Kia EV2 vs Renault 5

The Kia EV2 costs £5,000 more than the Renault 5. For that premium it adds 89 miles more WLTP range and 70 kW faster peak rapid charging. On EVcarsguide's combined category scores, the Renault 5 comes out ahead overall.

The Renault 5 is £5,000 cheaper to buy. Running costs are almost identical - about £144 a year either way, at 8,000 miles on an off-peak home tariff. Add 5 years of charging and the Renault 5 comes out roughly £5,000 cheaper overall. These figures cover list price and home charging only - insurance, servicing, tyres and depreciation will move the real total.

EVcarsguide estimates a real-world motorway range of about 234 miles for the Kia EV2 and 160 miles for the Renault 5 - both below their WLTP figures, because sustained high speed is the hardest case for an EV. The Kia EV2 goes roughly 75 miles further between charging stops.

The two are within 8 mm on width, so neither is meaningfully easier to thread into a tight space. In a standard 2,400 mm bay that leaves about 600 mm of total clearance for the Kia EV2 and about 592 mm of total clearance for the Renault 5.

Over a 8-year ownership window EVcarsguide's degradation model projects roughly 84% battery health for the Kia EV2 and 84% for the Renault 5. That is close enough that capacity loss should not decide between them. Both use NMC-type cells, so for daily use keep the charge limit near 80% to slow degradation. The Renault 5 has the longer battery warranty at 8 years, versus 7 for the Kia EV2.