BMW i7 review: This is what the future of electric motoring looks like

Two great scientific minds – the Dane Niels Bohr and the German-born Albert Einstein – had very interesting, if slightly different thoughts on what the future holds for us.

Bohr, the Danish physicist, rightfully said: “predictions can be very difficult – especially about the future,” while Einstein, a theoretical physicist, reckoned: “I never think of the future. It comes soon enough.” 

These two men – Nobel prize-winners in 1921 and 1922 – were visionaries in their field undoubtedly, but for both, looking into the future was something impossible. And that’s understandable and beyond the realm of even their extraordinary talent.

So, if even the greatest scientific minds balk at future gazing, or predicting, then what chance have the people tasked with creating the motor cars of the future? Of course they can constantly invent, test, develop and envisage the future needs of motorists, but they can only work with the technologies at hand when doing so.

In the era of the internal combustion engine (which we are still in, obviously) all they could do was tinker with already existing sciences and fine tune them for stuff like performance, economy and so forth. Rarely did they come up with something revolutionary.

In the era of electric power, however, things are different. This is largely because while the basic technologies are already in existence, developing them for the immediate needs of the people who will buy the product was the hard bit.

We have already seen – in a very short period of time – massive gains being made in critical areas such as range, re-generation and the adaptation of new and emerging technologies which continue to evolve on an almost hourly basis.

It has been a privilege to witness the car companies adjust and adapt in the way they have done and with so little time to play with; it’s also been impressive to see their capacity for problem solving and especially so at the low to medium end of the purchasing scale.

At the upper end of that scale – the luxobarge end – things have been rather different and the level of change and the industry’s reaction to those changes has been much slower. Whether that was because their client base was completely uninterested in sitting in a vehicle – no matter how expensive – which was stuck without any form of power on the side of an autobahn somewhere.

Unsurprisingly, the rich and powerful – like the rest of us – like to get to their destination without any bother, but doing so in their preferred mode of transport presented singular difficulties for the industry and it was only last year we saw the first signs of them coming to grips with it.

When Mercedes launched the stunning (and five-star rated by Examiner Motoring) EQS, it showed that the industry had finally worked out what it took to make an electric luxobarge go the distance – or at least the distance most of its customers wanted it to go.

This week’s tester – with one or two minor equivocations – nails that assertion down. The BMW 7-Series has always been to the fore in the luxury class, but this new i7, in the guise of the 536 bhp i7 xDrive60, brings the car’s reputation to a whole new level.

This two-and-a-half tonne monster is not something which will be to everyone’s tastes, particularly the front-end look which is as stocky as an international prop forward and just about as pretty. It’s square-jawed demeanour and that huge grille is almost shocking to the senses.

Indeed the mammoth nature of this car takes some getting used to (the long wheelbase version is the only one in town) as you will find when you try and park it in a regular parking space, where it will considerably over-fill the room available – a bit like an elephant in an armchair.

But then you sit inside and wallow – there’s no other word – in the opulence you will feel as lucky as a lotto winner. Everything about the interior, from the choice of materials to the operation of the multifaceted systems indicates the high-end nature of the car. Even the iDrive click-wheel on the centre console is rendered in crystal glass, for God’s sake.

Indeed faux crystal is everywhere – from the electric seat controls on the door panel to the BMW Interaction bar which traverses the dash and which lights up depending on which driving mode you’re in, will flash red when you push the hazard warning button and will also come alive in collision warning situation.

All this might look tacky in lesser cars, but not here where it adds to the overwhelming aura of unrestrained luxury. And when you factor in the devastatingly brilliant infotainment systems, the frighteningly comfortable seating (you should never again fear sweaty buttocks or need a massage) front and rear.

Having read of the car’s accomplishments on this front I was a little disappointed to find that the big-screen entertainment system (the screen folds out from the roof) for the rear seat passengers was not specified on the tester, but there was really little to quibble about anywhere. That the rear seat passengers can move themselves and their seats about via a phone-style touchscreen is another ‘wow’ element.

In fact the passenger on the left rear – if there is nobody in the front passenger seat – can adjust their seat to an almost airline-style (business class, of course) lie-flat position. The list of gob-smacking stuff in here in endless. And the Bower and Wilkins sound system is fantastic too.

On the road you’d be forgiven for thinking something this big would be a bus-like and intransigent drive, but quite the contrary. During my time with it, I thought it would be good to test it a little, so I took it over Molls Gap – the legendary rally stage between Kenmare and Killarney – just to see what it was made of.

And what it is made of is – unequivocally – The Right Stuff. It is a bit like the Manchester City star Erling Haaland in that it looks like it wouldn’t manage a tight curve, but it has balance, poise and can turn any road inside out without any flap. The manner in which it despatched normal roads was expected, but the way it dispatched Molls Gap would make it a contender in this weekend’s Rally of the Lakes.

The ease and grace which the air suspension deals with road vagaries was stunning and on some of the Gap’s more demanding corners it dismissed them with vigorous distain. There were no ‘oh shit’ moments where you though you might have pushed your luck a tad too far. This car just ate up whatever was thrown at it and spat them out with something approaching contempt. The 4WD system adds greatly to drive peace of mind.

As if the 4.5 second 0-100 km/h was impressive enough for a car the size of a Leopard 2 tank, the general acceleration was pretty astonishing (3.3 seconds 30 to 70 km/h), the manner in which the car went and, importantly, stopped was jaw-dropping.

Much has been made of the range of this car and while the BMW claim of 590-625km seemed optimistic at best, it appeared to me that around the 450 mark was nearer reality. The EQS will genuinely give you 550 km of range, so this initially seemed no match.

But such were the regenerative powers of this car that as I went up Molls Gap there was an indicated 200km left in the tank. At the other end I had 260. Sure I was using the brakes extensively, but that was impressive and left you with the impression that this car was not as shy of the Merc as I feared.

Some folk will dismiss this car on the range issue alone, but to do so would be a sorry premise because this is one of the finest luxury cars on the road right now – up to and including anything from Rolls Royce. It might cost a few quid, but it’s simply brilliant.

If you want to look into the future – it’s here and it gets five stars.