-100& charge in 11 hours. On a 22 kW three-phase, you’ll get 0-100% in 5 hours and 45 minutes. 

Driving the BMW iX3 – The on road feeling

Nothing that I’ve just told you is really new information. It’s been out there for a while. What is it like to drive? That’s what we want to know. I’ve got to tell you it’s a joy to drive. BMW’s old slogan (I don’t know if they still use it) was “Sheer driving pleasure” and I think you really get that from this car. From the very first feeling of sitting behind the wheel and feeling this steering wheel, which is different, it’s literally made to feel comfortable with your hands at 3:00 or your hands at 9:00 and 3:00, however you see it. I don’t know how to describe it any more than to say it just feels like the wheel was made around your hands as opposed to gripping onto something that was made without the thought of how your hands actually grip.

The wheel actually has a bunch of buttons on it as well, which are touch-sensitive buttons. They’re not physical buttons and that’s not a great thing. Many companies have moved away from that so I feel like BMW might have missed a mark on that one. It is intuitive. Certain buttons and functions only appear when they’re needed and it certainly works when you get used to it. There’s no issue there but I just wonder whether we’ve actually moved on from putting this much technology into the steering wheel of a car.

On the road it’s got great punch, great get-up and go at any speed. We were on country roads needing to do some overtaking and even at 80 km/h the punch you get for a quick overtake is always there. Feeling through tight corners or winding bends was sensational. Obviously the huge battery, the low centre of gravity, the almost 50/50 weight distribution, plays perfectly into that but that’s exactly what you expect from a car like this. There are some really intricate dynamic functions of this car which are very hard to describe. Because they’re electric motors, the control that BMW can build into the systems in this car means that the stability is not just a comfortable feeling but it’s about comfort at every level.

Something as simple as going over a speed hump: when you go over a speed hump you normally bounce just ever so gently after you come off the speed hump in this. I experienced it once or twice. BMW say they’re actually able to overcompensate the electric motors’ regeneration or braking capacity to ensure that you don’t feel those bumps. It really does feel steady at all speeds around town, around the car park, and on the open road.

I adore driving this car. It was like I was at one with the road, no matter whether I was just driving a freeway section or, most importantly, in the hinterlands around Byron Bay. It really did feel planted at every moment. 

Overall

Unquestionably BMW are on to a winner here. This car and the iX5 are critical vehicles for BMW because they’re such a popular sector of the market, with a price tag starting at around $82,000 plus on roads for the iX3 40 variant or $109,900 for the iX3 50 variant. Not a cheap car but no BMW is. The thing is, I don’t see how you drive a petrol BMW and then this and don’t feel like this is the future of motoring.

No it doesn’t have the roar of an engine like some sort of M-series BMW but there are some beautiful artificial sounds that kick in when you’re at speed or with your foot to the floor. I think this is a very impressive vehicle and I think it’s a nice look on the road. Personally I think this is an absolute winner for BMW so it’s a great line in the sand for them going forward. I think they’ll do very well with it. I just wish I was in the market for a new car. 

Web: BMW