Having unveiled the Smart Concept #5 at the Beijing Automotive Show back in April 2024, the Smart brand has now confirmed production of the new model, and the first renders of the production version have emerged, along with images of the car undergoing testing.
This will be Smart’s third model release after #1 and #3, both more compact takes on the all-electric SUV. Smart describes the #5 as a mid-size SUV, and it will be the brand’s most spacious vehicle yet.
If you’re not familiar with the Smart car-maker in the present day, it’s a prestige brand that deals solely in electric cars, and represents a joint venture between original owners Mercedes-Benz, and Chinese company Geely, the firm that also owns Volvo and Polestar. All the company’s offerings so far have been all-electric SUVs of various sizes, so long gone are the days of teeny-tiny Smart cars such as the ForTwo and ForFour.
2025 Smart #5: Price, specs and release date
- 2025 Smart #5: styling and dimensions
- 2025 Smart #5: interior design and practicality
- 2025 Smart #5: motors, batteries and dynamics
- 2025 Smart #5: price and release date
2025 Smart #5: styling and dimensions
Despite Smart’s description of the #5 as a mid-size SUV, the firm is yet to release details of the car's dimensions, so it’s difficult to get a handle on precisely how big the it will be. That description would lead us to believe that the car would be a rival for the BMW iX3, Tesla Model Y or Peugeot e-3008 for size, but we can’t be sure.
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That said, between the various images we’ve seen of the #5 - which include the concept car, the production renders and the testing spy shots - we can get a decent idea of what the forthcoming car will look like.
Like most other SUVs, you’ll notice the characteristically boxy and upright design, plus a conventional two-box silhouette. The new Smart #5 won’t be entirely conventional, though, with the wheels pushed further out to the corners than on most SUVs, resulting in very short overhangs both at the front and the back.
Smart has been clear that the #5 is an SUV that is genuinely meant to appeal to the active lifestyle set, so expect a fair amount of ruggedness as a result. Granted, the concept car’s integrated winch, bonnet tethers and roof-mounted light bar probably won’t make production, but the production sketches suggest that the front and rear skid plates probably will in some form or another.
One feature that has remained constant throughout is the lighting signature found at both ends of the car. The headlights and rear light clusters are both connected by a horizontal line of four individual lights running between that, so expect that to feature on the final production car.
2025 Smart #5: interior design and practicality
With no dimensions having been published for the new car, and no figures for passenger or luggage space to work with, it’s impossible for us to know precisely how practical the car is likely to be, but we’d expect a five-seat cabin with decent passenger space and a decent boot.
The only interior images we’ve seen of the #5 so far are of the concept car, but these appear to be fairly conventional rather than too out-there and ‘concepty’, so the design and layout could well be pretty close to production-spec.
These images show two embedded OLED dashboard screens spreading across the width of the dashboard, in addition to the smaller digital driver readout behind the steering wheel. These will control pretty much all the car’s various functions, with very little other switchgear on display. Smart also mentions that there’s a detachable portable speaker integrated into the centre console, which is an interesting touch.
Expect all the usual infotainment functionality such as DAB radio, Bluetooth, Apple CarPlay, Android Auto, a wi-fi hotspot and a ton of USB ports. If you’re one of those folk that gets bamboozled by complex, feature-laden touchscreens, Smart says you can operate most functions through the car’s sophisticated voice-control system, and there’s also an AI-powered personal assistant feature, too.
The #5 also has what Smart calls a ‘zero-gravity front passenger seat’, which is a rather over-dramatic way of saying that it combines heating, cooling, massaging and an additional leg rest.
2025 Smart #5: motors, batteries and dynamics
The only technical information we’ve seen on the #5 so far refers to the concept car: no details have been issued on the production car as yet.
The concept car had all-wheel drive and off-road tyres, along with a drive system featuring 800-volt technology, allowing for super-fast rapid charging of 10-80% in 15 minutes. Smart claimed that the concept car’s battery had a nominal capacity of 100kWh or more, giving the car an all-electric range of more than 341 miles according to the WLTP cycle.
Now, if these kind of figures are to be replicated in the production version of the #5, then it won’t be inheriting the mechanicals of its Smart #1 and Smart #3 stablemates, both of which share their underpinnings with the Volvo EX30. Those cars are available with battery pack options of 49kWh or 66kWh (total capacity, nominal capacities are 47kWh or 62kWh), and in the case of the #1, this results in a driving range of 193 miles or 273 miles, respectively.
Bearing that in mind, we’d say it’s more likely that the #5 will share the SPA2 platform and powertrain used by the Volvo EX90 and Polestar 3 electric vehicles. These cars get an electrical architecture that features 107kWh battery, giving a broadly comparable electric driving range to that claimed by the concept car. However, it should be made clear that this supposition is unconfirmed at present.
The images released of the car undergoing testing suggest that Smart’s engineers are subjecting their development mules to fairly hard use in mud and snow, which would support the firm’s insistence that the #5 is aimed at those with an active lifestyle, so we’d expect most - if not all - versions to have dual-motor four-wheel drive. That said, more affordable single-motor versions would be a, erm, smart move on the company’s behalf, catering for customers who want the looks and character of the #5, but not necessarily the ruggedness. It’s also far too early to speculate about whether a high-performance Brabus model might come along in the fullness of time.
2025 Smart #5: price and release date
With so many details about the #5 yet to be confirmed, it’s no surprise that the pricing, specification and precise release date of the car are among them. Indeed, all Smart has said on the release date is that it’ll be available in Europe sometime in 2025. We’ll update this article once we have more news. That’s likely to be in the summer, when the new car is due to be unveiled in Brisbane, Australia. Watch this space.