I recently spent a week in San Jose with Samsung, where it unveiled its latest range of Galaxy S smartphones (the most powerful of which we’ve reviewed here). While I was staying in California, I saw so many electric cars, including Rivians, Hummer EVs, and the extremely ugly Tesla Cybertruck – but among my EV sightseeing, I passed by a dealership displaying the gorgeous Lucid Air – and I’m in love.
Now, before we get too far into this article, the Air isn’t due to hit Australian shores anytime Soon. Drive reported in July that the car is at least two years away from coming down under. If you’re unfamiliar with the company, it’s led by CEO Peter Rawlinson, who previously led development on the Tesla Model S (the Air’s direct competitor) and was previously a Lotus and Jaguar engineer.
Lucid only has one car out at the moment in the US, its only market at the time of writing, along with a performance trim of said car (the ‘Sapphire’ variant of the Air), and an SUV named the Gravity on the way in 2024. The company is also, like many EV startups, losing tonnes of money for every car it sells – while the brand is hemorrhaging cash, we still want them to come down under (pretty please).
That doesn’t mean I won’t gush about the Lucid Air. A four-door premium sedan with a gorgeous cross-bonnet light bar, along with a beautiful sport roof and a masterful-looking body that manages a drag coefficient of 0.197 (versus the Tesla Model S’ 0.207 coefficient), this EV is gorgeous.
There is, however, so much screen in this bloody car. No car needs this much screen – four displays wrapping the dash and the centre console – including an instrument cluster, a nav menu, essential features over on the left side, and other settings in the centre console screen. Surely we could compress these into two screens and some buttons? It did feel more sci-fi than many other EVs, though. Compared to EVs I’ve driven in Australia, the interior felt close to a Polestar 2.
The two-tone on this particular model, the Lucid Air Touring, was quite nice. A tan leatherette secondary colour, that is extremely satisfying right up until you consider how painful it would be to clean.
It would be remiss of me not to mention the gigantic frunk in this thing. Just look at this bad boy – 10 cubic feet, or 283 litres. For comparison, the Model S has 150 litres of space.
Like many EV showrooms, Lucid also had a battery model and a drive unit on display. The fastest trim of the Air is capable of a 0-60mph (96km/h) speed of just 1.89 seconds, and on the EPA test cycle, the car can travel 520 miles without needing a recharge – about 836 kilometres, though it’s worth noting that the EPA test cycle is different to the WLTP test cycle that we’re more inclined to use when talking about EVs in Australia. The car’s max speed is 378km/h and it can charge at up to 300kW on a DC public charger.
There was also a racing battery pack on display – purpose-built for the Formula E series. Unfortunately, while I considered bringing it home, I don’t think it would have fit in my plane luggage.
Gosh, I wish the Lucid Air was available in Australia. I get that it’s not economical at the moment for the company, but I can dream, can’t I? That being said, I question demand and return on investment; after all, Tesla doesn’t even sell the Model S in Australia any more – so what chance does its biggest competitor have?
Though as noted by Car Expert, the company is mulling over right-hand drive market development, with it speculated that the company could fill the void left open by the absent luxury Tesla models (the X and S).
Regardless, this is one of the most gorgeous EVs I’ve ever seen. I’ll take two.
Image: Zachariah Kelly/Gizmodo Australia
Want more Aussie car news? Here’s every EV we’ve reviewed in the last two years, all the EVs we can expect down under soon, and our guide to finding EV chargers across the country. Check out our dedicated Cars tab for more.