New Cupra Born vs Volkswagen ID 3: costs

The new Cupra Born has a lot going for it, being closely related to the five-star Volkswagen ID 3. But which is the better electric car?...

New Cupra Born side shot

Buying and owning

Costs, equipment, reliability, safety and security

With list prices of less than £35,000, both of our contenders qualify for the Government’s £2500 grant for zero-emissions cars, and you can expect to get a small discount on the Volkswagen ID 3 if you buy through our online New Car Buying service, helping to close the gap on the slightly cheaper Cupra Born for private cash buyers.

Bills for running them should be very similar, with the Born expected to work out a couple of hundred quid cheaper over three years, due to its slightly lower predicted depreciation and electricity costs.

Volkswagen ID.3 side shot

PCP finance figures weren’t available for the Born at the time of writing, but ID 3 buyers face monthly payments of £444 on a three-year deal, assuming a £3000 deposit and a limit of 10,000 miles per year. Both cars will cost a pittance for drivers paying company car tax.

The ID 3 doesn’t even come with alloy wheels as standard, but it does have two-zone climate control and a panoramic glass roof in Family trim. The Born comes with an augmented reality head-up display that actively tracks and highlights other vehicles and displays annotated sat-nav instructions on the windscreen, directly in your line of sight.

Our contenders are too new to have appeared in the most recent What Car? Reliability Survey, but Seat (from which Cupra is derived) ranked 17th out of 30 brands and Volkswagen was down in 20th.

Cupra Born vs Volkswagen ID.3 costs

The Born is yet to be tested for safety by Euro NCAP, but we expect it to perform similarly to the ID 3, which achieved a five-star rating. Safety features such as lane-keeping assistance and a driver alert system are standard on both.

These cars can be charged at a rate of up to 120kW, taking just over half an hour to get from 10-80% via a suitable CCS rapid charger. Plug into a 7kW wallbox at home and a 0-100% charge takes at least nine hours.


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