Mercedes has received a five stars ANCAP safety rating for the EQE electric sedan that it launched into the Australian market, making it one of the safest large sedans on the market.
It did this by receiving high scores for all of the four key areas ANCAP focuses on, including:
- 82% for Safety Assist features
- 92% for Adult Occupant protection
- 92% for Child Occupant protection
- 83% for Vulnerable Road User protection
According to ANCAP CEO Carla Hoorweg, the Mercedes EQE now forms part of the 60 “battery electric and alternate-powered” vehicles in the market:
“ANCAP’s Safe and Green guide is designed to help consumers easily compare the safety of alternative-powered models – and with over 60 current models holding a five-star ANCAP safety rating, there are plenty of options.”
The high scores come off the back of the safety suite on offer in this luxurious sedan. It incorporates a full suite of airbags at various locations in the car, including:
- Driver knee airbag
- Centre airbag
- Head and chest-protection airbags in both rows of seats
The centre airbag reduces the risk of occupant injury in case a vehicle strikes on the opposite side.
Other strong scores were also seen for protecting vulnerable road users such as pedestrians. The EQE has an advanced collision avoidance capability to offer maximum protection to these users when various types of collisions are detected.
These include car-to-car, car-to-pedestrian, and car-to-cyclist where the vehicle would reduce the impact on other road users.
The maximum points were given to the EQE for its ability to detect standing or walking pedestrians when reversing as well as driving forward.
The EQE starts at $135,000, before on-road costs and has a very sleek drag coefficient of 0.22.
The base EQE variant comes with 215 kW of power meanwhile the top of the range variant delivers up to 460 kW, propelling the luxury sedan to 100 km/h from a standstill in 3.5 seconds.
Luxury electric sedans are setting benchmarks when it comes to safety. Last year, the new Tesla Model S scored the highest overall safety score of any vehicle ever tested by Euro NCAP under the new stricter testing 2022 protocol.
Mecedes EQE ANCAP five-star testing video
Riz is the founder of carloop based in Melbourne, specialising in Australian EV data, insight reports and trends. He is a mechanical engineer who spent the first 7 years of his career building transport infrastructure before starting carloop. He has a passion for cars, particularly EVs and wants to help reduce transport emissions in Australia. He currently drives a red Tesla Model 3.